Same for Mathematics yet they're unpatentable *and* uncopyrightable. Yet innovation goes on.
Mathematical principles are facts that are discovered, they are not analogous to software.
If I patent a mathematical proof, it actively obstructs you from using it to further mathematics.
I can patent my software and that does not prevent you from re-implementing it in a novel way.
I think you can appreciate that just because innovation *can* happen without patents is not necessarily evidence that they should be abolished.
I agree with you 100% - and it just goes to show that there is sometimes no amicable solution and someone has to lose out. I think a lot of people miss this very important point when considering intellectual property rights.
Overall, I think this news is a win for New Zealand. But that doesnt mean all the losers are patent trolls.
Software patents need to get much more stringent, and the terms should be much shorter, but I think it would stifle innovation to disallow them altogether. There are some really innovative things happening all the time in software and they take money and time to research. Amazon's one-click checkout doesnt count.
i think this is indicative of a new business model that is emerging - one of an intangible "service" coupled with, or made possible by, hardware. In this case the service is the cell phone plan, and the handset is the hardware accessory that makes it possible. The problem is that providers want more control over the hardware and how the service is used.
This is perfectly within their rights, but it would have to be clearly spelled out in the contract -- and again, this all gets fuzzy because the business thinks they can control the phone, even though the customer has purchased and legally owns it. For comparison, look at XBox live and the fiasco with modded xboxes.
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Engineering is all mathematics. Does that prove that nothing that is engineered should be patentable?
Its the arrangement and application of the mathematical statements in software that makes it patentable, not the mathematical principles themselves.
I had a fleeting suspicion someone would bring this irrelevant point up...
Same for Mathematics yet they're unpatentable *and* uncopyrightable. Yet innovation goes on.
Mathematical principles are facts that are discovered, they are not analogous to software. If I patent a mathematical proof, it actively obstructs you from using it to further mathematics. I can patent my software and that does not prevent you from re-implementing it in a novel way.
I think you can appreciate that just because innovation *can* happen without patents is not necessarily evidence that they should be abolished.
I agree with you 100% - and it just goes to show that there is sometimes no amicable solution and someone has to lose out. I think a lot of people miss this very important point when considering intellectual property rights.
Overall, I think this news is a win for New Zealand. But that doesnt mean all the losers are patent trolls.
Software patents need to get much more stringent, and the terms should be much shorter, but I think it would stifle innovation to disallow them altogether. There are some really innovative things happening all the time in software and they take money and time to research. Amazon's one-click checkout doesnt count.
i think this is indicative of a new business model that is emerging - one of an intangible "service" coupled with, or made possible by, hardware. In this case the service is the cell phone plan, and the handset is the hardware accessory that makes it possible. The problem is that providers want more control over the hardware and how the service is used.
This is perfectly within their rights, but it would have to be clearly spelled out in the contract -- and again, this all gets fuzzy because the business thinks they can control the phone, even though the customer has purchased and legally owns it. For comparison, look at XBox live and the fiasco with modded xboxes.
Should be an interesting thing to watch for.