That anti-patent pamphlet I mentioned

[M E Leypold @ labnet]

Arnoud Galactus Engelfriet writes:

 > For me, the economic argument is simply "software can be used
 > to imitate hardware, so if software is unpatentable I can get
 > around patents by simply using software instead". This is

Exactly. That is, as it should be. The original intention with patents
(a privilege temporarily granted to an inventor), was to protect
_methods_, not _results_ or effects. So actually you shouldn't be able
to patent things, but only ways to produce them. You shouldn't be able
reserve the right to _have_ or use horses to yourself or your
company. Of course if you find a new and unique method to produce
horses, or a new method to use horses to build a spaceship: You can
patent that.

In my opinion the source of all the confusion is, that people started
to think about data, services and so on as 'things', and also forgot
that only _methods_ should be patentable.

I hope I'm understandable.

Regards -- Markus


 > unfair to patent holders and hence software that imitates
 > hardware should be protected by the patent.