It is all too easy amid the legislative and political scrum over patent policy to forget just why we protect intellectual property in the first place.
We don’t have IP for the sake of IP; we have IP protection to secure the rights of inventors, writers and artists to their creations, to give them the economic incentive to keep creating for the benefit of us all.
Which is why Patent Truth sometimes gets caught up in the wonder of invention. (See an account of this year’s inductions into the Inventors Hall of Fame.)
And it’s why on Sept. 27 we’ll be watching a conversation between two legendary inventors, Dean Kamen and Irwin Jacobs, who will be discussing invention and IP at an event hosted by the Newseum in Washington.
Both men are National Medal of Technology and Innovation laureates. Kamen, the founder of three medical-device companies and holder of more than 100 U.S. and foreign patents, was cited “for inventions that have advanced medical care worldwide, and for innovative and imaginative leadership in awakening America to the excitement of science and technology.” Jacobs, a co-founder of Qualcomm, was cited “for his vision, innovation and leadership in the field of digital wireless communications over the past 25 years; and for his development of Code Division Multiple Access as a commercial technology adopted as a U.S. digital cellular standard providing increased capacity, quality and services and greatly enhancing the U.S. position in the international telecommunications marketplace.”
Their fireside chat and a series of panel discussions in the daylong event that include other inventors, policymakers and academics will focus on the process of invention and the role the U.S. patent system plays in fostering innovation and economic growth. Anyone interested in attending can register here.
