Re: [Patents] Hardware N Software

[John Tobey <jtobey@john-edwin-tobey.org>]

On Tue, Jan 22, 2002 at 08:23:50PM -0500, Gregory Aharonian wrote:
> Silly.  Are you telling me a circuit diagram (especially one in
> VHDL form) isn't pure thought as well?  I mean what is an impure
> thought.

Don't be dense.  Nobody is going to enforce a patent on my reading,
copying, or modifying a circuit diagram.  But they might try to do so
(here in the US) if I use patented software, even if I don't
manufacture anything as a result.

Nice blurb in Scientific American, btw.

    http://www.sciam.com/2002/0202issue/0202patents.html ;(Greg is
    asked to describe four horror patents and selects only one related
    to software, two business-methody, and one biotech.)

The plug for software patentability is subtle, coming at the end:

    "... It shows that the problems of prior art that are common in
    the software and electronics fields affects other fields, such as
    biotech."

What it doesn't show is that the non-problems (i.e. social utility)
with patents that are present in other fields are absent in software.

-- 
John Tobey <jtobey@john-edwin-tobey.org>
\____^-^