Posted on 02/18/2008 8:35:44 PM PST by dickmc
Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) has sponsored an unusual provision at the urging of the nation's banks granting them immunity against an active patent lawsuit, potentially saving them billions of dollars. The federal government would have to pay $1 billion to the owner, DataTreasury, over 10 years as compensation
.......
The provision, passed without dissent by the Senate Judiciary Committee in July and inserted into legislation scheduled for a vote by the full Senate this month
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Political action committees of financial institutions were the largest single category of industry donors to Sessions, with $52,300 in the current election cycle, the center said. That represented nearly a quarter of PAC contributions he received as of midyear 2007.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
I guess the bridge to nowhere wasn't good enough.
Also, another story of the Patent Office gone mad. An obvious idea with prior art.
What a crock.
I want a little more information. Sessions been quite a conservative Senator, considered by many “one of the good guys.” I have been very proud of him and I think he would make a good President if we can get him to run.
Therefore, considering the source of this piece is the Washington Post, “one of the BAD guys”, I think they may be trying to take down a very promising conservative President before he starts building momentum (for 2012 or 2016).
I do NOT TRUST anyone in the lamestream media.
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“... “Limiting patent holders’ rights and remedies in this instance could reduce innovation in this technology area,” wrote Assistant Secretary Nathaniel F. Wienecke. “The Administration does not support exceptions to patent protection based on a particular technology.”...”
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Sure wish the Bush Administration had the same protectionist attitude towards emigration laws.
Again, I’m highly suspicious of this hit piece. Sessions is gaining in popularity and power. Who is setting him up? RNC because they do not support the conservative agenda, the RATS because they know Sessions will be supported by conservatives and the establishment if he does ever get the nomination, or has there indeed been shady dealing? I don’t trust anybody, but I’m especially tired of the good guys getting slammed by what are relatively minor (compared to the RATS) problems.
It is sort of like comparing panties on the head and waterboarding as torture when the enemy disembowels people and sets them on fire (while alive). The seriousness just isn’t there.
Banks are getting squeezed right now, and this may have more to do with a Senator trying to help out the banking system and prevent a serious recession/depression. Bank failures was a major component of the Great Depression. Small investors and holders of savings accounts lost all their money - complete and total losses. Many communities no longer had banks by 1935 and for a long time many people refused to keep their money in banks.
Does Sessions accept large donation from banking concerns? There seems to be so much quid-pro-quo nowadays, but I guess that has always been the case in politics.
BS! They took technology and processes that have been in industry-wide (public) use for over twenty years, with continuous improvements, wrapped the technology and processes in a different package, then tried to extort money from the companies that were already using and improving the processes.
Just a wild guess, but I'd bet his little gizmo scans a check image into an encapsulated TIFF image, captures the transaction data, and merges the data and image into an x937i format, then transmits it to some server.
That's like patenting a particular method of breathing currently in universal use, and then suing the pants off every person caught sucking oxygen.
Copyrights and patents have outlived their usefulness. With wide-open borders and practically unlimited work-visas being used to wage war on productive Americans, we surely don't need to provide protectionist cover for obvious scam artists.
...he's obviously guilty of something terrible and should be burned at the stake! Imagine them using a photo of Ted Kennedy or any Democrat with their hands in a defensive posture as if to fend off blows. You'll never see that.
The prior court case seemed to only address whether the technology had been previously patented, and not whether it was worthy of a patent on its own merit.
Can anyone provide any more info?
I tried searching but either got no hits or too many hits.
Not so. It this were true, we would still have tight restrictions on the transfer of technology abroad, and we wouldn't have 10+ million foreigners working in high-tech jobs in the U.S. while 10+ million American tech workers are either unemployed or working outside their field.
That’s my point exactly. Plus, CONSIDER THE SOURCE. IT’S FROM WAPO AND CANNOT BE TRUSTED.
Not all patents and certainly not trademarks! But I agree a lot of patents should be invalidated. There are a lot of patents whereby someone took a well known and widely employed manual process and made it an electronic process, and then claimed patent protection over the process itself. That’s bogus. He may have added value, but to try to shake down industries by preventing them from automating long held practices is lame. But the patent office let a lot of them slide, either because they didn’t understand what was happening or because they were under a misguided mandate to “protect” a burgeoning computer software industry.
All those Folks that we’ve elected to send to Washington love EITHER Banks or Trial Lawyers.
‘nuff said
In a very early ‘Batman’ comic book (maybe even issue #1) arch-villain “Toyman” copyrighted the alphabet so nobody could use it without his permission.
I believe this is it (US Patent #6,032,137--"Remote image capture with centralized processing and storage").
Enjoy!
In addition to the check imaging concept, which has existed in various forms for thirty years, he wants to claim ownership of point-of-sale credit card collection processing, which has been around for even longer.
It is arrogant jackasses like this that make banking fees higher for merchants and customers. He hasn't invented anything. He is claiming rights to fees on processes that existed before he was even born. Even more outrageous is that the patent office is abetting this fraud.
Maybe I could patent the letter 'e'.
I'd bet a dollar to a doughnut that this guy is a gamer and comic book freak.
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