Do Patents Stop Companies From Creating 'Perfect' Products?

Chris M writes "In a recent CNET article, the mobile phone editor writes about what he thinks would make a perfect phone. Unfortunately, as someone in the comments section points out, much of the technology that is used in this concept phone belongs to separate companies. 'I'm sorry to be the Devil's Advocate here, but most of those feautres are patented to separate companies. It would require almost all the major manufacturers [working together] to do this, which is highly unlikely.' Do you think patents are stopping companies from creating 'perfect' devices, or are there other factors at work?"

Not Really

[MontyApollo]

I did not RTFA (glanced at first page), but first off, I doubt there is a perfect phone that is perfect for everybody. Every product has tradeoffs, and certain product directions appeal to some people but not others, especially when they affect price. Sometimes it is just plane personal preference.

I think in certain respects patents spur competition and make every phone better. Each company tries to come up with something that their competitor hasn't thought of to help differentiate their product. They would be less likely to invest the time and effort to develop innovations if they knew their competitor would just immediately copy it. The really perfect phone would not be possible to begin with without all these previous innovations. One could argue that patents made the author's ideal phone possible, but it is more a business issue whether it ever comes to market.

During WWII, the British and Germans both independently and secretly discovered chaff as a radar countermeasure. Neither side used it in the beginning because they were more afraid of the enemy copying them and gaining a bigger advantage than they themselves would receive.

(I do think software patents need to be drastically reformed or completely done away with altogether)

Sometimes

[SatanicPuppy]

Patents are a big problem, when someone patents the equvalent of a hammer, and you're stuck without a really basic tool.

Other times, someone patents "the way it's done" and the result is, when you try and find another way to do it, you actually find a better way.

The problem is, you never know which one you're going to get when you're just starting. I definitely thing innovation can overcome most patents, but a lot of time that's a real pain in the ass, when all you want to build is a slightly better breadbox.

The Perfect Phone in 20 years

[radarjd]

At worst, in twenty years we'll get the perfect phone. I suppose I can wait that long for perfection...

Perfect Devices are Bad for Business

[Anonymous Coward]

Perfect Devices are bad for business because it leaves no room for failure, improvements, and other features which companies rely on. If your computer was always easily upgraded, and you never needed that new Video Card, what good would it be for the companies?

pfft...

[djupedal]

"Do you think patents are stopping companies from creating 'perfect' devices, or are there other factors at work?"

No -- Yes.

I say that because the patent system, good, bad or otherwise, has been around long enough that if there was genuine smothering of genius going on, it would have been a major topic long since, and because everyone has a different interpretation of 'perfect' devices. (left handed versus right - textured vs. smoothed...)

For those that need a concept to wrap their heads around, read the book 'The Difference Engine' ...twice, if you have to.

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:pfft...

[Alchemar]

It has been a major topic long since. At least since the creation of an affordable autombile.

http://inventors.about.com/library/weekly/aacarsse ldona.htm [about.com]

Re:The Perfect Phone in 20 years

[Kadin2048]

In 20 years you can get "The Perfect Phone of 2007."

In 20 years, there will be a host of new technologies around, all encumbered with patents, that people will want to have in a 'perfect phone.' The stuff that's under patent now will be like pulse-dial rotary POTS equipment. If you're lucky it's still use-able, in the most basic sense, but it doesn't do much of what people want.

The problem is that innovation is now moving so much faster than it was when the patent term was set at two decades -- by the time something works its way out of patent protection now, it's generally pretty obsolete. And this will only get worse as the pace of innovation continues to quicken.

Re:Sometimes

[Anonymous Coward]

Patents are government-issued monopolies. Monopolies are incompatible with a free market.

Aren't monopolies a result of a truly free market where there's no government intervention to prevent unfair competition practices?

Not that I disagree with your overall message, it's just that I'd rather point to the silly conflict of interest in government both simultaneously establishing monopolies (patents) and having them be illegal (Standard Oil, so on and so on).

Perfect phone was done decades ago.

[fishbowl]

I miss the perfect phone, the base Bell System model. Something fundamental has been lost: The experience of hanging up. You could hang up a Bell System phone as violently or as delicately as you liked. It was indestructible. There were few things more satisfying that slamming the phone down on the hook, pounding the receiver against your desk or hurling it at the wall.

Re:Incorrect

[BalanceOfJudgement]

All of that sounds great for lawyers, corporations, and patent holders, but it sounds horrible for consumers. I thought the purpose of patents was to foster innovation for the benefit of the society - if so many great inventions get trapped inside patent hell, exactly how does that benefit anyone?

