The Technology Liberation Front - Latest Comments in Goodbye to Most Business Method & Software Patents?

Re: Goodbye to Most Business Method & Software Patents?

JAmes — Wed, 05 Nov 2008 16:37:51 -0000

I had a patent pending in 19 countries - but it failed after 5 years

Re: Goodbye to Most Business Method & Software Patents?

Don Marti — Fri, 31 Oct 2008 15:18:11 -0000

Patents give the holder the right to attack independent innovation. If I write a program that does the same thing as an earlier copyrighted program, without copying it, the copyright holder doesn't have an infringement case against me. If I implement a patented technique, even if I had never heard of the patent, I can get shut down for infringement.

Re: Goodbye to Most Business Method & Software Patents?

Steve_R — Fri, 31 Oct 2008 08:29:40 -0000

Hopefully, the pendulum is swinging back to rationality. An inconvenient truth that has not received the public spotlight that it deserves: is that those who advocate so-called intellectual property have been aggrandizing their so-called property right. at the expense of the public domain. The public perception, unfortunately, has been that the advocates of so-called intellectual property have been protecting a private property right. This property right does not really exist.

Pantently-O writes "In Dissent, Judge Mayer thought the decision did not go far enough: "Affording patent protection to business methods lacks constitutional and statutory support, serves to hinder rather than promote innovation and usurps that which rightfully belongs in the public domain." Citing work by Professors Dreyfuss and Pollack, Mayer argues that business method patents have the overall effect of stifling innovation by restricting competition."

TechDirt had an article "CAFC Judge Regrets Decisions That Resulted In Software Patents" In terms of unintended consequences Greenspan referring to the financial crisis is quoted by the NY Times as saying "humbled Mr. Greenspan admitted that he had put too much faith in the self-correcting power of free markets and had failed to anticipate the self-destructive power of wanton mortgage lending." Unlimited patentability would have unintended self-destructive consequence of stifling free enterprise.

TechDirt also writes: "Nobel Prize Winning Physicist Explains How Intellectual Property Damages Innovation" While no one likes to deprive anyone of an income, there is a point where unfettered greed is destructive to society. Patents and copyright were never meant to guarantee anyone an unlimited income. They are meant to foster innovation by providing a limited benefit to the creator and to provide society with a benefit too. We need to return to that concept.

Re: Goodbye to Most Business Method & Software Patents?

Bob — Fri, 31 Oct 2008 07:17:30 -0000

OK, copyrights do not seem to be affected by this - what does patent protection provided that copyright protection does not?

BobL
Chicago

Re: Goodbye to Most Business Method & Software Patents?

BubbaDude — Fri, 31 Oct 2008 05:58:42 -0000

I doubt this ruling is nearly as significant as the populist press imagines it to be.