"this" side of the atlantic VS "the other" side of the atlantic.

[Chymera]

Specifically software patents. It is risky since many obvious things that cover pretty much anything in software might be used to sue.

This article sums it up well

http://perens.com/Articles/PatentFarming.html

There are many good resources, and I likely can't do them justice with my post here

http://www.groklaw.net/staticpages/i...patentlyabsurd

Free Software and patents, wikipedia has a good entry.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Softwar..._free_software


Hopefully that covers it.

Luckily, (the groklaw page lists them) a couple of cases resulted in these "obvious" patents being weakened. However, those with big pockets can still sue and bully. Or a company that produces nothing go after several
companies just to get some cash.

Here is a recent one (if you google I assure you will find MANY)

http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post...ringement.html

och.... i really dont want anything like that anywhere near me.... sounds like someone wanted to pave the way for creating a software monopole of some sort.... and got pretty damn close to doing it