Linked by Jordan Spencer Cunningham on Tue 6th Oct 2009 21:43 UTC, submitted by Moulinneuf
The patent wars rage on. Eolas, a company that before won US$585 million from Microsoft in 2003 in a suit that challenged the use of ActiveX and AJAX, is now after twenty-three separate companies allegedly because their precious patent was spoiled by all of them.
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Member since:2008-07-15
No, "we people" in the US don't all believe this is how things should be. However, the thing you must understand about the US is that big business and industries rule in all but name these days. If you've got enough money you can do whatever the hell you want and the consequences be damned since you'll never see any consequences other than perhaps a slap on the wrist from time to time. Politics and big money, that's what has resulted in this crazy situation... well that, and the average person being dumbed down to the point where as long as they have their TV and sports they're happy.
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Member since:
2006-09-22
IANAL, but how do patents actually work? I mean, who reviews these things? Software patents are specially tricky things because of the very important distinction between the algorithm and the actual implementation.
But my question is: Who decides if a patent is valid or not? A group of specialists on the matter, a bunch of random people...? I'm asking this because, reading through a few patents I can't help but imagine that it would be actually possible to patent "Process of doing stuff with a computer" and then start lawsuits again pretty much everyone near something that computes stuff.
And I just don't get people saying "Hey, the laws don't penalize this, so it's allright". So, the fact that such... douchebaggery isn't illegal makes it automatically legal and ethical? Laws are always right and the end-all-be-all of reason and common sense?
Do you people from the USA really think this is the way things should be?
I'm sorry but I just don't get it.