Is The Lone Coder Dead?

CyNRG writes "The little guy. The one-person software company. Can it still exist today? That's me. I'm once again, after many years, writing my own commercial software to sell. A few things have changed: the patent feeding frenzy. This is my main concern. My perception is that one must verify that you don't infringe on any patents when developing new cool software, and that the explosion of patents granted by the USPTO has reached epic proportions. If this perception is true, then that makes it almost impossible for the Lone Coder to create something new that doesn't infringe on other patents. The amount of money required to perform the due diligence research seems like it would be greater than the amount of money needed to develop the software, or even the total revenues that the software could ever generate. Please someone tell me I'm wrong!" Is he?

Comments

Re:Count me as a fellow Lone Coder

[flacco]

I'm a fellow lone coder. It's not easy -- you have to stoop to doing stuff like adding gratuitous links to your Slashdot posts. This isn't going to be a popular sentiment here, but I'd say that the GPL and P2P generally make it tougher to make a living.

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Here's what I do: Andromeda [turnstyle.com] MP3 Juke/Server for PHP or ASP

oh yeah, i dimly remember andromeda. i threw it out when i realized that it purposely wouldn't work if i modified the php. and i replaced it with a GPL competitor.

He is now!

[Rui del-Negro]

Is The Lone Coder Dead?

Well, he is now. I walked up to him and he was lying on the ground, covered in blood and with his eyes closed. But I could see was still breathing. So I asked "Are you pretending to be dead, motherfucker? You're fucking pretending you're fucking dead, aren't you?". Since he didn't answer this simple question in plain American, I shot the bastard and put an end to the uncertainty. He's definitely dead now.

Re:He is now!

[Oswald]

Good, 'cause that fucker and his asshole buddies were dangerous, and I would hate to think that I sent you to kill him and you pussied around and ended up dead yourself.

Constitutional Provision Violated

[Baldrson]

The U. S. Constitution -- the first place patents of invention were guaranteed a prominent place in the foundation of a republican form of government -- says this of patents in Article I, Section 8, Clause 8:

To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries;

If the founders, many inventors themselves, saw the way inventors routinely assign their rights to others they would be appalled. This is not to be blamed on the inventors but on a system that removes from inventors the resources necessary for them to defend themselves against acquisitors. This is largely the result of the tax system that rewards acquisition while punishing productivity.

A better system founded on eminent domain rights could be legislated and might work somethnig like the following proposal:

The government should tax net assets, in excess of levels
typically protected under personal bankruptcy, at a rate equal to
the rate of interest on the national debt, thereby eliminating
other forms of taxation. Creator-owned intellectual property
should be exempt.

The levels typically protected by personal bankruptcy can be
approximated by the median price of housing an individual added
to the median capitalization of a job in the economy. Together,
these exemptions add up to between $50,000 and $100,000.
Additional but smaller exemptions may be added to represent the
lower levels of bankruptcy protection typically extended to
children within families.

The NAT is a self-adjusting system that seeks an equilibrium
between government debt levels, current tax rates and private
wealth distribution, without attempting to achieve an outright
balanced budget or direct intervention in the economy.

Under current (1992) asset distribution and government debt the
NAT would generate between $1 trillion and $1.5 trillion in
revenue, thus totally displacing other forms of taxation.