Stallman Critical of OSDL Patent Project

PatPending writes to mention a News.com article about Richard Stallman's objections to the OSDL patent project. He argues that the project may actually be 'worse than nothing', as it will undermine certain legal tactics. From the article: "'Thus, our main chance of invalidating a patent in court is to find prior art that the Patent Office has not studied,' Stallman wrote. Second, patent applicants could use the prior art uncovered by the OSDL to write patent claims that simply avoid the technologies used in the tagged software. 'The Patent Office is eager to help patent applicants do this,' Stallman wrote. Finally, he wrote, a 'laborious half measure' such as the Open Source as Prior Art project could divert attention from the real problem: that software is patentable in the first place."

Comments

Re:Playing the odds

[andrewdski]

"640K is more memory than anyone will ever need" - Richard Stallman, 9/14/1988

He can't have said that. GNU Emacs never fit in 640K.

Ooh! Let me try!

[s20451]

If an emu defecates on your azaleas, do you run for President, or do you weep for all humanity?

Re:Moral correctness is not enough

[codehead78]

Dude, cloning existing good software, assigning it a 0.1 version number, giving it away for nothing, and telling everyone they should be using the clone instead is what Open Source is all about.

Re:Playing the odds

[Just Some Guy]

Actually, I lost the exact code I sent out, but here's the original template I wrote.  The Python program I wrote when my youngest daughter was born actually compiled and ran.

---- baby.c ----
/* This code is distributable under the terms of the GPL.  However, I *
* retain full rights to its output for up to eighteen years.         */

#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
#include <unistd.h>

void main()
{
    void *a = malloc((size_t) weight);
    sleep(270 * 24 * 60 * 60);
    if (fork())
    {
        free(a);        /* Ouch, that hurt */
        my.weight -= 20;
        wait();
    }
    else
    {
        my.length = 18;     /* Inches */
        my.weight = 101;    /* Ounces */
        printf("Hello, world!\n");
    }
}
--------