Week 2 - Post 2: Patent War Perspective

        I have read several of the posts by the students of the Dr. Lavian's class, and I noticed that many people expressed a negative opinion regarding the patents that had been filed and /or purchased by Google, Apple, Samsung, Microsoft, etc.  Many people commented that a majority of the patents that were filed were "excessive", such as the patent on the rounded edges of a smartphone.  I completely agree with many of the students about patents such as these, however because nobody seems to be arguing for the opposing view - that the smartphone patent wars are not excessive and that they are instead actually good for the economy- I have decided to play devil's advocate.

        In a New York Times article published November of 2012, David J. Kappos, director of the United States Patent and Trademark Office, argued that the smartphone patent wars were not excessive and that, "'the fact is, the explosion of innovation — and follow-on litigation — that we see across consumer electronics hardware and software is a direct reflection of how our patent system wires us for innovation.'”  Kappos argues that the patent wars are simply a naturally occurring byproduct of the competitive society that we live in - an idea which does have a lot of merit.  Kappos also argued that after examining, "'some of the highest-profile litigation among major firms in the smartphone industry... the courts ruled that more than 80 percent of the patents were valid.'"  Kappos thus implies that most of the patents that were filed, ridiculous or not, were deemed valid by the courts, and thus that these patents were inherently valid to begin with.  I'm curious to see what everyone else thinks about Kappos' view.

Here is the link to the article:

http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/11/20/smartphone-patent-wars-show-the-system-works-patent-chief-says/?ref=patentandtrademarkoffice