-----Original Message----- From: IBM Mainframe Discussion List [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Kirk Wolf Sent: Tuesday, March 11, 2008 6:00 PM To: IBM-MAIN@BAMA.UA.EDU Subject: Re: Legal Issues with WEB
I'm not familiar with the specific patents in question, but it should be obvious by now that nearly all software patents are either stupid, obvious or both. Big companies that hold huge portfolios of these stupid things trade them with other big companies to the net effect of building legal barriers that prevent small companies from building and selling software. The end consumer pays more for crappy software while the lawyers clean up. Google your favorite software company and read some of their ridiculous patents for yourself. Here's a stupid one: http://www.freepatentsonline.com/6981278.html <SNIP> I was involved in defending against a patent that had been granted -- the patent appeared to me to violate an existing patent, and what it claimed I could demonstrate that NETVIEW had been doing for years. The problem with these things are, once granted, the owner is presumed righteous and all costs to quash it are born by the challenger. It then becomes a form of legal extortion. Regards, Steve Thompson -- All opinions expressed by me are my own and may not necessarily reflect those of my employer. -- ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with the message: GET IBM-MAIN INFO Search the archives at http://bama.ua.edu/archives/ibm-main.html
