On Fri, 2009-02-20 at 17:01 -0600, Lindsay Haisley wrote: > On Fri, 2009-02-20 at 16:54 -0500, Chris Hoogendyk wrote: > > Perhaps just because someone has the Chutzpah to try to patent it and > > the patent office hasn't a clue. Technology of all sorts has moved too > > quickly for the patent office and/or the patent laws to keep up. Another > > example is a U.S. company that uses recombinant DNA to put an unusual > > color in a bean. Then they patent it and sue a Mexican company and block > > imports of a bean that the Mexicans have been growing for generations. > > That's just nucking futs. > > Sounds like Monsanto at work. > Exactly.
Two words: prior art. If the US patent office had the balls to enforce that clause then it wouldn't be necessary to argue about software patents. Knuth would invalidate most of them and Hopper would have put paid to most of the rest. Another point: IIRC[1] the patent is required to describe an invention in enough detail to allow a 3rd party to make the patented item. If *that* was enforced then a whole bunch of speculative patents would die when the claimant would be unable to show a working model built from the patent description. [1] I know this applies to British patents but am uncertain whether it still applies to US patents. If it doesn't, it ought to. Martin
