Intellectual Property; patents and open technology Flashcards
In what ways can intellectual property be protected, and what types of intellectual property are best (or better) protected using what instruments?
Intellectual property can be protected through several tools that give the owner the exclusive right to market an invention for a fixed time period.
These tools vary depending on the object of
the protection. Intellectual property rights can be divided in two broad families: copyrights and industrial property rights.
a) Copyrights:
Describe the rights that creators have over their literary and artistic works. It refers to the act of making copies of literary or artistic work. Under copyright, two types of rights are protected, namely economic and moral rights
The owner of a copyright can authorize:
•its reproduction in various forms
•its public performance
•its recording (“fixation”)
•its broadcasting (by radio, cable or satellite
•its translation into other languages
•its adaptation, such as a novel into a film screenplay
Theduration of copyrights is limited in time
b) Industrial property rights:
can take on several forms including patents (and licenses), industrial designs, and trademarks
Patent is the „right granted to an inventor by a State, or by a regional office,…which allows theinventor to exclude anyone else from commercially exploiting his invention for a limited period…“period…“(WIPO, Understanding Industrial Property
•Imitation is forbidden throughout the length of the patent
•Inventor MUST disclose the patented innovation
•Innovation can be patented ONLY IF certain conditions are satisfied (namely, industrial applicability,
novelty, non obviousness and patentable subject matter)
•Patentee: person to whom the patent is granted
•Anyone who wishes to exploit the innovation commercially must obtain permission from the patentee
(= get a license from the patentee)
•Patents are transferable
•The length of a patent varies by country
Industrial design is the right to protect the original, ornamental and non functional features of a product that result from design activity
• Only valid with new or original designs
• It grants the owner the right to make, import, sell, hire or offer for sale articles to which the design is
applied or in which the design is embodied“
• Maximum length from 10 to 25 years
Trademark
distinguishes the goods or services of one enterprise from those of another
•Has 2 additional functions ( guarantee and appeal functions)
•Can also be a three dimensional, olfactory or audible sign
•Often used for marketing purposes
•Period of protection varies, can be renewed indefinitely on payment
Utility model
is “an exclusive right granted for an invention, which allows the right holder to prevent others from commercially using the protected invention, without his authorization, for a limited period of time” time”(WIPO).
The main differences between utility models and patents are the following:
•The requirements of “non obviousness” may be much lower or absent altogether (utility model therefore is
good to protect incremental innovations)
•Shorter length (usually between 7 and 10 years without the possibility of extension or renewal)
•Registration process is simpler and faster
•Utility models are much cheaper to obtain and to maintain
•In some countries, utility model protection can only be obtained for certain fields of technology and only for
products (primarily mechanical innovations) but not for processes
•Overall, utility models are considered particularly suited for SMEs that make “minor” improvements to, and adaptations of, existing products
What do we mean by “open technology
An umbrella concept that encompasses
•Open standards : reasonable and non discriminatory
patent fee required (e.g. IEFT and ITU T standards)
•Open security
•Open source (software) software): free access to the sourcecode, free redistribution http://opensource.org/definition
Open ≠ Free software movements: “open” refers to the development methodology, “free” refers to the social implications of it
•“Open” e.g. OpenBSD , OpenGL, OpenLDAP , OpenOffice.org, OpenPGP , OpenSSH , OpenVPN , Mozilla,…
•“Free” e.g. GNU (General Public License, software “intended to guarantee your freedom
to share and change free software“), …
•“Free and Open” (“ e.g. Linux, Ubuntu, …
Open standards
• A standard is a specification for a technology or methodology
• Open standard : publicly available (anyone who wants to can obtain it and use it to create an implementation of the specified methodology or technology); e.g. TCP
• Standardization : process of building functionality based upon standards , using standards as building blocks
• Standards compliant : substitutability is relevant standards based systems function as freely exchangeable components (e.g. SMTP server
• Closed (proprietary) technology : not open; creates lock in situation, e.g. if a software cannot freely be replaced by another software system may be(come) problematic due to arbitrary pricing and (dis –)continuity risk
Open security
• Inspection intended and unintended use of facilities and information
• Risk associated to a system can only be assessed if the system is accessible
•“Security by obscurity”: to refer unfavorably to closed architectures but: restricting access to content offers no particular protection against a flawed design!)
Open source
• Open source : source code available to the general public without restrictions that
limit studying, changing or improving
• Open Source Initiative (OSI) OSI): non profit organization ‘dedicated to managing and promoting the Open Source Definition for the good of the community”
≡ OSI registers and classifies (certifies) software licenses;
≡ OSI provides definition standards (“The Open Source Definition”)
• OSS ≠ shareware (freely distributed, but source remains
• OSS public domain software (not licensed, usable by everyone without constraint)
What are the differences between freeware, shareware and open source software?
Freeware
is copyrighted software that the owner has made available to the public for use without cost. This is different from ‘free software’, which is software to which users are permitted to make changes.
