<story><title>Linked list patent</title><url>http://www.google.com/patents?id=Szh4AAAAEBAJ&amp;printsec=abstract</url><text></text></story><parent_chain><item><author>fnid2</author><text>Every time the patent debate comes up, someone links to this patent as the summit of absurdity.  Why not link to this one:  &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.freepatentsonline.com/6368227.pdf&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http://www.freepatentsonline.com/6368227.pdf&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;It&apos;s just as absurd as lots of software patents -- that doesn&apos;t mean &lt;i&gt;all&lt;/i&gt; software patents are absurd.  Some are genuinely novel, unobvious, and valuable.&lt;p&gt;I still don&apos;t understand why someone could patent a physical machine that computes instructions, but not software that does the same thing.&lt;p&gt;It seems like we are throwing the baby out with the bath water. I know patents cause trouble, but what about the case where a patent helps an entrepreneur get the value out of an invention when big corporations steal it, market it, and make money without giving the inventor a dime?&lt;p&gt;There&apos;s good and there&apos;s bad, but it seems like around here there&apos;s only mud slung at software patents.  Some inventors of software algorithms are every bit as clever as inventors of anything else that may get patented.  Why shouldn&apos;t they be treated the same under the law?&lt;p&gt;Equal rights under the law.  That&apos;s the way it should be.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>lutorm</author><text>Do you think mathematicians should be able to patent formulas too? Some are novel, unobvious and valuable.&lt;p&gt;The argument, I believe, is that formulas aren&apos;t &lt;i&gt;invented&lt;/i&gt;, they&apos;re discovered. That&apos;s why I think it&apos;s totally, unequivocally absurd that you can patent genomes. Who &lt;i&gt;invented&lt;/i&gt; the human (or any other naturally occurring life form&apos;s) genome?&lt;p&gt;Just because something&apos;s not obvious or novel doesn&apos;t mean you can patent it. You can&apos;t patent music or poetry, no matter how obvious, novel or valuable it is.&lt;p&gt;At least this example is an implementation detail. That seems more reasonable to me than, for example, UI patents. If someone patents a way to make steel, you are free to make steel any other way you can figure out. The same seems to apply with the implementation detail patents, but with the &quot;multitouch&quot; patent Apple&apos;s suing over, it seems that the question of how HTC has implemented the functionality doesn&apos;t matter because the patent covers the user interaction. And that makes no sense to me. If it&apos;s so genuinely difficult to make, then they can patent the implementation. But patents were meant to cover &quot;the process P which accomplishes B from A&quot;, not &quot;any means of accomplishing B starting with A even if totally unrelated to P.&quot;</text></comment>
<story><title>Linked list patent</title><url>http://www.google.com/patents?id=Szh4AAAAEBAJ&amp;printsec=abstract</url><text></text></story><parent_chain><item><author>fnid2</author><text>Every time the patent debate comes up, someone links to this patent as the summit of absurdity.  Why not link to this one:  &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.freepatentsonline.com/6368227.pdf&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http://www.freepatentsonline.com/6368227.pdf&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;It&apos;s just as absurd as lots of software patents -- that doesn&apos;t mean &lt;i&gt;all&lt;/i&gt; software patents are absurd.  Some are genuinely novel, unobvious, and valuable.&lt;p&gt;I still don&apos;t understand why someone could patent a physical machine that computes instructions, but not software that does the same thing.&lt;p&gt;It seems like we are throwing the baby out with the bath water. I know patents cause trouble, but what about the case where a patent helps an entrepreneur get the value out of an invention when big corporations steal it, market it, and make money without giving the inventor a dime?&lt;p&gt;There&apos;s good and there&apos;s bad, but it seems like around here there&apos;s only mud slung at software patents.  Some inventors of software algorithms are every bit as clever as inventors of anything else that may get patented.  Why shouldn&apos;t they be treated the same under the law?&lt;p&gt;Equal rights under the law.  That&apos;s the way it should be.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>alanthonyc</author><text>Perhaps you can provide a counter example that shows the usefulness of software patents.&lt;p&gt;I personally think they are absurd, as demonstrated by the OP, but am open to changing my thinking if proven wrong.&lt;p&gt;The internet has leveled the playing field for everyone.  But one of the few ways that big corporations can take advantage of their size against smaller, more innovative entities is by throwing money into a legal battle which the smaller entity can&apos;t afford to fight.&lt;p&gt;Equal rights under the law.  But currently, the more money you have, the equaler you get.</text></comment>