I is just plain silly to be able to patent the obvious. If you asked 10,000 engineers to list the ways a rocket stage could be recovered in the ocean, I bet that all of them would suggest a landing on a boat or barge as one possibility.
For about the thousandth time: you can't patent ideas. No-one has patented "landing on a barge".
Quote from: QuantumG on 09/12/2014 06:57 pmFor about the thousandth time: you can't patent ideas. No-one has patented "landing on a barge". I'm not sure who you're debating with. The BO patent abstract reads:"Launch vehicle systems and methods for landing and recovering a booster stage and/or other portions thereof on a platform at sea or on another body of water are disclosed. In one embodiment, a reusable space launch vehicle is launched from a coastal launch site in a trajectory over water. After booster engine cutoff and upper stage separation, the booster stage reenters the earth's atmosphere in a tail-first orientation. The booster engines are then restarted and the booster stage performs a vertical powered landing on the deck of a pre-positioned sea-going platform."So apparently BO has, in effect, been granted a patent for "landing on a barge."If your point is that the patent should not have been granted, I agree. But "processes" can be patented, and apparently the patent examiner considered this to be a patentable process.
Recommend not playing patent lawyer here. Even if you ARE a patent lawyer
Quote from: Space Ghost 1962 on 09/02/2014 09:39 pmRecommend not playing patent lawyer here. Even if you ARE a patent lawyer :)Totally not a patent lawyer, but I have followed the phone patent wars...My impression from some of the outcomes there is that even a valid patent doesn't legitimize totally unilateral monetary demands or outright area denial.The barrier for getting an outright injunction seems to be quite high, and the body that actually did issue a few injunctions, the ITC, did so in the context of imports, where SpaceX does everything domestically.Whatever action Blue Origin took, they would be unlikely to get a preliminary injunction and would have to fight the legal battles for years to even hope to get some monetary damages.
Recommend not playing patent lawyer here. Even if you ARE a patent lawyer :)
It's civil court that's supposed to be the primary recourse for patent holders. In civil court, what matters isn't whether infringement is good or bad for the country as a whole, what matters is whether infringement hurt the patent holder. The patent holder is entitled to monetary damages based on how much the patent holder lost because of the infringement.
Quote from: Kabloona on 09/12/2014 07:19 pmQuote from: QuantumG on 09/12/2014 06:57 pmFor about the thousandth time: you can't patent ideas. No-one has patented "landing on a barge". I'm not sure who you're debating with. The BO patent abstract reads:"Launch vehicle systems and methods for landing and recovering a booster stage and/or other portions thereof on a platform at sea or on another body of water are disclosed. In one embodiment, a reusable space launch vehicle is launched from a coastal launch site in a trajectory over water. After booster engine cutoff and upper stage separation, the booster stage reenters the earth's atmosphere in a tail-first orientation. The booster engines are then restarted and the booster stage performs a vertical powered landing on the deck of a pre-positioned sea-going platform."So apparently BO has, in effect, been granted a patent for "landing on a barge."If your point is that the patent should not have been granted, I agree. But "processes" can be patented, and apparently the patent examiner considered this to be a patentable process.It's the "Launch vehicle systems and methods" that are being patented. Landing on a barge is what the patent enables.
Nothing stops to register a patent when LV is launched from one sea platform and reusable first stage would be landed on another sea platform
Not a lawyer, but went (and am going) through the process several times.Just to narrow the conversation, a patent has two parts. A specification, and a set of claims. That bit with "embodiments" is all in the specification.When the USPTO "gives you a patent", what it is actually doing is "allowing your claims". You can describe a lot of things in the specification, but you only get protection on the claims. The claims must be "from the world of the specification", but the specification absolutely contains a lot of generics. It is a plain-language description of the entire apparatus or method, not just the bit you're seeking a patent on. It is supposed to be described from scratch, and in context. It's the claims that are more "legal" and "mathematical".Therefore, quoting just some leading paragraphs from the specification does not tell you what was patented.From experience, the USPTO is very serious about the process of negotiating claims with you. And they get pretty deep into understanding what you've invented.Of all government agencies, they are surprisingly functional.That said, the system does get abused, and silly patents do get allowed. The barge landing seems to me like it should not have been allowed. Bezos has good patent lawyers, I guess.
For about the thousandth time: you can't patent ideas. No-one has patented "landing on a barge". It's a real shame we can't talk about patents as knowledgeably as we talk about spaceflight on this forum.
I really need to find the patent on the "Plasma Powered, Hovering, Anti-Missile Platform" again... Something like 20 pages of wonderful illustrations, NO claims, NO specifications, just artwork and it was a patent not an application or such... Ya, the system CAN be abused at times