|
|
|
| Authored by: Anonymous on Monday, June 11 2012 @ 05:08 AM EDT |
Point of order: jetpacks and flying cars *do* exist, and they *do* work.
Unfortunately they are not practical for general use.
A real working jetpack can be seen in the pre-title scene of one of the James
Bond movies, operated by a stunt double of course. The common theme is severely
limited flight time due to limited fuel. Also, mind your heels or they'll get
roasted.
Flying cars fall into two basic categories:
1) Cars with detachable/foldable wings, or planes that fold up compact enough to
fit on the road. These generally make fairly poor examples of both planes and
cars, and require a pilot's licence and a runway to take off.
2) Cars with added vertical-lift thrusters or rotors. These are generally quite
inefficient at flying but make better examples of cars. Unfortunately they
require a *helicopter* pilot's licence to fly.
Proper solutions to the above-mentioned problems would undoubtedly merit patent
protection.[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Monday, June 11 2012 @ 06:20 AM EDT |
And you can't run your computer games in your head because:
1) Your head is too slow at running the program unassisted.
2) The copany selling the game proabbly doesn't want to give you the
easy-to-read version of the instructions, but even if they did, your head is
still too slow on it's own.[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Monday, June 11 2012 @ 10:51 AM EDT |
Basically, you are claiming that anything that affects the real world should be
patentable. That is NOT what the law says, that is NOT what the Constitution
says. Patents are not a right, they are a choice. Society made the wrong
choice and is now paying the price.
1) Why does poorly written software make my life an existential hell?
Abstract things can make your life an existential hell.
2) Why does that so-very-abstract compression algorithm save me oh-so- very real
disk space and network bandwidth?
Abstract things can affect the real world. Abstract art takes up space on the
gallery wall.
3) Why does heavy computation of all that abstract stuff make my PC go all hot
and whiny?
Abstract things can affect the real world. BTW it is actually *erasing* that
requires energy. I doubt that you would agree that clearing memory to zero is a
patent-worthy subject.
4) Why don't we have working examples of other abstract ideas, like jetpacks and
flying cars? (Oh wait, you mean those are ABSTRACT abstract ideas, as opposed to
"only" abstract ideas as covered by the Swype patent?)
There are many many examples of abstract ideas that are useful and used in the
real world. Addition and subtraction are abstract ideas. They are used every
time I pay my restaurant bill. Religion is abstract, yet people claim to use it
every day to determine their course of action. Maybe we should patent
religion?
5) Why do I need a computer to run my games at all? Shouldn't I be able to run
it all in my head?!?
You can. One of the exercises we used to do in school was to
"execute" a program by thinking about it. Mental "programming
running" is crucial to understanding and debugging computer programs.[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Monday, June 11 2012 @ 12:31 PM EDT |
Just very slowly. :-)
As for several of your other questions, software is totally abstract
mathematics. If you're not good at it, mathematics is hard. Mathematics is
still abstract and still unpatentable. Just because it's hard doesn't make it
patentable.[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, June 13 2012 @ 04:19 PM EDT |
<blockquote>Merriam-Webster Dictionary.
Definition of ABSTRACT
1
a : disassociated from any specific instance <an abstract
entity>
b : difficult to understand : abstruse <abstract problems>
c : insufficiently factual : formal <possessed only an
abstract right>
2
: expressing a quality apart from an object <the word poem
is concrete, poetry is abstract>
3
a : dealing with a subject in its abstract aspects :
theoretical <abstract science>
b : impersonal, detached <the abstract compassion of a
surgeon — Time>
4
: having only intrinsic form with little or no attempt at
pictorial representation or narrative content <abstract
painting>
</blockquote>
<p>
The definition of abstract in the context of patent law is
either definition 1b (applicable to software patents in that
the patentable ideas are difficult to understand from the
code), and/or definition 1a - lacking the
ability/specificity for practical application (not for
software patents because anything that can be expressed in
code that can run obviously has application).
<P>
In the UK in the past patent law explicitly excluded
patenting of software because it was "abstract". This is
proof that the meaning of abstract in UK law at least, that
"abstract" in patent law means obscure because it is
difficult to understand/link the patent claims to the code.
[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]
|
|
|
|
|
