The Patent Epidemic

cheesedog writes "BusinessWeek is running an editorial titled The Patent Epidemic, which chronicles not only how abusive and absurd our patent system has become for software and business method patents, but how it hurts even traditionally innovative fields such as the automobile industry. Interesting commentary can be found in the regular places, with Right to Create suggesting action you can take to stem the spread of this epidemic, and Patent Prospector attempting to refute BusinessWeek's arguments."

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Best quote from the article

[Billosaur]

From Business Week: Old Economy companies face similar trouble. Apparel maker VF Corp., for instance, regularly gets letters complaining it has infringed bra patents. "In the old days you would think of these things as the tinkering of a technician who knew his way around women's apparel...and wouldn't even think about getting a patent on it," says Peter Sullivan, the attorney who filed the brief in the KSR case on behalf of VF and others. "How many bra patents can you possibly have?"

That says it all.