I don't subscribe to this economic hardship argument. There are always costs associated with running a business, so just saying that licensing costs money -- which leads to higher prices -- is pretty pointless.
The real debate should be about what constitutes patentable subject matter. On a fundamental level, should software be patentable?
People who are in business (people who actually make and sell stuff) get letters like this all the time from "inventors" who own patents that aren't much more than expensive wallpaper. Although I'm not a patent attorney, I'm sure that the claims are so ridiculously narrow that the patent is worthless.
Anybody can patent anything so long as the claims are sufficiently narrow, and at some point it becomes a worthless joke of patent. Right off the bat, the fact that it's a method patent indicates that there is probably no value there. Ironically, the guy who wrote the letter thinks that method is good.
These patents get through because they just can't find any prior art to side against them, but that doesn't mean that there valuable. Joke patents are not the biggest problem the patent office has.
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(untitled comment)
The real debate should be about what constitutes patentable subject matter. On a fundamental level, should software be patentable?
(untitled comment)
Anybody can patent anything so long as the claims are sufficiently narrow, and at some point it becomes a worthless joke of patent. Right off the bat, the fact that it's a method patent indicates that there is probably no value there. Ironically, the guy who wrote the letter thinks that method is good.
These patents get through because they just can't find any prior art to side against them, but that doesn't mean that there valuable. Joke patents are not the biggest problem the patent office has.
Techdirt has not posted any stories submitted by freestewart.
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