Little-known intellectual property agency IP Innovation LLC and its parent Technology Licensing Corporation this week became the latest to claim that Apple had abused a patent they hold. Filed April 18th in a US district court in Marshall, Texas the four-page formal complaint purports that Apple has engaged in 'willful and deliberate' infringement of a computer control patent by selling its current Tiger operating system. On a related note, Microsoft has similar problems.
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Member since:2006-04-21
Software patents are a terrible idea.
Patents are given to encourage innovation and research and to prevent companies from having to keep their discoveries as trade secrects.
The problem with Software patents is that innovation is already happening at a great rate in the software industry, So it doesn't need encouragement.
Anyone expecting me to join in and have a general rant against software patents better sit down.
You make some good points, but I'm not actually implacably opposed to software patents. But I think they should be limited to somewhere between 2 and 10 years, and should - as you have suggested - be awarded only for innovation. Example: Xerox innovated when they came up with the GUI; but neither Apple nor MS innovated when they came up with the minimize button.
Member since:
2005-08-17
You're missing the point.
Patents are fine (as long as they are actually innovation.)
Software patents are a terrible idea.
Patents are given to encourage innovation and research and to prevent companies from having to keep their discoveries as trade secrects.
The problem with Software patents is that innovation is already happening at a great rate in the software industry, So it doesn't need encouragement.
But the USA patent system is terribly broken because patents aren't getting proper review before being granted.