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TechDirt on patent reform on Dec. 15

By Lawrence B. Ebert, Esq.

In covering an FTC hearing on patent reform, TechDirt wrote:

And then, of course, there's a big lobbying fight, and the pharmaceutical companies (who don't want any sort of patent reform whatsoever) win -- and the bill gets killed. It's an annual tradition. However, plenty of people still realize that patent reform is necessary, and now they're debating just how it's going to happen.

Apparently, the opposition to patent reform by small companies (like AmberWave), small inventors, universities, and labor unions goes unnoticed in the IT-centric world of TechDirt.

Also
http://ipbiz.blogspot.com/2008/12/david-gregory-on-meet-press-on-14-dec.html

**UPDATE. Concerning the posted comments below.

Mike, at TechDirt, made comments below, but provided no citations to back up his statements.

Of small inventors and patent reform, here is what Mike actually said -->

There are some news reports coming out about "small inventors" and "startups" coming out against patent reform, but when you read between the lines, that's not what's happening at all.

Mike just spouts the IT party line about patents being bad. But then one looks at the number of patents Microsoft, and other IT folks, are getting and one sees that the statement companies who recognize they don't need patents to innovate is just duplicitous double-talk. Judge the IT folks by what they do, not by what they say.

In that post by Mike at TechDirt, there was a comment by one "mr. vilms" about university efforts, to which Mike at TechDirt made no response:

Universities, independent research laboratories, start-up companies, and venture capital companies make up the innovation industry. Its products are patents and combinations of small organizations and patents. The products are sold to large companies as patent portfolios and as acquisitions, to improve their existing competitive position and to branch into related emerging fields.

A post at it.toolbox titled 2009 Show Down: Democrat Software Patent Reform versus the Republican Biotech Patent Reform placed the battle as IT vs. pharma, but strangely acted as if the Republicans controlled the Senate during the demise of S.1145. [text: It needed to also pass a Senate vote so S. 1145: Patent Reform Act of 2007 was drafted and it quickly passed through the Senate sub committee process and was recommended for a Senate vote. That?s where the Republicans struck back, as the majority party in the Senate they set the agenda and they put this Act into limbo. ] Duh, what is Vincent McBurney thinking? Also, anybody who views this as a party-line matter is gravely mistaken. Here, in New Jersey, Democrat-scientist Rush Holt voted AGAINST HR 1908 and conservative Republican Chris Smith voted FOR HR 1908. Patent reform 2007 was about apportionment of damages, period. Ask the Coalition for Patent Reform, who pulled the plug when their position on damages could not get through the Senate. Arlen Specter may have triggered the demise, but one suspects Patrick Leahy knew he didn't have the votes.

Full post as published by IPBiz on December 15, 2008 (boomark / email).