> (And don't show them to me or tell me what they are, 'cause then it's triple damages.)
I'm not sure that's an accurate description of the law. The patent laws authorize a court to increase the damages in patent infringement lawsuits up to
three times the amount found or assessed. This is known as the “treble damages” award. A decision to increase damages is discretionary with the court, but is usually exercised only in cases of willful and wanton infringement or bad faith litigation. Fortunately, an increase in damages is inappropriate when an infringer mounts a good faith and substantial challenge to the validity of the patent or the existence of infringement.
Can you show me the case that made you feel the triple damages were unfair?
I kind of feel like you're trying to say X or Y battery patent is not fair or justified. But without specifics, I fear that's far too broad. If someone spent billions on lithium chemistry research, then I'd say they should have the monopoly right to monetize their achievements/discoveries (if any) for a reasonable period. If there's no payoff, then nobody will gamble on it and we'll all be worse off with a stagnant battery industry.
> I'm not sure that's an accurate description of the law.
When I worked at Microsoft we were explicitly forbidden from looking at any software patents, Just To Be Safe.
Kind of defeated the entire idea of patents being published to help improve innovation. Basically other company's patents were treated like poison that were to be avoided looked at at all cost.
If you read the history of patents during the industrial revolution, inventors would come up with incremental improvement after incremental improvement over existing patents. The system worked as designed.
That feedback cycle is non-existent with software patents.
> I kind of feel like you're trying to say X or Y battery patent is not fair or justified.
Actually no - I'm more concerned about who owns the patents to the pre-existing technologies that the batteries depend on.
'Commercially Viable' to me means that the technology can be mass produced within acceptable bounds of fault tolerance at a price that will allow the final product to sell at profitable margins.
What it does not say is that the company isn't going to get sued by some patent hoarding snake in the grass.
It was flippant (and damned near off-topic), but it stems from my dismissive notion of the very idea of wilful infringement.
What other legitimate form of infringement could there be?
Accidental plagarism certainly exists, but I'd imagine that a fairer punishment there would be either an injunction of sale and distribution, or a fair and reasonable licensing fee.
Not being sued into oblivion for something that at most caused minimal damage.
But beyond that - I imagine rare case - the vast majority of non wilful infringements are the result of the independent derivation of ideas.
And I simply don't see how a patent system can justify prohibiting someone from using their own ideas - regardless of whether or not someone else had them first.
Who owns the patents?
(And don't show them to me or tell me what they are, 'cause then it's triple damages.)