Shareware
is a type of copyrighted software provided free of charge to user, usually on the condition that if they want to continue to use it after a certain time they have to pay for it.
Open
source software is made available to the public by copyright holder, who gives a license to modify it and distribute the modified version to any other persons.
They can use it as a platform to promote their own (copyrighted) products which serve as add ons or enhancements to the free software.
They can sometimes more easily recruit talented programmers who may have experience of the shareware.
What is meant by an elasticity? Explain this rigorously and accurately but in simple, everyday language.
An elasticity is the ratio between an infinitesimal proportionate change in one parameter and an infinitesimal proportionate change in another parameter.
For example, the energy efficiency elasticity of energy consumption’ is a measure of how much energy consumption changes, in proportion to its magnitude, when energy efficiency undergoes a very small change in proportion to its magnitude.
In a particular industry, the energy price elasticity of production innovation patents is 0.3. What does this mean?
If the energy price elasticity of production patents is 0.3 (30%), the usual way of explaining this prosaically is to say that for each 1% change in the energy price there is a 0.3% change in the number of patents.
In fact, however, this is not completely accurate because a change of 1% is quite large compared to an infinitesimal change.
Depending on the algebraic relationship between patent numbers and energy price, an elasticity of 0.3 might lead to a slightly greater or lesser change than 0.3% in patent numbers when the energy price changes by 1%
What are the characteristics of FOSS?
- Conventional software development consists of: planning, analysis, design and implementation
- By FOSS:
•Planning, analysis and design of the software are concatenated and performed by a small number of developers -> Prototype
•Implementation
->Code : writing code and submitting to the FOSS community for review
->Review : a strength of the FOSS is the independent, prompt peer review
->Pre commit test : the negative implications of breaking the build ensure that contributions are tested carefully before being committed
->Development release : code contributions may be included in the development release within a short time of having been submitted this rapid implementation being a significant motivator for
developers
->Parallel debugging : the so called Linus‘ Law (“given enough eyeballs, every bug is shallow“) as the large number of potential debuggers on different platforms and system configurations ensures bugs are found and fixed quickly
->Production release : a relatively stable, debugged production version of the system is released - Nature of infrastructural systems in horizontal domains
- Two possible business models:
• Value added service enabling Support service and other software products are sold (e.g. Red
• Loss leader/market creating OS distributed for free with the purpose of enlarging the market of closed software (e.g. Sendmail and Sendmail Pro) - Property rights are protected via copyrights. Licenses are used to grant others liberal rights:
• GNU Public license (GPL) ensures complete and unrestricted access to open source software and derivatives copyleft all rights reversed”
• Lesser GPL (LGPL) software may be linked with proprietary code
• Artistic license
• Berkeley System Distribution (BSD) acknowledgement of previous contributors ´work
• Mozilla Public License (MPL) conversion of a commercial software product to open source
What are the characteristics of OSS 2.0?
Characteristics of OSS 2.0
Strong commercial orientation corporate firms place an important role in the
development phase with developers often paid to
1. More vertical applications
2. More rigorous project management
3. Business strategies
≡ Value added service enabling : consultancy, service, support
≡ Market creation : products with dual licensing, cost reduction and accessorizing
≡ Leveraging community software development : increase development productivity and
have work done for free while increasing functionality and attractiveness
≡ Leveraging the open source brand : promotion of large companies and government
agencies
5. Profitable opportunities in customer support
6.New licenses are introduced (e.g. OSL and corporate style)
Compare FOSS and OSS 2.0
see table in Exercise 3
What are the Economic incentives of open source ?
Challenges to economists’ paradigm
• Individual incentive : why do top notch programmers choose to write code that is released for free?
• Corporate strategies : why do commercial companies allocate some of their talented staff to open source programs?
• Organizational behavior : is it a new business organization model an apparently anarchistic progress of open source production?
• Innovative process: how does the new process fit with the conception of the innovative process driven by IP rights (as we know it from Arrow, 1962 or Schumpeter, 1942
However , OSS 2.0 is actually not that far from economic
• Altruism
-Cost of contributing is not that high
-Why do programmers not focus their generosity on more needy beings?
=Answer: recognition, ready access to venture capital, career opportunities etc.
• Additional benefits
-Beta testers of commercial software point out problems, testers of OS software see code and either fix bugs themselves or identify where they think the problem is
• Organizational perspective
-Clear procedures
-Modularity
•Complementary services are charged
•“Value for money” concept at the base of OSS 2.0
•Presence of positive externalities
Economic incentives of open source:
Why do established commercial software enter this business?
•Try to make money on complementary services
•Some of their programmers involved in OS , so that they keep abreast with OS
developments:
-better know competition
-develop absorptive capacity (spot talented programmers for
-attract programmers who want to work in intellectually challenging environment
• Embrace an open source project to preempt the development of a standard around a technology owned by a powerful rival
