🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <1992Oct27.182843.8452@newsgate.sps.mot.com> dichter@chdasic.sps.mot.com (Carl Dichter) writes:

   I'm not defending Kodak, or any corporation, large or small. 
   I am defending my right to get rich someday by patenting the "better mousetrap"
   (in software).


FIRST: It was never the intention of the Constitution to make you
rich.  Patents were added to promote innovation and ideas at the
expense of secrecy.  It is only the current state of the legal system
that patents are used as an end rather than a means.

SECOND: There are many reasons why software and mathematical
expression were not, and should not be covered by patents.


   If you want to worry about big corporations, here's some REAL issues to 
   worry about:
   - Look how much money the tobacco companies use to lobby congressmen.
   - Many paper companies are destroying the environment.
   - Remember that the oil companies derailed the Department of Energy from studying
     alternative energy sources (solar, etc).
   - It took boycotts to get tuna companies to stop killing dolphins.
   - American companies claim they can't make cars in the US, but the Japanese can.
   - American companies still don't listen to their employees.
   and many more.

Totally irrelevent to the issue.  You can worry about big companies
and dream of making your big score with a software patent but I am
worried about losing the ability to create software without infringing
on somebody's patent.

   Patents is an issue as charged as Gun Control or Abortion. In Arizona, many gun
   enthusiasts were mad when a law to prevent children from carrying guns
   was put through. Between the absolute extremes of the right of anyone
   to carry any weapons, and totally disarmed citizens, there is a reasonable
   compromise:
   *** Only reasonable people can recognize a reasonable compromise ***

The only real similarity is the question of how much freedom people
should have.  I vote for freedom in all these issues.


jv

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|     | Johnathan Vail     vail@tegra.com     (508) 663-7435
|Tegra| jv@n1dxg.ampr.org    N1DXG@448.625-(WorldNet)
 -----  MEMBER: League for Programming Freedom (league@prep.ai.mit.edu)