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UK Developers Quit US App Store Over Patent Fears
iamflimflam1 writes "The Guardian is running a story on how app developers in the UK are withdrawing from the U.S. app store over patent fears. 'The growth of patent lawsuits over apps raises serious issues for all the emerging smartphone platforms, because none of the principal companies involved — Apple, Google or Microsoft — can guarantee to protect developers from them. Even when the mobile OS developer has signed a patent licence — as Apple has with at least one company currently pursuing patent lawsuits — it is not clear that it has any legal standing to defend developers.' This follows a blog post from the iconfactory about the death of independent developers. Have the big corporations really won? What is the future for small teams and one-man-band developers?"
Thats as silly as it gets. If you were right, it would be immoral to build a house for shelter, just because someone else already had the idea to build a house. It would be illegal to make a cheese&bacon-sandwich just because someone else already made one. It's completely ok to build the umpteenth clone of Crush the Castle or Galaga, even if someone else already made one. You just shouldn't claim to be a creative game designer. And so I will my enjoy cheese&bacon-sandwich and continue to live in my house, well aware to be not the first one to ever do so.
This is not a fault of patents per se. This is a fault of the US litigation system. Unregulated lawyer fees, which I agree are ridiculous, the possibility of forum shopping, so everyone ends up in Bumfuck, TX for their patent cases, non-technical judges that have no clue about the engineering aspects of a patent, jury trials, just to make sure that the deciding body has no clue about the matter at hand, and ridiculously overblown damages. The US patent system differs from the European one, but not so much as to hurt. What hurts is the difference in litigation. Over here in Europe I have seen small inventors going after global corporation over their patents - successful and on a budget. I have seen patent cases to the highest national court for a total cost in the low five figures. That won't kill a small business. Pushing the litigation costs before damages in the millions - that kills the small guys. Regulate your lawyers, guys.
Ubi solitudinem faciunt, pacem appellant.
There are too many humans to allow the continued allocation of one idea to a person. We have too many eyes now for this system to provide benefit. Very few human ideas are both unique to that human and a benefit to mankind.
Good-bye