Re: [xml-dev] Another Microsoft XML patent

[Alan Gutierrez <alan-xml-dev@engrm.com>]

* Kurt Cagle <kurt.cagle@gmail.com> [2005-06-06 17:30]:

> >     We spend x billion a year on research and development. How can
> >     you tell us that our application approval pivots on the consesus
> >     of a newsgroup.

> Not the CONSENSUS of a newsgroup ... only its ability to provide
> DISCOVERY. The decision is still, ultimately, in the hands of the
> patent arbiter. All that opening up this process would do is to insure
> that if prior art existed that it could be brought forth through a
> normal discovery process. This is done by the W3C all the time when
> they are attempting to insure that the patents that they are filing do
> not infringe existing patents.

    Yes, yes.

    But, don't you just know the press release is going to say it?

    The huge patent portfolios of the large corporations are such
    that the patents lend validity to each other. The well funded
    research departments lend validity to the patents they produce.

    I can hear it now. We spend so much money on this, we fuel
    innovation, we take risks, we don't want our competitors
    influencing the patent approval process.

    The money spent on research is how big phrama justifies its
    patents on medicine, even when lives depend on that medicine to
    be generic, they argue that the innovation of new medicine
    requires patent protection.

    Brace yourself for similiar arguments from big software, as
    specious as they may be when applied to software.

--
Alan Gutierrez - alan@engrm.com
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