An invention should have to work harder to earn government protection than simply having a sixth birthday.

Reuters reports that the Supreme Court declined to hear Google’s challenge to a patent-office policy that makes administrative review less likely for patents more than six years old. The rule invokes the parties’ “settled expectations.” A wonderfully soothing phrase. The expectation may be settled; whether the patent should have been granted is precisely the question somebody wanted to ask.

This does not establish that the disputed patent is invalid, or that Google has behaved impeccably. VirtaMove accuses Google of infringing its server-software patent. Google wants the patent reviewed. I am capable of supporting a useful review process without buying Alphabet a friendship bracelet.

The Patent Trial and Appeal Board offers a route for challenging patents. Under the Trump administration, the proportion of review requests it takes up has fallen: Reuters cites 37% in 2026, compared with 65% under the previous director. That measures access to review, not the percentage of inventions that are secretly rubbish. Keeping those numbers straight is part of the job, even when the job involves being annoyed.

But why should age make a questionable government-granted right more difficult to question? If the evidence is good, examine it. If it is weak, reject it. The calendar has not conducted a technical analysis. It has been hanging on the wall showing pictures of national parks.

Technology companies use this process frequently, including Samsung, Apple and Alphabet. They are not humble woodland creatures begging for shelter. They have lawyers. Patent owners can also have legitimate complaints about expensive, repetitive challenges. A fair system needs to distinguish those complaints from an invitation to keep collecting leverage without renewed scrutiny.

Protect the invention. Don’t patent the benefit of the doubt.

Google argues that the agency has created a time restriction Congress did not authorize. The administration urged the justices not to take the case, and they did not. That refusal leaves the policy in place; it is not a Supreme Court finding that every older patent deserves a congratulatory cake.

The broader concern is who gets to challenge a legal barrier and at what cost. We’ve seen how procedural rules can determine whether a complaint is practical. A technically available remedy is less impressive if reaching it requires the resources of a company whose name is also a verb.

I want inventors paid for real inventions and competitors free to challenge claims that should not block them. Neither objective is served by treating elapsed time as evidence of technical merit. Write fair limits on abusive challenges; do not let a patent’s age impersonate an answer.

Six years is old enough to ask why.

It should not be old enough to stop answering.