Federal Court Srikes Down Software Patents
This is kind of a big deal, as several games and game technologies have had patents issues on them over the years.

Federal Circuit Decides Software No Longer Patentable

To be completely honest - while my name has been on some patent applications in the past with some former businesses - I actually don't think this is a bad thing, and I hope this decision holds up. The system has been horribly abused in recent years. Rather than protecting a small inventor from predatory, better-financed companies who could beat him (or her) to market, it has become used by those predatory companies as an offensive, anti-competitive weapon.

Update: As pointed out in the comments, this may not be the sweeping end-of-the-world-to-the-software-patent-industry destruction that several patent lawyers on some sites are making it out to be. Bummer. It's a bit more limited in scope, but still a pretty interesting change in how patent law gets applied to software.

Case in point, a couple of years ago several indie software developers (and bigger firms) were told that their Solitaire games on the computer infringed on some soon-to-expire computer Solitaire patent --- never mind a mountain of prior art that existed previous to the patent's issuance --- and that they all had to pay some hefty licensing fee to the legal office that had bought the patent. Somehow I don't think Microsoft paid up... (though they are one of the biggest offenders in building up a colossal stockpile of questionable patents).

I'm a diehard defender of software copyrights - naturally, since it is what feeds my children - but software patents are a whole 'nother can of worms.

Labels: Biz, Politics

- posted by The Rampant Coyote @ 10:39 AM (Permalink)