[Patents] patent pools enforcing per-copy-licensing mode of software development

[A +W Endres endres-sifi@t-online.de]

Hallo, Mr. Lang,

    I will only comment on your "heart of the problem" this year. I will look
again at this forun next year.

Bernard Lang schrieb:

> But the heart of the problem remains.  Why should society protect your
> invention/discovery/creation/whatever ?  What does society get out of
> it ?  To what length should it go to protect you, given its limited
> resources, rather than do things for other people ?

I could describe it that way: Patenting was introduced in most countries as a
kind of public protection of "X". I go there, if I am afraid of  "Y" and pay
for
the protection. I could imagine other solutions, i.e privately offered ones,
but
I am not sure that you would like those any better. As an analogy, some
people prefer to hire private guards rather than rely on public police
protection.

Society got interested because people believed this would entice people to
communicate that otherwise would be afraid to do so. It is believed that
communication, i.e trade, would help the economy. A booming private
economy produces more tax, etc. Of course, acamedia is no private
economy and most people in academia are motivated different than people
in industry. They learn to communicate, i.e publish, in order to survive.
Most people in industry have no inherent motivation to publish, but lots
of fear. I have been in industry and know this first hand.

Cheers, Al.