Lawsuit Up

Essay-a-Week Challenge - Week 9

"July 1st: Ideas I've Outgrown"

No one goes through life without revising some of their opinions. Take some time to reflect on some of the beliefs you’ve had to revise in your lifetime, and the importance those beliefs held for you at the time.

Topics from, A Bookful Blockhead.

Well, I bring my Canada Day post to you on this early October day, out of order and weeks late. I previously stated I had trouble with this topic - partially because I don't have a full record of my beliefs when I was much younger, and I consider most of my ideas today to have evolved gradually over the last couple years, i.e. no sudden changes that would be of much interest to you.

One revelation that I had earlier intended to be the focus of this essay was the gaps in our education system. Partially inspired by a fellow challenge blog's post on education reform, I watched "Waiting for Superman" (and could lend it to anyone who wants to see it), and have thought about the pitfalls and potholes in our system. Aside from the waves of students slipping through the cracks of our schools, the highway overall is in drastic need of repair, to the extent that demolishing even our basic foundations and rebuilding may be the best option. A shorter info-video on education reform by RSA animations can be found here. 

While I'm very interested in the ideas of education reform, my opinions are preliminary, and I will save them for a later time. But the education system falls in a category of "things that seemed wonderful when I was young, but no longer seem so good". I was blessed with decent schools and hardworking teachers, and it was easy to admire (homework aside) the public education system, but I have also come to understand the gripping reality of alarmingly high drop out rates, and the many students who were unable to grasp fundamental concepts in math, science, and English. 

I'll move on to another formal part of our society that used to "seem wonderful", well, as wonderful as patents can seem. Like public education, intellectual property is a government effort to develop a national standard and serve its citizens in their best interests. Inventors and entrepreneurs are rewarded for their aspiring ideas, and maintain a "right" over their creation. This system a) encourages people to innovate, and b) discourages direct mimicking and encourages differentiation for increased competition. More competition and more inventions lead not only to better technology for the public, but lower prices too.

Patents are supposed to be this achievement that inventors strive for - you come up with a great idea, fool around with prototypes, get your patent, and make millions/change the industry. Today's patent system is far from this ideal, filled with patent trolls, abuse, and lawsuits/counter-suits that defeat the purpose of the entire system. Throw in a modern market that emerged after the development of IP laws, say the software industry, and you see how broken and outdated patent law has become.

What is... patent abuse? Or TORONTO??????

Patent trolls are companies that develop or buy patents (often from companies going bankrupt) and never use them, generating revenue by waiting for other businesses to infringe on their patents and then suing. For example, Toronto's very own i4i received a patent in 1993 for incorporating xml into word processors. The relatively generic concept sat rather undisturbed until a few years ago, when i4i sued Microsoft for the use of xml in Microsoft Word and ultimately won a $300 million reward. These companies, and the countless other patent trolls, don't help the industry because they don't provide the services/goods to the consumers - instead, they charge those who are actually trying to innovate, or force them to find potentially more expensive workarounds.

Then you have companies that horde up patents over the years and use this power to crush any opposition. There's perhaps some anti-trust issues, and quickly these businesses become abusive. I'll let this quote from an IBM lawyer speak for itself:

"OK, maybe you don't infringe these seven patents. But we have 10,000 U.S. patents. Do you really want us to go back to Armonk [IBM headquarters in New York] and find seven patents you do infringe? Or do you want to make this easy and just pay us $20 million?" - IBM lawyers to Sun Microsystems, in the latter company's early years. Sun paid it off. 

Microsoft has currently used this technique to force Android hardware makers to pay a licensing fee, even though Microsoft hasn't contributed to this open source, free software. The company's currently making $5-$15 dollars from Samsung and HTC for every Android phone sold (totalling tens of millions per month) and is currently in a lawsuit with Motorola. In fact, Microsoft is making significantly more money by suing companies using Android freeware than by selling its own Windows Phone 7 software.

Lastly, with today's mobile industry, we've departed from a world where competitors aim to build the best products and entered an industry marked with lawsuits.

Image from Design Language News,
featured in this article on The Guardian.

Just a list of some of the ridiculous/frivolous tech lawsuits in the last few years:

• Apple sued Samsung for "a black rectangular device with all four corners equally rounded" and for the "use of a tray that cradles products to make them immediately visible upon opening the box." Lawsuit in progress.
• Samsung sued Apple for the ability to use internet while making a call. 
• Apple sued Amazon for the use of the term "appstore". Apple lost. 
• Samsung is rumoured to be suing Apple to ban the sale of the iPhone 5 in South Korea, before the phone is even released. Probably as revenge with the Galaxy Phones/Tab being blocked in Europe because of Apple lawsuits.
• And perhaps a future frivolous lawsuit: Google has patented its doodle, as a "method of enticing users to a web site."

Yes, I did just turn a "ideas I've outgrown" essay into a full-scale rant on our patent system. But I think this is just one example of how my worldview has changed since I was ten. There are a lot of problems in the world that aren't apparent when you're younger - a teacher who smiles a lot seems like a good-enough indication of a successful school board. But now, cracks in the system have begun to appear, and I expect to see and learn more as I fly through my twenties. It's a bit saddening at times, but a world in need of repair is arguably each generation's greatest motivation to continue striving to make the world a better place. Let's get to work.