Re: Patent clauses in licenses
On Sun, Sep 19, 2004 at 07:17:15PM -0500, John Hasler wrote:
> Glenn Maynard writes:
> > I don't believe that enforcing software patents is a legitimate "legal
> > right" that needs to be protected.
>
> What about hardware patents?
Well, a patent probably doesn't really apply to software at all, but to
algorithms in the software. I think that, more generally, patents which
can be enforced against software are what we mean when we say "software
patents". So, such a patent can probably often be enforced against hardware
as well. The distinction isn't important--I consider the "XOR cursor"
patent[1] to be bogus, regardless of whether it's being enforced against
nested loops, a hardwired circuit board or a big mechanical contraption.
As to whether patents specifically targetting hardware are legitimate, I
don't know--I'm not in that business, so I havn't formed much of an
opinion on them. Those probably aren't relevant here, though.
[1] which I only know of from hearsay and have heard expired
--
Glenn Maynard
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