

Litepanels may ban all LED lights from the market - mtgx
http://patentfreeled.com/

======
lutusp
The problem with this essay is that, if its claims are true, Litepanels can't
possibly prevail in court, so there's no reason to respond to a grass-roots
funding appeal.

The essay tries to make Litepanels' legal maneuvers sound like a realistic
legal threat to monopolize the LED lighting business. But it then explains
that there's plenty of prior art and no basis for Litepanels' claiming patent
rights over the manufacture and sale of LED products.

Only one of the above claims can be true.

Also there are some very big players in the LED field, with potentially
billions of dollars at stake. This isn't exactly the scenario in which a
grass-roots action committee is either the appropriate response, or likely to
make any difference.

Also, the essay needs some fact checking:

> Furthermore patents are legally only given to those that create something
> new that someone skilled in the art would not think of.

Although once true, at present this is false -- very, highly, extremely false.
In fact, things have gotten to the point where (at least in the US) patents
are issued with little or no prior-art checking, on the assumption that the
patent is nothing more than a license to sue, with the expectation that the
courts will sort out the issues.

And worse (or better, depending on your tastes), just over the horizon is an
explicit Patent Office rule change that will grant a patent to the first
filer, regardless of whether or not that person has any connection to the
creation of the idea being patented:

"USPTO Publishes Proposed Rules Governing First-Inventor-to-File":

<http://www.uspto.gov/news/pr/2012/12-44.jsp>

Finally, the headline is flat wrong: "Litepanels may ban all LED lights from
the market"

The headline (which isn't from the linked article, but from the poster) wrong
in these ways:

* Litepanels can't do any such thing -- that power rests with the courts.

* Litepanels seems to be claiming a proprietary interest in LEDs used on photography, not (as one example) TV sets.

* Finally, Litepanels doesn't want to ban LED sales -- they want to hold the business hostage.

I can't repeat this often enough: when you submit an article, _do not write
your own headline_ , because you will get it wrong. Copy the original
headline.

~~~
cube13
>And worse (or better, depending on your tastes), just over the horizon is an
explicit Patent Office rule change that will grant a patent to the first
filer, regardless of whether or not that person has any connection to the
creation of the idea being patented:

This is false.

The burden of proof has not changed. The only thing that has changed is
determining who would be awarded a patent if two almost identical patents are
filed around the same time.

In the previous system, the patent would be awarded to the party that could
prove that they started working on the invention first, assuming that it
passes the prior art check. You still have to prove that you actually created
the invention in the first place.

In the new system, the patent is awarded to the party that files first, also
assuming that it passes the prior art test. Again, you still have to prove
that you created the invention. The rules changes here actually increases the
prior art field, counting any published patents, and also including
internationally filed patents.

The fact that the USPTO has had a bad track record with prior art checks has
no bearing on this rule change. It's a separate issue.

~~~
lutusp
>> And worse (or better, depending on your tastes), just over the horizon is
an explicit Patent Office rule change that will grant a patent to the first
filer, regardless of whether or not that person has any connection to the
creation of the idea being patented:

> This is false.

Yes, it is false, and it's too late for me to reword my original post. I
should have emphasized that first-to-file applies to two or more people, all
of whom are working on inventions so close together as to be
indistinguishable.

A claimant might try to assert priority but not be actually involved in the
work, or someone might purchase the right to pursue a claim but not be
directly involved, but these are perversions of the intent of the change.

------
sparky
> Litepanels may ban all LED lights from the market

.. all LED lights used for film/video/photography, not for home lighting,
electronics, etc. etc. Still bad, but title should be changed.

More on topic: No need to weaken the argument by listing all the components of
the "invention" that Litepanels didn't come up with themselves. We all stand
on the shoulders of giants; the important question is whether your particular
combination/improvement of existing things is novel and non-obvious. This
clearly violates the non-obvious clause.

This Initial Determination lists the patents and claims in question:
[http://www.itcblog.com/wp-
content/uploads/2012/09/idnoticein...](http://www.itcblog.com/wp-
content/uploads/2012/09/idnoticein804.pdf)

Here's one of the patents in question:
<http://www.google.com/patents/US7972022>

Devices infringing on claims 1 and 57-60 are essentially "LED lights, on a
stand, hooked up to a camera, with a couple dials for color temperature and
brightness." Yikes.

------
jack-r-abbit
> _We only have until Friday, October 13, 2012 to stop Litepanels_

Not to nitpick... but that date does not exist. I don't really want to throw
out all their facts just because they got this simple one wrong. But it
certainly puts their accuracy on other more important things in question.

------
gm
This is HORRIBLE execution, I had to click three different links to help out
in the campaign. Three different pages I had to wade through only to get to a
hard to read form letter I am supposed to cut/paste somewhere and I guess mail
to someone? After looking at the page that has the form letter, it just says
to send it to the ITC, but does not even provide an address? It's just bad
execution.

This page is probably generating less than 1% of the action it could generate
if it was designed right. It kept babbling too much.

There is a link on the right to "sign now". That should be front and center in
the main article text. it should be bigger and impossible to mix. It should be
after the first or second paragraph.

------
rprasad
This is a scam. The LED industry includes hundreds of players and thousands of
products driving billions of dollars in annual revenues. If this patent was
truly a problem, everyone in the LED industry would be all over this, as this
would absolutely devastate the industry. There would be no need for a
grassroots campaign.

Moreover, this website contains numerous factual inconsistencies and
falsities, numerous grammatical and spelling mistakes, and looks like it was
slapped together by a Nigerian scammer in about 5 minutes.

The only logical explanation for this "campaign" is that someone is taking
advantage of the situation to scam money out of people.

~~~
jack-r-abbit
> _The only logical explanation for this "campaign" is that someone is taking
> advantage of the situation to scam money out of people._

Are they asking for money anywhere? I didn't scour the whole site but the
call-to-actions seem to just involve signing the petition or contacting some
people. Another logical explanation would be to collect a bunch of name/email
pairs from the petition form. But even that seems dumb since it is usually
cheaper to just buy these lists than to build a site and drive traffic to it
to make a list. Unless they are intending to sell the list. But really... who
knows why people do most of the stuff they do on the internet. :)

