Microsoft Seeks Patent On Brain-Based Development

theodp writes "With its just-published patent application for Developing Software Components Based on Brain Lateralization, Microsoft provides yet another example of just how broken the patent system is. Microsoft argues that its 'invention' of having a Program Manager act as an arbitrator/communicator between a group of right-brained software users and left-brained software developers mimics 'the way that the brain communicates between its two distinct hemispheres.' One of the 'inventors' is Ray Ozzie's Technical Strategist. If granted, the patent could be used to exclude others from making, using, or selling the 'invention' for 17 years."

Comments

Re:The patent office - retarding development?

[PopeRatzo]

Having no patenting system would make the whole market far too volatile.

Why? Are you sure this is so or is this idea so ingrained (like the canard about how higher taxes mean a shrinking economy) that we just accept it as conventional wisdom?

And as Shai-kun points out below, software patents are patently ridiculous. If we need an entire legal structure just to make sure a certain segment of society can get rich, maybe that's God's way of telling us that software engineers aren't supposed to get rich.

Wrap your noodles around that for a while.