David Honig wrote: > > protection of patent monopolies, > > Individual inventors get patents, what extra rights do > corps get? patent portfolios. a long time ago, in a country not very far away (i.e. the US of A) patents were rare and only granted after extensive examination for really worthy inventions. but ever since the micro-patentism started (i.e. "let's go and get a patent on this line of code, too") a single patent is in most cases pretty much worthless. but a good number of interrelated patents are a different matter, and no single inventor is so inventive that this is a viable path for an individual. > >specially extended copyrights > > Other than the recent digital-millenium-copyright-crap, > and UCITA, what special privledges exist for corps? depends on whether you believe in an afterlife. if you don't, extending copyright to death + XX years is pretty much a corporate advantage. (yes, sometimes it benefits your kids, but reality tells that this is the rare exception, rather then the rule) > >Microsoft would be a whole different company if it did not have the > >benefits given to it by the government as a large corporate entity. > > Zap the government, and microsoft would lose sales to government, > is *all*. Zap the government, and industry would rely on trade > secrets and technical means to protect what patents protected > before. <lol> this made my day. I'm one of the people being sued (i.e. "big daddy government, please hit this guy for me") by the DVD CCA for - guess what - TRADE SECRET "misappropriation". (known better as DeCSS here) looks like neither the technical means nor the "trade secret" works without the government...
