Patents are not suitable for the information age

The word patent is no stranger to us. It has been more than 100 years since the first patent law was promulgated in 1883. However, with the progress of society, all aspects of the patent system have been questioned and challenged. Nanjing Huaxun believes that the patent system has been unable to keep up with the development of the information age. Why do you say that?

Before answering this question, we have to review how the patent system came into being.

In the farming era, industry and commerce were not developed, and most of the products from raw materials to production to sales were confined to a relatively small area, so the need to protect inventions was not urgent. There are individual goods that can be exported to the world, such as our porcelain and silk, which can also be effectively protected by controlling raw materials and confidential production processes. At this stage, people actually do not need the patent system. In the industrial age, especially with the promotion of the globalization of industry and commerce, the raw materials, production and sales of products are no longer restricted by regions, coupled with the gradual improvement of the level of industrialization, a product is easy to be copied. At this time, the need to use the law to protect the rights and interests of inventors arises. Therefore, the patent system is a product of the industrial age.

Let's look at another question: what exactly is a patent protecting? Is it an invention, a technology, an idea or an idea? In fact, these statements are not accurate. What a patent actually protects is a process and a result produced by this process. For example, Newton's three laws of mechanics cannot be patented, but using these principles to invent the way they work, or the steam engine, can be patented. For example, in the computer field, Viterbi invented the world-renowned Viterbi algorithm, but this algorithm itself can not be patented, everyone can use. But he wanted to make money with this algorithm, so he founded a company called Qualcomm, which used this algorithm to make semiconductor chips. This chip is a specific product, and this product runs the Viterbi algorithm. In this way, the chip meets the conditions of patent protection. Therefore, patents can only protect the implementation method of the idea, not the idea itself.

Why does the patent system have such characteristics? Because the patent system came into being in the industrial age, and in the industrial age, any idea to become a profitable product must go through some kind of process, and to protect this process is to protect the invention. For example, the famous alkali making method "ammonia alkali method" in history, as long as the manufacturing process is well protected, others cannot bypass this process to make alkali. In those days, it could be said that one trick was fresh, eaten all over the sky, and one invention could comfortably make a lot of money before the patent expired.

But now that it's the information age, the patent system sometimes doesn't seem to work very well.

First of all, it is not so easy to use patents to protect inventions, because there are usually many ways to achieve a goal. In order for patents to truly protect inventions, all possible paths to their goals must be blocked. Although it is difficult, there are also successful companies, such as the Viterbi we mentioned above, who almost monopolized the profits of the entire 3G era by applying for patents on CDMA technology and 3G communication standards.

In fact, CDMA itself is not Qualcomm's invention, and it has long been used in the field of communications. But Qualcomm invented a complete set of solutions for using CDMA in mobile communications. Because this solution is a process, it meets the standards for patent applications. Of course, others can also propose other solutions, but if so, Qualcomm will find it difficult to make money. Therefore, Viterbi applied for a patent for all easy-to-implement solutions, so that later people must go a long way if they want to use CDMA technology for mobile communication. China's TD-CDMA is actually a very detour method, so that the world has begun to popularize 4G, China's TD-CDMA can not be popularized. But then again, in the information age, to want to really rely on patents to guarantee exclusive profits like Qualcomm, after all, you need to apply for and obtain a large number of patents. As long as there are other ways to achieve the goal, there will be new competitors. It is too difficult to block all the roads. It is not possible for ordinary start-up companies to do it. It is particularly difficult to set the patent threshold.

Secondly, the protection of the patent system has been much less than before. Most of today's inventions are on the shoulders of their predecessors, and many are improvements to existing products, making it difficult to use only one's own patents without touching the patents of others. Such a complicated relationship is not conducive to the innovation of new products. The general solution is to reach a patent sharing agreement between the two companies. So, although the old companies with a large number of patents are still in a relatively favorable position, it is clear that the protection of inventions by the patent system is actually not as strong as before. Today's new generation of technology companies, their purpose of applying for patents is no longer to drive away competitors and form a monopoly, but to become a defensive strategy, that is, to prevent others from using patents to sue him.

In fact, the patent system also faces another challenge, that is, the patent of service invention. The beneficiary should be the inventor, or the unit or organization. If in the industrial age, this is not a problem at all, because individuals are highly dependent on the organization, and the beneficiaries of the patent of the service invention certainly belong to the unit. But in modern times, this is a problem, because the relationship between the individual and the organization is not as close as it used to be. In fact, the contradiction arises as to whether the invention and patent of the electronic computer belong to the individual or the organization. The two inventors of the electronic computer believe that the main beneficiaries of this invention should be them, and the University of Pennsylvania, where they work, believes that this invention should belong to the school. Later, the two inventors' companies failed to do a good job, and the computer department of the University of Pennsylvania is still a second-rate major in the United States to this day.

Having said so much, it is not difficult to find that the patent system, a product of the industrial age, has become more and more difficult to protect inventions and creations in the information age after more than 100 years of development, and the intensity of protection will become smaller and smaller. Moreover, the patent system has also led to disputes between individuals and organizations. So, the patent system is really a little behind the times.