By way of reporting by Electronista, Judge Richard Posner writes in his blog entry Do patent and copyright law restrict competition and creativity excessively? Posner about how the software industry has completely overreached itself in software patents. I cannot agree more. As we’ve seen in the Apple vs Samsung trial, patents are granted for non-innovations, such as a bouncing effect when one reaches the bottom of a list on a smart phone.
Apple makes for a convenient poster child for this, but they are not alone. Most of these “innovations” are modest tweaks of the work done by others, and the only thing they do is buy time for the company that patents them first, until the time comes that those patents will get tossed. But time is all they need – time to keep other companies from implementing them. This doesn’t even equate to standing on the shoulders of giants.