Sounds more to me like a bunch of individual monopolies each trying to force their competitors either out of business or to their knees, resulting in a slew of competing products that do nothing but frustrate consumers due to their lack of interoperability.

How many picture card formats do we have now? 15 major ones? Is that REALLY necessary? There's something to be said for innovation and competition, sure, but there's a reason we invent standards.

Re:What would be cool

[EvanED]

Then you could drag and drop the desired features onto the phone that is plugged into your computer via USB.

That would be the perfect phone.

Can you drag and drop different form factors, so that Bob can have a big, rich iPhone-like interface with a camera and touchscreen and whatnot, while Mary can have one of those really tiny flip phones that's not much bigger than your thumb and has physical buttons?

There's still a LOT of difference between what I consider a perfect phone and what you consider a perfect phone that is more than software. Heck, I'd go so far as to say that the hardware that's present and the form factor is a much bigger issue. Theoretically you could have a pluggable interface where you could buy just the hardware you need and such, but such a solution would probably give a product that works worse than just going out and getting something from the market today.

Re:Sometimes

[Husgaard]

You have a good point there.

My point is that when the government issues monopolies in the market (as patents are), the government is actually working against the free market.

Of course it isn't quite as simple as I state it here. There are some arguments for patents that look good on the surface.

One of these arguments often seen in the mainstream media is the idea of the lone inventor who gets a patent to protect his investment in the research and development he has done, so he will not be ripped off by large corporations. But in reality the lone inventor is usually ripped off anyway. The reason for this is the cost of a patent infringement case. Only rarely such a case costs less than a few million US$. How many lone inventors have a war-chest of a few million US$ to take a patent infringement case to court?

Re:Perfect Devices are Bad for Business

[deblau]

Perfect Devices are bad for business because it leaves no room for failure, improvements, and other features which companies rely on. If your computer was always easily upgraded, and you never needed that new Video Card, what good would it be for the companies?

It would force them to innovate in wholly new areas of technology. Which is a primary purpose of the patent system.

Drug industry does it all the time

[r_jensen11]

I believe Chris Rock said it best:

Why the hell would drug companies want to find a cure for AIDS? There's no money for a cure. The real money's in the treatment!

The obvious conclusion

[rabiddeity]

The obvious conclusion is to not allow patenting of anything necessary to follow an industry standard. Tell someone applying for a patent that they can either patent it, or make it an industry standard, but not both. If it becomes an ITU, ISO, IEEE or other professional body standard, all patents necessary to implement that standard become invalid. Coincidentally, this would nix most software patents as well.

Software Patents

[Anonymous Coward]

The problem with software patents is that most of them are awarded to fundamental building blocks or concepts, not to finished products, as they should be.
To illustrate this, consider art or literature.
Imagine where would fantacy authors be if somebody had patented Dwarves as a character type. This is much like patenting "One-Click" A patent on something so fundamental and obvious.
Where would horror novels be if there was a patent on dark stormy nights?
Where would art be if there was a patent on still-life or portraits' "look and feel"?
Or the "look and feel" of a whodunnit novel?

Consider what would happen to art if some artist patented a particular shade of blue.
It was his creation, so why should he not patent it? Others would need his permission to use it.
Major problem. What if somebody else, stumbled accross the same shade independantly?
Likewise, patenting an algorithm should not be permitted. It is quite plausable that others could come up with the same solution to a problem, completely independantly.
It is a building block, like a particular colour is to a painting.
Likewise, no author can patent a phrase. Any other author can use the same phrase. It is only the finished product that is copywritable.

In the same way, a finished software product, like a novel or a great masterpiece of art, is copywritable.
Note, this is different from a patent.
If somebody created the exact same thing, and tries to pass it off as the same thing, that's forgery, and copywrite infringement.
However, if any Joe copies a great Picasso, and signs it Joe, and makes it clear it is not a Picasso, it's not forgery or an infringement of copywrite.
We have many authors writing books about similar concepts, and many artists doing still-lifes and portraits.
In the same way we have many authors and artists using the same phrases in their books, and shades of colours in their paintings. None of these are seen as patent infringement.

Why should the shades and phrases of a software product be patentable?
Why also is a broad software concept patentable?
Copywrite the finished product, and dump the algorithm and "look and feel" patents and the world will be a better place for it.

But then again, show me a large corporation, lawyer or accountant that wants to make the world a better place.