RPG Patents?

[herrozerro]

So I just found this thread on reddit and thought it was interesting:

http://www.reddit.com/r/rpg/comments/28dvw1/rpg_patents/

Apparently a game company is trying to patent the process of converting characters from one genre to another. I wonder what this means for savage worlds or other genreless games if this goes through.

Edit: Whether or not the situation improves, it's sad that the big publicity that this game seems to be getting is a backlash against this patent.

 

[Crothian]

I was not impressed with the game. I don't know anything about patents so I won't comment on that but the game did not interest me enough to purchase it.

 

[Umbran]

The patent application should probably fail, due to prior art, as people in the public have been porting characters back and forth for decades. They'd need some honestly and truly novel approach to conversion for it to deserve a patent.

 

[herrozerro]

it appears that they have cleaned up their facebook page (read deleted all the bad press).

 

[gamerprinter]

The patent application should probably fail, due to prior art, as people in the public have been porting characters back and forth for decades. They'd need some honestly and truly novel approach to conversion for it to deserve a patent.

Not that I'm disagreeing with you, but I know someone who wanted to build a "Find a Vendor" website where you input your zip code and get a list of results based on specified distances from your zip code to a given vendor, and he applied for a patent using that mechanism in 2008 - even though many online services use zip codes to find sources within a given distance from that zip code and had been using it for years and years (long before 2008). He got is patent approved. The worst part is that he didn't even finish building the site that this patented mechanism was supposed to be used. Instead, he and his lawyers are searching for commercial websites that use zip code searches and suing them - he has sued over 20 companies so far. (This isn't a friend of mine, rather a friend of mine's dad).

So just because a given mechanism or process has not been previously patented and actually in use by many companies for many years, does not mean the patent office won't grant the patent to someone asking and paying for it - they very well might.

 

[Umbran]

So just because a given mechanism or process has not been previously patented and actually in use by many companies for many years, does not mean the patent office won't grant the patent to someone asking and paying for it - they very well might.

Yes. See how I said *should* fail, rather than *would* fail?

The patent office, unfortunately, is insufficiently staffed, with people who have inadequate expertise implementing processes that aren't up-to-date, so that many things that get a patent really shouldn't.

Thankfully, if such a thing gets to court, the patent can be challenged, and examined in more detail than the US PTO can manage these days. So long as the patent stays in the hand of a small business, it isn't so much a risk, as small businesses can't usually afford to launch into a patent-infringement suit it may well lose. In the hands of a big company who cares about enforcement, it gets uglier.

 

[gamerprinter]

From my understanding, the guy I'm speaking of was told by his lawyers that they'd need to sue a hundred or more small business sites using the mechanism first, before attempting to sue a big company such as Amazon for this. Having a body of 100+ successful law suits make it more likely to succeed in a suit versus a large company. I'm sure eventually he will be doing exactly that. As said, he's only successfully sued 20 or so companies, so he's got a few years before he attempts to sue any of the large companies that use what he patented.

 

[Agamon]

Edit: Whether or not the situation improves, it's sad that the big publicity that this game seems to be getting is a backlash against this patent.

If a save a runaway baby carriage before bombing an orphanage, the latter should certainly take priority.

 

[Umbran]

As said, he's only successfully sued 20 or so companies, so he's got a few years before he attempts to sue any of the large companies that use what he patented.

How has he successfully sued any companies, when his patent has not yet been granted? My understand is that a pending patent may block other patent applications, but I am not convinced you can sue someone for infringing a patent that has not yet been granted to you.

 

[gamerprinter]

How has he successfully sued any companies, when his patent has not yet been granted? My understand is that a pending patent may block other patent applications, but I am not convinced you can sue someone for infringing a patent that has not yet been granted to you.

In my first post in this thread, I said the person I'm speaking of did get his patent granted by the US Patent Office.

Below is my first post with emphasis mine.

Not that I'm disagreeing with you, but I know someone who wanted to build a "Find a Vendor" website where you input your zip code and get a list of results based on specified distances from your zip code to a given vendor, and he applied for a patent using that mechanism in 2008 - even though many online services use zip codes to find sources within a given distance from that zip code and had been using it for years and years (long before 2008). He got is patent approved. The worst part is that he didn't even finish building the site that this patented mechanism was supposed to be used. Instead, he and his lawyers are searching for commercial websites that use zip code searches and suing them - he has sued over 20 companies so far. (This isn't a friend of mine, rather a friend of mine's dad).