Re: Leadership, effects on Debian and open source community

[Will Lowe <harpo@UDel.Edu>]

> >patent system was set up mostly to allow the patent owner to collect
> >money,  so anyone who's taken the trouble to file for the patent is
> Actually, that's a misconception.  The purpose of the patent sytem is
> to encourage inventors to publish their inventions.  The inventor does
Right.  It encourages them to publish their inventions,  because it allows
them to make money even if their inventions are public knowledge once
they are published.  It also protects some sorts of things from reverse
engineering (which is actually _against_ the whole "patents encourage
dissemination of ideas" bit),  thereby allowing the owner of the patent to
make money.

	I still say that you wouldn't patent anything unless you were
somehow interested in money -- you might file the patent is so that
somebody else can't come along and make millions on your invention,  even
if you've got no desire to make the money yourself.

                     					Will


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