On Fri, 2011-05-06 at 19:01 +1000, Erik Christiansen wrote: > On Thu, May 05, 2011 at 08:29:00PM -0500, R. van Twisk wrote: > > > > Mark, I partially agree with you, > > what if I (as a person) invent something great, but I don't have the > > resources > > to back it up. Then I am going to be a poor puppy. > > If you have evidence of making the thing before, then you can continue > to make and sell it. Dated laboratory notebooks have served that purpose > in the past. If you've been selling it, or otherwise gone public, then > your "prior art" can totally invalidate the patent. (For those of us who > can't afford patenting costs, or think the invention isn't worthy of > patenting, then cutting off parasites, by putting it in the public > domain, may be our only comfort.) > > Google has just been in the courts over a "garbage collection in linked > lists" patent. To me that sounds a bit like patenting pi. Algorithms and > data manipulations are just "where you drive your cpu" in program-land. > I do not have any way of seeing barbed-wire fences when driving there, > other than look-and-feel, i.e. copyrightable product appearance and > identity. But then, for our own use there are none. > > Since FOSS isn't sold, its private use cannot readily be stopped by > patents. Can't we just ignore them? > > > I kinda like the system in Europe, there are no software patents there, > > and thee is no such thing 'Let me make a patent of swiping a finger across > > a display to do whatever action'. > > We had that here in Australia, until a "Free Trade Agreement" with USA set > numerous restrictions on our trade freedom. (Currently proposed > extensions include allowing US companies to sue our government if future > policy formulations impact in any way on corporate profitability.) > > Patents are currently used to restrict competition, not advance human > knowledge. > > Erik > Originally, patents were supposed to lapse in 17 years. However, greed has triumphed and they now can be extended. I have heard of cases where the inventor didn't apply for a patent; just jumped into the market assuming a 2-3 year product lead would make him safe.
just my tuppence. Dave "Not all that you read on the internet is true" ... A. Lincoln ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ WhatsUp Gold - Download Free Network Management Software The most intuitive, comprehensive, and cost-effective network management toolset available today. Delivers lowest initial acquisition cost and overall TCO of any competing solution. http://p.sf.net/sfu/whatsupgold-sd _______________________________________________ Emc-users mailing list [email protected] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/emc-users
