Patents
AT&T claims that one of its video patents is
infringed by MPEG-4, the standard video compression technology, and is now
pushing for licensing and royalties from every company that uses
it.Software patents are evil. They
are theoretically supposed to encourage innovation. In practice they stifle it.
And I dare anyone to find a single useful software innovation that was developed
with patents that would not have been developed -- faster --
without.I have personally canceled
software projects (including a cool Mac Photomosaic program) because of
potential patent infringement. Who does this
benefit?And for heaven's sake, there's
a patent on waving
a laser in front of a cat to exercise it. Software and business method
patents were illegal before 1990, and they should be abolished again. It was an
interesting -- if ill-fated -- experiment, but it needs to end.
Now.
Filed Fri - February 10, 2006, 08:53 AM in
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