Those who subscribe to the "startup CEOs shouldn't debate with or mentor others" mantra will miss out on working with some of the greatest CEOs in the world.
Josh, you're right - that's why it isn't possible right now.
I put that we need a simpler, cheaper way to invalidate patents before a patent-killing x-prize is possible in the post, but maybe not clearly or loudly enough.
I like the use / active-pursue requirement except it seems nearly impossible to enforce. A patent troll could easily spend money to look like they're trying to use a patent.
Ask Patents is for stopping patents from being granted. I'm suggesting a way to kill patents that are already granted + monetary incentives for the worst / most expensive offenders.
Granted patents aren't re-reviewed, so someone would have to cough up a few tens of thousands of dollars to do anything with submissions on granted patents.
Is the concept that people are contributing evidence to be used should someone challenge the patent?
Indeed, as stated, askpatents is not just for new patent applications. It's got a bit of head-wind right now, and the more people that get involved the better.
My argument is based on the premise that most software patents are bad for our economy.
Amazon's One-Click patent is a perfect example. Amazon would have developed one-click whether or not it was patentable. By granting the patent, we granted Amazon a monopoly and didn't get anything in return.
I LOVE the shorter patent idea - particularly for software patents. It wouldn't work for pharma, but that's okay.
The monopoly is supposed to be compensation for disclosing how the invention works, not merely creating it. If one-click were so amazingly hard that nobody else could have done it for another twenty years, we might have derived some benefit. But when any of us could do the same in hours, the patent is merely obfuscated drivel.
The problem with this - at least as I understand it - is that patent trolls make a lot from patents on a one-by-one basis - much more than companies want to pay or feel is affordable.
I don't think curing cancer makes much sense in the Kickstarter sense:
1. It is enormously expensive - curing a form of cancer costs well into the millions. So it wouldn't get funded.
2. There are loads of funding sources out there already.
3. "Curing" is actually very difficult to define. Most cancer treatments reduce and you'd need a bunch of expensive studies just to determine if the metric was met if it was anything short of "cured."
That said, it might work on a limited basis if you applied an X-Prize to certain forms of cancer. It could mobilize people to really focus on certain types of cancer and specific goals.
The EFF is probably the closest to doing something like this, but they picked the patents and there isn't a way to support killing just one: https://www.eff.org/patent-busting
