Time To Abolish Software Patents?

gnujoshua writes "Has the time come to abolish software patents? Fortune columnist Roger Parloff reports on a new campaign called End Software Patents, which he views as 'attempting to ride a wave of corporate and judicial disenchantment with aspects of the current patent system.' Ryan Paul of Ars Technica writes that the purpose of the campaign is to 'educate the public and encourage grass-roots patent reform activism in order to promote effective legislative solutions to the software patent problem.' The campaign site is informative and targets many types of readers, and it includes a scholarship contest with a top prize of $10,000.00. We've recently discussed the potential legal re-examination of software patents."

Now it's personal!

[Anonymous Coward]

Ok so we've established that software should be an exception to the rule that he who creates something novel shouldn't be rewarded. Any other fields of endevour we should exempt? Not that anyone here doesn't have a personal stake in the outcome.

Re:Software patents aren't the problem

[Anonymous Coward]

Which shoots 'free market' in the face worse than patents do now.

Unused patents should simply expire.

Re:Now it's personal!

[somersault]

So then someone can come along, change 1% of the design and sell it as their own? I'm thinking of cars as usual. In software's case, the final product is protected by copyright rather than patents. Individual methods are protected by patents. AFAIK America only introduced software patents in the 90s and things have gone downhill over there since then.

Re:Now it's personal!

[Anonymous Coward]

I agree, very fundamental things in software should be left unpatentable (mathematical calculations, basic operations, etc.), but for the application as a whole, maybe it would be acceptable. Don't we have copyright for things like that though? Software is technically a "work of art".

Re:Software patents aren't the problem

[louks]

The only time a licensing request should be denied is in the case of gross misconduct of the licensee or if the licensee is a direct competitor to whom providing the patent would materially damage the patent holder.

I believe companies blocking 'direct competition licensing' would create as much litigation as infringement does now...

Case in point [wired.com], isn't nearly everyone who could use the "Pinch Technology" a direct competitor?

Re:Cure worse than disease

[CastrTroy]

My biggest problem with software patents is that most of the don't provide a working model. If you want to patent the software, you should have to provide all the source code with the patent that shows your "invention" working. I don't like how software gets 3 kinds of legal protection where anything else in the world only gets one. With software you get trade secrets, because you never have to release your source code. You also get copyright, so the relased binaries (or source code if you choose to release it) can't be copied unless specific permission is given. You also get patent protection. No other thing produce by people gets so much legal protection. My biggest problem with software patents is that they are mostly given on trivial inventions, where any skilled developer faced with the same problem would come up with a very similar solution.

Re:copyright too..

[Peaker]

You have a leap in your logic.
As one who opposes software copyrights, I use the GPL and not the BSD license.

As long as copyright exists, we use it, via the GPL, to prevent others from using it.
When copyright does not exist, the GPL is not necessary, and then the "BSD license"-style freedom takes place.

Choosing the BSD, rather than the GPL is the choice that reflects support of copyright -- it lets others use copyrights on derivatives of your work! If you do not support copyrights, disallow others from using copyright to restrict your software.

Those of us who oppose software copyrights are also pro-GPL, and I do believe Stallman is also in this crowd.

Re:Weigh the options.

[CastrTroy]

The problem with software patents is that anything that's really novel, like your impossible compression algorithm is basically a mathematical algorithm. Since you can't patent mathematical algorithms, there shouldn't be any need for software patents. I'm not sure if I've ever seen anything really inventive in software that wasn't a mathematical algorithm. There's patents on things like one-click shopping, which aren't mathematical algorithms, but which aren't really all that novel either. And then there's patents that are inventive, like GIF compression, MP3 Compression and others, but which fall under the umbrella of mathematical algorithms.

Re:Cure worse than disease

[evilviper]

And if something can be easily re-implemented (i.e. CSS/deCSS), then does it really deserve the ability to stifle all competitors like patents do ?

It's pretty easy to "re-implement" newly developed pharmaceutical drugs as well...

The cost of development of both drugs and mathematical concepts (software) can be extremely high. And if you don't give companies the options of patents to protect their developments, you can immediately say goodbye to all open standards and scientific sharing. It'll all instantly switch to undocumented and obfusticated binary-only code. And since reverse engineering is simply too easy, the only workable model will be to create a new product with the advent of each incremental improvement they come up with. The cost of developing something advanced like H.264 can't exactly be covered by selling support books...

How do you think the world would have been if Ford had patented the assembly line ?

How do you think the world would have been if the Wright brothers had patented the airplane?

Oh, that's right, they did... Not only did their patents NOT drag the industry down, it spurred the development of alternate ways to achieve flight, which soon after gave us the methods we know and use today... That nice new Boeing 787 doesn't exactly use "wing warping" now does it?

And I should point out that DVD-CSS is NOT patented, and the assembly line no doubt would not have been unique enough to be patented, or at least would have had more than enough prior art in slaughter houses to invalidate it quickly.

Re:copyright too..

[Dog-Cow]

The parent you replied to blindly and stupidly assumes that if copyright did not exist in Law that all software developers would magically decide to release the source. You and I know that if copyright Law were to be abolished, source code would be treated as Trade Secrets by those who don't currently believe in Free Software.

Re:Now it's personal!

[deanlandolt]

There are lots of things which can't be patented - mathematics, scientific discoveries[*], plot devices in novels or films, methods of trolling Slashdot.

Sadly, you, sir, are incorrect [techdirt.com].