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From: chrisbr@cogsci.ed.ac.uk (Chris Brew)
Subject: Re: patents
In-Reply-To: gosse@let.rug.nl's message of Mon, 29 Apr 1996 13:02:05 GMT
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Sender: chrisbr@blair.cogsci.ed.ac.uk
Organization: Centre for Cognitive Science, University of Edinburgh
References: <1996Apr29.130205.20965@let.rug.nl>
Date: Thu, 2 May 1996 10:40:22 GMT
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>>>>> In article <1996Apr29.130205.20965@let.rug.nl>, gosse@let.rug.nl
(Gosse Bouma) writes: In article <1996Apr29.130205.20965@let.rug.nl>
gosse@let.rug.nl (Gosse Bouma) writes:


> Note that the number of patents in the area of `natural language
> analysis' almost equals that of ai, nn, or oop, and exceeds the
> number of patents in area's such as vr and biotech.

> Does anybody have any idea what these patents are about (speech
> recognition, information retrieval,..)? Does anybody have any
> explanation for the fact that such a small (?) field, which has
> never been very succesful when it comes to developing commercial
> applications, leads to a relatively large number of patents ?
There is only a loose correlation between actual technical
importance and number of patents granted. If (for example) there
is natural language work in a small number of companies who
rate their researchers by patents awarded or applied for, then there
will be such patents. The real measure, which is usually secret, is 
the number of companies who have paid good money to  license and
use a patented idea. Anybody care to guess about that?

Chris
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