[OT] Free software versus software idea patents

[Terry Reedy]

On 4/12/2011 4:15 AM, harrismh777 wrote:

Anyone here who does not understand how absurd software patents can get 
should contemplate the following (based on a real patent from about 20 
years ago, when CDroms were new.

A Methods for Ensuring that the Correct CDROM is in the CDROM drive.

While the correct cdrom is not in the drive:
   Display a message asking the user to insert the correct CD.

Buried in a page of verbiage, that was it, completely obvious and 
unoriginal.

> That is what made the last Supreme Court decision (from this argument in
> part) so important... because for the first time the U.S. Supreme Court
> is beginning to buy it ... in part.

What might help lawyers understand the obsurdity of software patents 
would be to have them contemplate the possibility of patents on laws and 
legal arguments, so that a legislature could not write a law, nor a 
lawyer submit a legal brief, without possibly having to pay royalties or 
violate a patent.

-- 
Terry Jan Reedy