Critic of Software Patents Wins Nobel Prize in Economics

doom writes "You've probably already heard that the Nobel Prize for Economics was given to three gents who were working on advances in mechanism design theory. What you may not have heard is what one of those recipients was using that theory to study: 'One recent subject of Professor Maskin's wide-ranging research has been on the value of software patents. He determined that software was a market where innovations tended to be sequential, in that they were built closely on the work of predecessors, and innovators could take many different paths to the same goal. In such markets, he said, patents might serve as a wall that inhibited innovation rather than stimulating progress.' Here's one of Maskin's papers on the subject: Sequential Innovation, Patents, limitation (pdf).

Comments

Great, but not an actual Nobel Prize

[mmcuh]

There is no such thing as a "Nobel Prize for Economics". There is the "Bank of Sweden Prize in the memory of Alfred Nobel". Nobel himself would never have testamented funds to something as uncool as an economics prize.

"Nobel price"

[Anonymous Coward]

There is no nobel price in economics. There is, however, a price called "The Bank of Sweden Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel".

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nobel_Prize_in_Economics#Controversies_and_criticisms

FFS

[FullMetalAlchemist]

For fucks sake, when will people learn that _THERE IS NO SUCH THING_ as Nobel Price in Economics. It's a price _IN MEMORY OF_ Alfred Nobel. Personally, as a swede, I think the the so called price is a _TOTAL_ fraud. It is rewarded by the swedish central bank; Riksbanken (the oldest in the world by the way); and central banks are by definition fraudulent institutions.