Word of the Day

[unixronin]

house_pundit made a comment last night that, this morning, made me think about a detail of terminology.

We have a name for people who register vast numbers of domain names on spec against the hope of someday being able to sell some of them for extortionate sums of money to people who actually need them for their business.  We call them domain squatters, right?

And they suck.  Right?

So how is this different from an [ostensible] medical research company that patents huge swathes of the genomes of any organism they can get their hands on the genetic sequence of, on spec against the possibility that they (or someone else) might someday discover a medical application for one or more genes in the pile?

I hereby declare that from now on, I shall refer to these wankers as gene-squatters.  They're not protecting innovations.  They're not protecting investments.  They're simply locking up as much genomespace as they can to prevent anyone else from being able to utilize it without paying them exorbitant amounts of money ... and thereby, in all probability, discouraging anyone who knows that genespace is patented from studying it for medical value.

There's your new word for the day, folks:  Gene-squatter.  Spread it around.  Because gene-squatters suck.

Comments

[otherbill.livejournal.com]

As do patent squatters.

[argonel.livejournal.com]

I generall refer to those as patent troll, and they aslo sometimes have submarine patents.. However the patent side of things may get a big shake-up if most/all? software patents are invalidated.

[unixronin.livejournal.com]

Yup, that's where this train of thought started — the impact of the USPTO's new rules on what is considered a patentable innovation (http://unixronin.livejournal.com/572982.html). I'm hoping a lot of the more stupid "business method" patents will go poof! too.

I think gene-squatting goes beyond patent trolling though. Patent trolling, you want someone to innocently infringe your patents, even if you have to amend the patent after the fact to make it appear so. Gene-squatters are mostly just trying to lock up as much genespace as they possibly can, just in case they ever get around to studying it to see if they can derive a profitable medical treatment from it, and to make sure nobody else gets to it first. It's like the monkey in the cage at the zoo who's rounded up all the fruit he can carry and has an orange in his mouth too, and is going frantic because there's still a dozen pieces of fruit in the cage that he can't pick up without dropping some of what he's already got.

[argonel.livejournal.com]

All too true. What we really need is a good test case with backing to point out that genomes are natural phenomena and are not patentable, trademarkable, or copyrightable. The potential monkeywrench would be artificial genomes created through direct or indirect manipulation of DNA.

In short some need troutslapping until they realize you should only be able to patent innovation/invention/creativity, not discovery.

[ilcylic.livejournal.com]

Word.

[smandal.livejournal.com]

I like.