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| Authored by: mschmitz on Tuesday, May 08 2012 @ 10:13 PM EDT |
Anyone still remember the Unisys patent on LZW which killed the GIF format?
One of the most bizarre experiences of my life - talking to a Unisys lawyer on
the phone about whether they would tolerate distribution of a GPL licensed
program that was capable of generating GIF format files.
Ripped out GIF and replaced it by PNG. Never looked back.
-- mschmitz
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| Authored by: Gringo_ on Tuesday, May 08 2012 @ 10:34 PM EDT |
By allowing software patents, we allow these
companies to have a
17-year monopoly on an idea.
...and for what? For simply
doing a job expected of any
software engineer? I have been writing software for
twenty
years. During that time, I have come up with endless cool
solutions to
problems I have encountered. If I worked for a
big company (and I don't), I am
sure they would have already
patented many of my algorithms by now. However, I
don't
think my algorithms are any more innovative than many dozens
of other
programmers I have known and respected over the
years. It is just part of the
job. And who knows how many of
those algorithms I developed were really
original, as
opposed to something I had once seen but forgotten where
or
when? [ Reply to This | Parent | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, May 09 2012 @ 12:25 AM EDT |
I saw a patent on extracting files from a corrupted ZIP archive
while searching for material on that topic. After translating
from patentese back to English, Claim 1 read "follow the ZIP file
format specification to scan for file headers, checking that
redundant fields between the file header and central directory
match."
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, May 09 2012 @ 05:15 AM EDT |
You know when heavier-than-air flight really started to take off?
When the patents expired.
Same with steam engines, crankshafts, probably a whole lot more.[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]
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