

IBM Wins Most U.S. Patents for 21st Year in a Row - kungfudoi
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-01-14/ibm-wins-most-u-s-patents-for-21st-year-in-a-row.html

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ryanobjc
If there was any doubt that the patent system was literally a game, this
headline is it: "IBM _Wins Most US Patents..."

So did they earn them? File for them? Play some kind of hunger-games-alike
game to win them?

it's a funny turn of language. It really does imply that IBM somehow didn't
research them like they're supposed to...

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mildtrepidation
I agree that it reflects some of the absurdity of the patent system, but only
incidentally... language is flexible, and how people use it to describe
something doesn't inform the nature of that thing.

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rbanffy
IBM does a lot of stuff that's really patent-worthy - materials, processes,
semiconductor techniques etc. It's not like they patented the most FAT
filesystems, double-tap-to-open or one-click-purchases for the 21st year in a
row.

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johnward
I'm an IBMer but I'm also personally disgusted with stupid patents. IBM does
invent a lot of things. They also purchase companies that invent a lot of
things. Though I have seen a few examples on HN where they were granted a
patent for something that was already somewhat common (can't find the
reference, sorry). Basically they aren't your typical patent trolls even
though their business models relies on owning patents.

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rbanffy
I'm quite sure that even if you removed the stupid/obvious patents from the
total, there is a good chance IBM would still be leading the pack.

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AndrewKemendo
_With inventors from 41 countries, more than 31 percent of the patents came
from overseas._

This is a bit confusing to me. Is IBM acquiring patents through
buyouts/purchases or are these inventors IBM employees? Seems like the former
would be more likely.

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rgbrenner
only 1/3rd of IBM's employees are in the US... they have more employees in
India than in the US

[http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9169678/IBM_stops_dis...](http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9169678/IBM_stops_disclosing_U.S._headcount_data)

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_India](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_India)

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knownhuman
Funny, I wasn't aware that intellectual property was a quantity competition.

