Crowd Source the Patent Approval Process

GrokLaw has a great article on a patent, that has been granted to Microsoft, on something that clearly has prior art.

Lordy, lordy, lordy. They have no shame. It appears that Microsoft has just patented sudo, a personalized version of it. Here it is, patent number7617530. Thanks, USPTO, for giving Microsoft, which is already a monopoly, a monopoly on something that’s been in use since 1980 and wasn’t invented by Microsoft. Here’s Wikipedia’s description of sudo, which you can meaningfully compare to Microsoft’s description of its “invention”.

link: Groklaw – Microsoft Patents Sudo?!! – Updated 2Xs

The high tech industry seems to have a track record of skipping through the patent system without the patent clerks noticing that prior art exists. Now, you may be for or against patents. That, however, is a bigger issue that may not be resolved in our lifetime. However, I wonder if the USPTO would consider opening up their patent evaluation queue to the public. Let all of the folks that contribute to these articles post if they are aware of prior art. The clerks can investigate that information for validity and then make a decision. Essentially, crowd source patent evaluations. At the very least, it would allow for a more transparent process, providing the patent clerks with the best resources when evaluating the validity of patent applications.

Crowd sourcing prior art research would go a long way toward fixing some of the most egregious problems in the software patent world. At the very least, it would help to provide the patent office with better information during the research phase and not after the patent is granted. Thoughts??