"Why is software so special that it should be exempt from patents altogether?"
Several reasons.
With a physical patented product, you buy it you can do with it anything you want (except duplicating it, of course). With software, you can't. Heck, if you see a nice patented feature in say Word and you want to exploit that on your Linux/Mac, it won't run. It won't cooperate. And you're not allowed to modify it either. If we'd had software patents in the beginning, you might have had a word processor capable of creating a text with pictures or a word processor capable of creating a text with nice fonts but not both. Fortunately that shit hasn't happened. Why do we need software patents now, all of a sudden, for things that are more minor? Most patent laws have provisions for working the invention in the territory. With software, that is a rather empty thing.
Software is not limited to the physical world. You want to create a real world transistor with an output characteristic of the skyline of Manhattan? Good luck to you. You want it in software? Sure.
A patent requires an invention to be described in terms such that the average person skilled in the art can work it, saving society much research time figuring it out. Software patents barely state more than the actual idea/goal/wish. Coming up with ideas in software is generally easy (compression being an exception). What you wish is what you can program. That's different in the physical world. I want a medicine agains kidney cancer. Now what?
Patents are there to give a proprietor an incentive not to keep his invention secret. If the inventor isn't going to keep it secret anyway, why give a monopoly in the form of a patent? Why create a legal mess people like me (patent attorney) benefit from? You do realise that software patents are so vague that doing a proper search is a terrible headache?
Brrrr, being ruled by the average outcome from a mob of denning-kruger challenged people who think that basing their opinion on the little info in the morning paper qualifies as sensible. I'd rather live in Singapore.
Why not starting to require that politicians qualify for a political position with a tough examination. Logical reasoning, etc. would be part of the curriculum necessary to pass the examination.
No, as it would require common sense, which isn't very common. There's a case where a person couldn't get his fish in a bag of water along because well, the amount of liquid (which could be an explosive, right?) was too much.
Every patent application is published after 18 months. Society may well get information that way before a product is even sold. Every patent application contains a detailed description of how to work the invention and to that end may well contain info you can't learn even if you have the product in hand. (If a patent application doesn't show how to work the invention it is unlikely to be granted. Except software patents, unfortunately). Having a proper description saves quite a bit of time over figuring things out for yourself. Society is saved from the burden of having to re-invent stuff. Other people can make another invention base on the earlier invention and apply for a patent too. Thus they get bargaining power over the original proprietor as that guy isn't to do what the other people came up with too.
I've a client who was confronted with a patent for technology my client would have liked to use. The client then started thinking and came up with something better (and not covered by the patent). Patents can drive innovation.
So, while a patent can stop other people from doing things, it can NEVER stop people from building on that. Apart from that, a patent being a territorial right, there's usually plenty of countries where you can do your thing freely.
I have one of those and the programmer should be shot. Make that at least a dozen of times. After each scan I have to make half a dozen of mouse clicks to get ready for the next scan. Close the floating window. Then it asks me whether I want to throw away the last scan. Why would I want that? And why is it the default? Then you have to go to the dock, right-click (not an ordinary click), select the proper menu item to get the floating window again. AAARrrrrrggghhh.
What it does a nice job at is recognizing single sided and double sided, as well as orientation. OK, deduct two bullets.
It would be nice if people stopped conflating the two. Copyright: World wide by default Patents: Only valid where it is applied for (IF granted) . In view of the cost, most patents are only applied for in 1 country/jurisdiction.
Copyright: No cost to the copyright holder Patents: Applicant must draft costly patent application
Copyright: Never ends in your lifetime or that of your children Patents: End when the proprietor stops paying the renewal fee and in any case within 20 years.
Copyright: Even for DRM where the work will never enter the public domain Patents: The applications are publicly available (for the treasure trove on just about any topic, see for exampole http://espacenet.com/ for everyone world wide (including developing countries).
