EA has made 23 accessibility patents available to other developers, by making them open-source. These patents include technologies for photosensitivity and speech recognition.
This doesn’t meet any of the traditional definitions of “open source”
EA isn’t using that term to describe their offer.
Our Pledge
Electronic Arts (EA) promises not to enforce against any party for infringing any of the listed EA patents. A list of patents subject to this pledge can be found below, and EA may add additional patents to this pledge at a later date.
EA makes this pledge legally binding, irrevocable (except as under “Defensive Termination”) and enforceable against EA and all subsequent patent owners of the listed patents. This pledge does not provide any warranties or assurances that the activities covered by pledged patents are free from patent or other intellectual property infringement claims by a third party
Defensive Termination
EA reserves the right to terminate this pledge for a specific party or its affiliates going forward if that party files a patent infringement lawsuit or other patent proceeding against EA, its affiliates, or partners.
And open source doesn’t make any sense for patents anyway. Open documentation maybe, but source is a code thing.
That said, patents are already “source available” anyway, and my understanding is that it’s effectively open documentation as well (can they sue for derivative works of their patent? That mask makes no sense…).
But yeah, legally binding non-enforcement pledge is about as close as releasing a patent as public domain as a company like EA is likely to get.
I think its kind of standard for these things but the defensive termination sounds like a trap. If you make a claim about an unrelated patent against “EA, their partners or affiliates” then they revoke your access to the pledge.
I’m not sure how partner or affiliate is defined in this context but EA have business dealings with a lot of companies…
It absolutely is. I’m not sure how that works if EA is the instigating the patent dispute though. If they’re still legally bound to honor the pledge, I think smaller devs are okay, so this would only really apply to other large studios with a bunch of patents of their own.
That said, software patents shouldn’t exist, that’s the realm of copyright and trademark law…
Right they are released patents. Fairly common in many industries to release all patents in areas like disability or safety. You gain more by releasing them any by holding them.
Important to note that:
https://www.ea.com/commitments/positive-play/accessibility-patent-pledge
And open source doesn’t make any sense for patents anyway. Open documentation maybe, but source is a code thing.
That said, patents are already “source available” anyway, and my understanding is that it’s effectively open documentation as well (can they sue for derivative works of their patent? That mask makes no sense…).
But yeah, legally binding non-enforcement pledge is about as close as releasing a patent as public domain as a company like EA is likely to get.
I think its kind of standard for these things but the defensive termination sounds like a trap. If you make a claim about an unrelated patent against “EA, their partners or affiliates” then they revoke your access to the pledge.
I’m not sure how partner or affiliate is defined in this context but EA have business dealings with a lot of companies…
It absolutely is. I’m not sure how that works if EA is the instigating the patent dispute though. If they’re still legally bound to honor the pledge, I think smaller devs are okay, so this would only really apply to other large studios with a bunch of patents of their own.
That said, software patents shouldn’t exist, that’s the realm of copyright and trademark law…
Right they are released patents. Fairly common in many industries to release all patents in areas like disability or safety. You gain more by releasing them any by holding them.