Fighting a Stupid Patent on Voting your Favorite contest

[reflectionsbyruth]

Been really busy, especially since Sept, wanted to finally share this with PBase members.

There seemed no other forum category that this subject fit, so Artistic was the closest.

It started out a fight for my own life, the more it went on I realized it needed to be a fight for all artist type websites or any website that runs voting competitions on the internet.
Plenty of articles all over the internet since February when we made it public.

https://www.eff.org/press/releases/photo-hobbyist-attacked-patent-bully

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2015/02/20/why-one-photographer-decided-to-fight-a-patent-on-online-contests/

http://consumerist.com/2015/02/17/hobbyist-photo-sharing-site-defends-itself-against-company-with-a-patent-on-online-voting/#more-10196102

http://petapixel.com/2015/02/21/photo-websites-being-sued-over-a-patent-for-online-photo-contests/

http://www.courthousenews.com/2015/02/19/photo-contest-host-fires-back-at-patent-bully.htm

Too many more to list, but those are some of the major ones

[reflectionsbyruth]

Bytephoto Prevailed!!!!!!!!!!

https://www.eff.org/press/releases/vict ... tent-bully

[dw_thomas]

Excellent! I guess the misuse and abuse of the patent system shouldn't be a surprise, since the whole country appears pretty much in the hands of the oligarchs these days, but some of these shenanigans are outrageous. I seem to recall at some point in time, patents were not supposed to be issued for somebody's purportedly clever trick that would be "obvious to someone skilled in the art," ergo, it was supposed to be for truly new and unexpectedly clever inventions. I suspect one problem is that with increasingly complex technology, many applications are a bit beyond the ken of the average patent examiner.

There have been software patents issued that leave me scratching my head. And in two cases, companies that I worked for were issued patents on something I came up with to solve a problem that I think anyone in my shoes would have been likely to do. Apparently their fear was that a competitor would reverse engineer one of our products and patent it themselves, causing us problems. "We live in interesting times!"

Anyway, congratulations and huzzah for the EFF.

DaveT

[reflectionsbyruth]

Hi Dave, you are correct, why was a patent for voting even approved in the first place as were so many other "obvious" software patents.

btw, I checked your website and noticed you live in the area of Perkiomen Valley not far from Central/Upper Bucks

[dw_thomas]

Hi Dave, you are correct, why was a patent for voting even approved in the first place as were so many other "obvious" software patents.

btw, I checked your website and noticed you live in the area of Perkiomen Valley not far from Central/Upper Bucks

Indeed, we chatted a bit at an outdoor show in New Hope a few years ago. (I say "a few" -- the way life has been going lately it might have been 7 or 8!!!)

Keep up the good work,
DaveT

[reflectionsbyruth]

haha, I wondered if we had chatted before. This year is the 3rd year I think in the New Hope highschool parking lot. Previous was down by the train station, then before was on the streets and I was in the parking lot by the Delaware River
My first big time art festival was the New Hope Arts festival in Sept 2007

[dw_thomas]

Yes, I saw you in a parking lot near the river on a rather dreary rainy day as I remember it. I think I had seen some posts on APUG and recognized the name. Small world!

[reflectionsbyruth]

that would have been 2008 or 2009, both years it rained both days

2009 there was a low rainbow over the river Sunday Sept 27th
I always have my camera with me at shows and since my booth was close enough to the river, I spotted this lol.