When VCs Attack - Patents

Brad Feld and Fred Wilson - two prominent VC bloggers - have been attacking software patents recently. Brad thinks software patents are "an abomination." Fred doesn't go that far, but he does suggest that software patents stifle innovation and creativity. Both support their credibility with broad statements about how long they've been in the industry, how many patent battles they've been in, etc, etc. Brad goes so far to say that he and his previous partner "have been in several situations where [we] had created prior art a decade earlier that ... would have been used to invalidate the patent [at issue]." Wow. Plus they’re renowned VCs, and the people who always get paid in patent battles are the evil lawyers. Brad and Fred must be right!

Only they’re not. Sure, too many patents get issued that later get invalidated anyway. And sure, there are a lot of anecdotes that both of them cite about patents being misused. (Fred also mentions that society would be worse off if Picasso had patented cubism or Chuck Berry rhythm and blues, but in both of those cases, the artists are protected by copyright and their derivative works rights are similar to the rights of patent holders). There are plenty of anecdotes about venture capital being misused, but no one’s arguing we should abolish that!

The issue has a lot of arguments on both sides. The system definitely needs reform. But it’s not “an abomination” just because a lawyer gets paid somewhere in the process or a prominent and intelligent VC makes a compelling but unrelated analogy.

Related Tags: patent law, venture capital, software patents, Brad Feld, Fred Wilson