Copyright: Has to be original (low bar) Patents: Must not only be New, but also Inventive (very high bar; sure, some bad stuff slips through but there are review process/opposition procedures to weed them out if someone is bothered by one). The invention must be described in a way in which an ordinary person skilled in the art can work it (or the patent is null and void).
So, while the patent law is crude, it is working. You don't think that applicants would provide the long explanatory texts that patent applications are if they had no chance of getting protection for their invention, do you? Copyright law, I agree with you: No balance between society and copyright holder. And the balance is shifting in the wrong direction too. If you conflate the two, you make it harder to get something done about copyright law.
If a person of religion x tries to convert a person of religion y, he also tries to stop another believing in their religion. I somehow doubt that it results in the same reaction.
Two points: Why so upset about slave labor in Asia? It is not as if (mainly black) people aren't forced to work at slave wages in the US. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-TpFlOioXys (mainly in the second half of the clip)
If the price of iPhones wasn't reduced by manufacturing at reduced cost, less money would come to the US from sales abroad. Basically it is money that Americans didn't have to work for.
Documented?! OMG, they finally found Mary's medical records? With a picture of her intact hymen during the pregnancy and stuff. Great news. Inform the pope right away, he will be very happy.
Or it was just a mishap in translation or a case of words evolving in meaning over time, and people today prefer the deluded version.
In effective terms a monopoly; being in control. Microsoft didn't get its ass kicked for being a monopoly. Being a monopoly is OK. *Abusing* its monopoly is what got it wrist-slapped in the US and fined in the EU.
It was a perfect job because it allowed me to further my own theories on the universe, which became quite popular. The only thing I forgot to program was that the voice said: "My assistant Bert brought to my attention and proved that....". I may miss the Nobel prize because of that.
I don't get the hang of the./ indentation system, but if you reply to me, here's the background I read the story about the prostitute here (written by Dr. Mohd Dzulhamka Kamaluddin, a Malaysian muslim), for what it is worth: http://www.malaysian-explorer.com/handling-pigs-halal.html
Scientist become famous for discovering things or for disproving things. The fame you'd get for disproving evolution is figuratively speaking beyond measure. None could do it. Science works by providing interlinked support. It is thus no wonder that completely unrelated phenomena (tree rings, radioactive decay, DNA analysis) result in the same findings. Evolution is a fact, not an opinion.
In the Netherlands there was a situation a couple of years ago where a muslim medical student refused to examine fellow male students (medical students practice on each other during their training). You don't want to have qualified doctors who refuse to help because the traffic casualty is of the opposite sex. I read recently a quote that the koran says that a prostitute went to heaven for giving a thirsty dog a drink (which she hauled from a well by climbing down, with the water in her shoe). So, helping a fellow (male) human being should be OK. Or she shouldn't be a doctor.
The students are not asked to like the facts, or to drop their beliefs. They are to meet scientific standards, however. Refusal to look at facts objectively disqualifies you as a scientist. In case of a court case, the students should lose, even in the UK.
To suppress closed mindedness, exams on evolution etc. should be show stoppers. Don't pass them, no graduation. This is science. Can't handle facts? You're in the wrong business. Don't like the facts? Prove them wrong by the rules.
Slashdot Mirror
Thank you both for your suggestions. Storyspace may fit the bill for me.
Bert
Does anyone know easy to use Mac programs to create hypertexted documents?
Bert
Because some people on Slashdot don't like parroted stories. I see complaints about that frequently.
Bert
"Why is software so special that it should be exempt from patents altogether?"
Several reasons.
With a physical patented product, you buy it you can do with it anything you want (except duplicating it, of course). With software, you can't. Heck, if you see a nice patented feature in say Word and you want to exploit that on your Linux/Mac, it won't run. It won't cooperate. And you're not allowed to modify it either. If we'd had software patents in the beginning, you might have had a word processor capable of creating a text with pictures or a word processor capable of creating a text with nice fonts but not both. Fortunately that shit hasn't happened. Why do we need software patents now, all of a sudden, for things that are more minor? Most patent laws have provisions for working the invention in the territory. With software, that is a rather empty thing.
