World's First Storyline Patent?
Originally published here.
eMediaWire is reporting that "the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office is scheduled to publish history's first "storyline patent" application today.
The release has Georgetown University law prof Jay Thomas saying, "The case law of the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit has established that virtually any subject matter is potentially patentable."
The idea that story lines could be patentable was first seriously proposed by Andrew Knight in an article for the Journal of the Patent and Trademark Office Society. In A Potentially New IP: Storyline Patents, Knight argues that "binding case law strongly suggests that methods of performing and displaying fictional plots, whether found in motion pictures, novels, television shows, or commercials, are statutory subject matter, like computer software and business methods".
And what of the individual who filed the patent application back in November 2003?
Funnily enough, it's Frank Knight.
Kight's web site, plotpatents.com, informs visitors that "Knight and Associates consists of Andrew Knight and a team of independent contractors comprising skilled writers and experienced patent attorneys, ready to turn valuable new fictional plots or storylines into U.S. utility patent applications."
They'll be able to "help your company integrate valuable Storyline Patent protection into your portfolio of other IP protection" and "draft and prosecute patent applications on unique storylines, as well as innovations in the fields of mechanical devices, electrical devices, optical devices, medical devices, engines, software, business methods, gadgets, tools, toys, and other consumer products."
This is perhaps the most reprehensable attempt by an individual to create a job for themselves. Simply create "property" where none existed before, then charge big media companies to look after the chaotic legal issues you've created for them. What does he have to say for himself?
"Recognizing that fierce competition for publication and financial reward focused on the quality of storytelling, as opposed to the quality of the underlying storyline itself, and further recognizing that even the world's most skilled storytellers (of which he is clearly not) rarely turn a profit, his unique fictional storylines have matured into pending patent applications instead of novels or screenplays. He thus seeks reward on the true value of his innovations - the underlying storylines - instead of forced, sub-par expressions of these underlying storylines."
So according to Knight, we should now be paying bad writers to use an idea that they've detailed in a utility patent.
The worst part of this is that several academics have theorised that there are only actually seven basic plots that exist in literature. Amazon.com says of Christopher Booker's The Seven Basic Plots, "there is literally no story in the world which cannot be seen in a new light: we have come to the heart of what stories are about and why we tell them."
Unfortunately, if Andrew Knight's patent application is granted, it won't be a question of what stories are about, or why we tell them. It'll be a question of whether we can afford to pay the royalties.
This article was the basis for an entry in Jon Newton's column on TechNewsWorld.com
eMediaWire is reporting that "the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office is scheduled to publish history's first "storyline patent" application today.
The release has Georgetown University law prof Jay Thomas saying, "The case law of the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit has established that virtually any subject matter is potentially patentable."
The idea that story lines could be patentable was first seriously proposed by Andrew Knight in an article for the Journal of the Patent and Trademark Office Society. In A Potentially New IP: Storyline Patents, Knight argues that "binding case law strongly suggests that methods of performing and displaying fictional plots, whether found in motion pictures, novels, television shows, or commercials, are statutory subject matter, like computer software and business methods".
And what of the individual who filed the patent application back in November 2003?
Funnily enough, it's Frank Knight.
Kight's web site, plotpatents.com, informs visitors that "Knight and Associates consists of Andrew Knight and a team of independent contractors comprising skilled writers and experienced patent attorneys, ready to turn valuable new fictional plots or storylines into U.S. utility patent applications."
They'll be able to "help your company integrate valuable Storyline Patent protection into your portfolio of other IP protection" and "draft and prosecute patent applications on unique storylines, as well as innovations in the fields of mechanical devices, electrical devices, optical devices, medical devices, engines, software, business methods, gadgets, tools, toys, and other consumer products."
This is perhaps the most reprehensable attempt by an individual to create a job for themselves. Simply create "property" where none existed before, then charge big media companies to look after the chaotic legal issues you've created for them. What does he have to say for himself?
"Recognizing that fierce competition for publication and financial reward focused on the quality of storytelling, as opposed to the quality of the underlying storyline itself, and further recognizing that even the world's most skilled storytellers (of which he is clearly not) rarely turn a profit, his unique fictional storylines have matured into pending patent applications instead of novels or screenplays. He thus seeks reward on the true value of his innovations - the underlying storylines - instead of forced, sub-par expressions of these underlying storylines."
So according to Knight, we should now be paying bad writers to use an idea that they've detailed in a utility patent.
The worst part of this is that several academics have theorised that there are only actually seven basic plots that exist in literature. Amazon.com says of Christopher Booker's The Seven Basic Plots, "there is literally no story in the world which cannot be seen in a new light: we have come to the heart of what stories are about and why we tell them."
Unfortunately, if Andrew Knight's patent application is granted, it won't be a question of what stories are about, or why we tell them. It'll be a question of whether we can afford to pay the royalties.
This article was the basis for an entry in Jon Newton's column on TechNewsWorld.com
posted by Alex H at 9:49 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home