
Google Acquires Over 1,000 IBM Patents - rmrm
http://www.seobythesea.com/2011/07/google-acquires-ibm-patents-in-july/
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TheEskimo
At this point software patents are broken beyond repair. The express purpose
of patents is to encourage innovation. They're being used only to dampen
innovation now. Why is that? The main reason is that patents, when created,
are absurdly broad and often obvious and still accepted. Well over 90% of the
existing software patents should have been denied as they're obvious ideas.
There's a patent on backing up data online for heaven's sake. It's now to the
point that anything you do on a computer will violate a patent somewhere.

What's even worse than stupid patents is the money being paid for them. A
collection of patents, most of which are useless, being bought for billions of
dollars is stupid. That money could have gone into R&D, employee salary, etc
any of which would have been better. And the worst part? The reason you should
be able to buy a patent is so that you can produce new technology and software
with the unique idea contained in it. Unfortunately, the patents don't see the
light of day as software because they're bought; nothing in those patents is
new to google. They're simple a defense against other patents.

In the US the patent system is one of the most stupid and broken systems still
functioning. Either patents need to be done in with altogether for software or
the acceptance of them needs to only happen after significantly stricter
review.

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bad_user
No, what's even worse is that when a company pays billions of dollars for
patents, they have to use them otherwise the investment is worthless.

Google may have a no-evil policy on patents for the time being, but the future
will be quite different. Microsoft also used to acquire patents for defensive
purposes only. Look at them now.

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SkyMarshal
Not necessarily. It's impossible to measure things like lawsuits that didn't
happen as a result of buying a patent portfolio, but that doesn't mean the
investment is worthless.

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51Cards
Good for them. As much as I hate the software patent system, until it is fixed
or eliminated it is a necessary evil for a large tech corporation. Tech
patents are the nuclear arsenal of big tech business. I have my stockpile, you
have your stockpile, and if we're relatively balanced we'll all just sit here
because it's too dangerous to start throwing heat around. Google just picked
up a nice set of silos for their defense.

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chocopuff
oh so it's good if Google's buying the patents?

the hypocrisy.

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Hostile
To my knowledge Google has never used a patent offensively.

I assume that your comment is referencing things like the recent nortel
patents with Apple and Microsoft.

Well, you can't even remotely say that those companies haven't used patents
offensively.

I really don't think it's hypocrisy until Google starts behaving like Apple
and Microsoft when it comes to patents.

Do you really not believe there to be a difference?

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rwmj
If they go through a rough patch and get acquired or there is a change of
management, it could happen. Patent reform is what we need, NOT anti-
competitive patent stockpiling.

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sek
The Google Trio holds over 50% of the voting stocks.

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mrich
This is huge for them, and also explains why they chose to stop bidding on the
Nortel patents. This gives them big leverage against Oracle, who probably
violate quite some patents with their hardware and also database business now,
so cross licensing becomes possible. Same for Apple. IBM is happy to give some
weapons to the Google "underdog" so that the "small" companies are busy
fighting amongst themselves, while they themselves can't lose much.

As others have noted, the patent system still sucks. But it is nice to see
someone score a point who doesn't abuse it for maximum monetary gain and
market share protection (hello Oracle, Apple).

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namank
Not much they could have done after that Nortel incident.

I do appreciate their sentiment:

 _“We buy companies all the time — for both people and interesting
technologies. This would have been north of $4 billion for none of those
things. We were bidding on the right to stop people from innovating"_

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andrewljohnson
Anything in there acquired to defend themselves against Oracle?

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dredmorbius
You fail to understand.

Patents are a mass weapon.

You pursue an infringement claim against some small random sampling of patents
in your portfolio.

Challengee has the option of 1) paying your fee or 2) challenging the patents.

Your average patent case cost is $3-$10 million.
[http://www.inventionstatistics.com/Patent_Litigation_Costs.h...](http://www.inventionstatistics.com/Patent_Litigation_Costs.html)

Supposing you can invalidate the patents, challenger returns with another
random sampling of patents....

Eventually you 1) go broke or 2) pay up.

If the companies are evenly matched (or at least sufficiently that they could
drain one another bloodless), they enter into a cross-licensing agreement.

I don't see any mention of what Google paid for the 1000 patents, but this
suggests a very friendly relationship between Mountain View and Armonk.

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beej71
_sigh_ Inevitable, of course, but I've always secretly hoped that Google would
try to take the more risky high road and work to invalidate the whole software
patent system, or at least hugely correct it (e.g. 2-year patent lifespan, or
something).

Maybe they still will, but their impetus to do so is diminished with every
patent they acquire.

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fpgeek
Am I correctly remembering that (prior to this) Google had something like 900
patents?

If so, this more than doubling their patent portfolio, which sounds
significant (though naturally patent quality from both technical and legal
perspectives plays a much bigger role than the raw number of patents
regardless).

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smackfu
For reference, IBM was awarded almost 6000 patents. In 2010.

<http://www-03.ibm.com/press/us/en/pressrelease/33341.wss>

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shmageggy
_"that has me wondering if Google has an interest in pursuing some new
interests and innovations."_

The author should have presented some more compelling examples, then. The
patents listed are incredibly far from new innovations, but rather just the
same overly-broad and generic defensive fare.

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thorwawy99
everyone knows patent reform will -likely- not happen/is not easy.

sooo here's a _naive_ idea... why doesn't google take these patents, and offer
them up for FREE to ANYONE as long as they are used IN DEFENSE of a patent
attack? ...with the hope of others contributing patents to this pool for the
same purpose? i would donate/license the patents i have to this pool... over
time there could be enough patents in the pool to deter against almost any
aggressor, effectively rendering the patent system useless and "reformed".

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known
Is this acquisition related to Oracle's Java suit against Google?

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dredmorbius
The answer to that question would almost certainly be "yes".

Or: duh.