Software is not limited to the physical world. You want to create a real world transistor with an output characteristic of the skyline of Manhattan? Good luck to you. You want it in software? Sure.
A patent requires an invention to be described in terms such that the average person skilled in the art can work it, saving society much research time figuring it out. Software patents barely state more than the actual idea/goal/wish. Coming up with ideas in software is generally easy (compression being an exception). What you wish is what you can program. That's different in the physical world. I want a medicine agains kidney cancer. Now what?
Patents are there to give a proprietor an incentive not to keep his invention secret. If the inventor isn't going to keep it secret anyway, why give a monopoly in the form of a patent? Why create a legal mess people like me (patent attorney) benefit from? You do realise that software patents are so vague that doing a proper search is a terrible headache?
Bert
Brrrr, being ruled by the average outcome from a mob of denning-kruger challenged people who think that basing their opinion on the little info in the morning paper qualifies as sensible. I'd rather live in Singapore.
Why not starting to require that politicians qualify for a political position with a tough examination. Logical reasoning, etc. would be part of the curriculum necessary to pass the examination.
Bert
Which will be released mid to late 2012. So, about the same time or later.
Bert
An Apple boycott would be silly, as just about any other manufacturer (Dell etc.) have their stuff manufactured over there too.
Apple is the first tech industry to join the FLA which is currently visiting China. First impression: Conditions are better than the norm:
http://www.vancouversun.com/business/technology/Apple+iPad+factory+conditions+better+than+norm+agency/6162817/story.html
Bert
No, as it would require common sense, which isn't very common. There's a case where a person couldn't get his fish in a bag of water along because well, the amount of liquid (which could be an explosive, right?) was too much.
Bert
Every patent application is published after 18 months. Society may well get information that way before a product is even sold.
Every patent application contains a detailed description of how to work the invention and to that end may well contain info you can't learn even if you have the product in hand. (If a patent application doesn't show how to work the invention it is unlikely to be granted. Except software patents, unfortunately). Having a proper description saves quite a bit of time over figuring things out for yourself. Society is saved from the burden of having to re-invent stuff.
Other people can make another invention base on the earlier invention and apply for a patent too. Thus they get bargaining power over the original proprietor as that guy isn't to do what the other people came up with too.
I've a client who was confronted with a patent for technology my client would have liked to use. The client then started thinking and came up with something better (and not covered by the patent). Patents can drive innovation.
So, while a patent can stop other people from doing things, it can NEVER stop people from building on that. Apart from that, a patent being a territorial right, there's usually plenty of countries where you can do your thing freely.
Bert
I have one of those and the programmer should be shot. Make that at least a dozen of times. After each scan I have to make half a dozen of mouse clicks to get ready for the next scan. Close the floating window. Then it asks me whether I want to throw away the last scan. Why would I want that? And why is it the default? Then you have to go to the dock, right-click (not an ordinary click), select the proper menu item to get the floating window again. AAARrrrrrggghhh.
What it does a nice job at is recognizing single sided and double sided, as well as orientation. OK, deduct two bullets.
Bert
That's because of the type of pictures you download?
Bert
It would be nice if people stopped conflating the two.
Copyright: World wide by default
Patents: Only valid where it is applied for (IF granted) . In view of the cost, most patents are only applied for in 1 country/jurisdiction.
Copyright: No cost to the copyright holder
Patents: Applicant must draft costly patent application
Copyright: Never ends in your lifetime or that of your children
Patents: End when the proprietor stops paying the renewal fee and in any case within 20 years.
Copyright: Even for DRM where the work will never enter the public domain
Patents: The applications are publicly available (for the treasure trove on just about any topic, see for exampole http://espacenet.com/ for everyone world wide (including developing countries).
Copyright: Has to be original (low bar)
Patents: Must not only be New, but also Inventive (very high bar; sure, some bad stuff slips through but there are review process/opposition procedures to weed them out if someone is bothered by one). The invention must be described in a way in which an ordinary person skilled in the art can work it (or the patent is null and void).
