Paul> Unfortunately, the 17 years or so that patents last is many
> generations in computer technology time.
Hmmm... Both copyrights and patents were granted as privileges, not rights,
as an incentive to advance state-of-the-art. But that use has been
corrupted as of late. Today it has become a tool that thwarts innovation at
society's expense, to feed the pockets of a few. Usually, the actual
inventor is rarely compensated for billion-dollar idea.
Wonder how Brian Kernighan, Dennis Ritchie, and Ken Thompson are doing?
http://www.bell-labs.com/history/unix/
Here's a history of UNIX. You'll notice it grew, until commercial interests
of large companies resulted in the "UNIX wars". The result was POSIX - an
IEEE standard based on UNIX. The government required POSIX (couldn't
require UNIX, since it came from a single vendor - AT&T). Microsoft designed
NT to meet POSIX, and while the UNIX guys were preoccupied with each other,
Microsoft (claiming to aim for Novell) became the Server OS market leader.
Then there was this student from Finland... And history begins to repeat.
Will Linux fork, and will we see the "Linux wars"?
What would happen if the government created a software patent - 3 years of
protection, then the code gets opened - and gave it (and open source)
preference for all taxpayer-funded projects? Thoughts?
Ken Elliott
=====================
-----Original Message-----
From: slug@nks.net [mailto:slug@nks.net] On Behalf Of Bill Canaday
Sent: Sunday, May 09, 2004 11:07 PM
To: slug@nks.net
Subject: Re: [SLUG] .net on Linux
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1
On Sunday 09 May 2004 10:39 pm, you wrote:
> On Sun, May 09, 2004 at 10:53:48AM -0400, Ken Elliott wrote:
> > That's the good news. Here's the bad news...
> >
> > http://news.com.com/2100-1001-984052.html
>
> This is one of the reasons patents only last a limited time, unlike
> copyrights. (Well, copyright lifetime is limited as well, but _much_
> longer.) If companies could lock down patents for decades, they would
> effectively have monopoly status for that amount of time.
> Unfortunately, the 17 years or so that patents last is many
> generations in computer technology time.
>
> Paul
It would make sense to me to extend a software patent for perhaps 3 years, 5
if renewal is unopposed (unlikely if the idea was worth anything to start
with). That was the approximate lifetime of software prior to patents.
Bill
- --
http://cannaday.us (genealogy)
http://organic-earth.com (organic gardening) Uptimes below for the machines
that created / host these sites.
23:05:00 up 4 days, 8:54, 4 users, load average: 0.46, 0.27, 0.21
22:58:00 up 4 days, 6:59, 3 users, load average: 0.00, 0.00, 0.00
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.2.3 (GNU/Linux)
iD8DBQFAnvHcSvjcx4uv21sRAgvCAJ9HbuyBDoONKvnc+KqnCyQ7+uj6qQCfZMhJ
xtqAV3egQm3p8HYpuJA8Bxo=
=bZ9Q
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
This list is provided as an unmoderated internet service by Networked
Knowledge Systems (NKS). Views and opinions expressed in messages posted
are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official policy
or position of NKS or any of its employees.
--- Outgoing mail is certified Virus Free. Checked by AVG anti-virus system (http://www.grisoft.com). Version: 6.0.651 / Virus Database: 417 - Release Date: 4/5/2004----------------------------------------------------------------------- This list is provided as an unmoderated internet service by Networked Knowledge Systems (NKS). Views and opinions expressed in messages posted are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of NKS or any of its employees.
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.3 : Fri Aug 01 2014 - 18:05:50 EDT