I won't try to convince you that the patent system isn't broken. It certainly does seem to violate the original intent of putting technology into the hands of the people while still giving an incentive to inventors. But, software is not different. You can get patents in almost every field with practically no research, ideas only. There are companies that exist with this as their sole purpose. I'll give one example. My favorite is carboxylic acids (citric, lactic, etc.) claimed in combination with anything. Patents issue every day claiming some novelty in mixing carboxylic acids with something else. People have used those since the dawn of civilization, it's ridiculous. How that meets the legal definition of "novelty" I don't know. And yes I have at least one of them and it still seems stupid.
Bookmarks