So, while the patent law is crude, it is working. You don't think that applicants would provide the long explanatory texts that patent applications are if they had no chance of getting protection for their invention, do you?
Copyright law, I agree with you: No balance between society and copyright holder. And the balance is shifting in the wrong direction too. If you conflate the two, you make it harder to get something done about copyright law.
Bert
I think it is perfectly true for the variable being equal to 0
Bert
If a person of religion x tries to convert a person of religion y, he also tries to stop another believing in their religion. I somehow doubt that it results in the same reaction.
Bert
Two points:
Why so upset about slave labor in Asia? It is not as if (mainly black) people aren't forced to work at slave wages in the US.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-TpFlOioXys
(mainly in the second half of the clip)
If the price of iPhones wasn't reduced by manufacturing at reduced cost, less money would come to the US from sales abroad. Basically it is money that Americans didn't have to work for.
Bert
Documented?! OMG, they finally found Mary's medical records? With a picture of her intact hymen during the pregnancy and stuff. Great news. Inform the pope right away, he will be very happy.
Or it was just a mishap in translation or a case of words evolving in meaning over time, and people today prefer the deluded version.
Bert
Dutch scientists found something similar. They transplanted poo:
http://www.diabeteshealth.com/read/2010/10/19/6914/transplanted-feces-from-thin-people-improve-insulin-sensitivity-in-people-with-pre-diabetes/
Bert
In effective terms a monopoly; being in control. Microsoft didn't get its ass kicked for being a monopoly. Being a monopoly is OK. *Abusing* its monopoly is what got it wrist-slapped in the US and fined in the EU.
Bert
It was a perfect job because it allowed me to further my own theories on the universe, which became quite popular. The only thing I forgot to program was that the voice said: "My assistant Bert brought to my attention and proved that ....". I may miss the Nobel prize because of that.
Bert
I don't get the hang of the ./ indentation system, but if you reply to me, here's the background I read the story about the prostitute here (written by Dr. Mohd Dzulhamka Kamaluddin, a Malaysian muslim), for what it is worth:
http://www.malaysian-explorer.com/handling-pigs-halal.html
What I wrote was factual story, not judging a religion. But if you want to know something that I base my opinion on, here's a link about my estimate that it holds water:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dbbh1P6DW5I&feature=player_embedded
Bert
Sorry, evolution is a fact.
If you have a basic understanding of biology (and the guts to learn something that might change your view), check out this youtube movie:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TUxLR9hdorI
As a bonus:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7e0Ic03c6f8&feature=related
Scientist become famous for discovering things or for disproving things. The fame you'd get for disproving evolution is figuratively speaking beyond measure. None could do it. Science works by providing interlinked support. It is thus no wonder that completely unrelated phenomena (tree rings, radioactive decay, DNA analysis) result in the same findings. Evolution is a fact, not an opinion.
Bert
The problem is if the system allows for one or a few bad grades.
Personally, I'd hate to see them pass marginally with a C minus (or 6 minus) because they are reluctant to put in the work.
Bert
In the Netherlands there was a situation a couple of years ago where a muslim medical student refused to examine fellow male students (medical students practice on each other during their training). You don't want to have qualified doctors who refuse to help because the traffic casualty is of the opposite sex. I read recently a quote that the koran says that a prostitute went to heaven for giving a thirsty dog a drink (which she hauled from a well by climbing down, with the water in her shoe). So, helping a fellow (male) human being should be OK. Or she shouldn't be a doctor.
Bert
The students are not asked to like the facts, or to drop their beliefs. They are to meet scientific standards, however. Refusal to look at facts objectively disqualifies you as a scientist. In case of a court case, the students should lose, even in the UK.
Bert
To suppress closed mindedness, exams on evolution etc. should be show stoppers. Don't pass them, no graduation. This is science. Can't handle facts? You're in the wrong business. Don't like the facts? Prove them wrong by the rules.
Bert