> -----Original Message----- > From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:brin-l-bounces@;mccmedia.com]On > Behalf Of Julia Thompson
... > The hardware innovations are great, and I fully support those patents. > > I do believe, though, that many *software* patents are just not a great > idea. And I believe that IBM routinely files suits against companies > that they think are violating their software patents, although I don't > have anything other than anecdotal evidence to support this belief. If > anyone has hard-and-fast numbers regarding suits filed by IBM for > software patent violations, I'd be very interested in seeing those. Probably a lot of income results from negotiations that never reach the point of an actual lawsuit... The more common argument against software patents (as well as a number of other high-tech patents) is that they are quite frequently worthless by the time the patent expires, thus defeating the purpose of the patent system. If they were just frivolous, the courts and the PTO could clean up the problem. But the term is something that Congress and the international IP community should deal with. Nick (who's contemplating filing several new software patents for defensive purposes...) _______________________________________________ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
