🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <1992Nov4.035758.1767@netcom.com> mcgregor@netcom.com (Scott Mcgregor) writes:

>I've commented on this before, that the argument about the public good
>raised by patent opponents sometimes seems to run like this:
>
>1) Patents are supposed to benefit the public.
>
>2) I'm a member of the public.
>
>3) I personally would never be motivated by patents to benefit others.
>(Being as I am opposed to them)
>
>4) I personally would be limited/hurt by the limitations. (Because I'm
>the type of person who would independently reinvent, or intentionally
>re-engineer another person's profitable invention).
>
>Therefore, generalizing from my personal limitations and lack of
>benefits, and because I am a member of the public I conclude that the
>public at large won't benefit. And since that conclusion is at odds
>with the goal in 1), patents should be eliminated.

You seem to have either a gigantic blindspot or an intentional tendency 
to ignore:

5)  Being an independent programmer without the financial backing of a
    large software development house, I have neither the legal expertise
    nor the financial resources to produce an acceptable patent application.
    A substantial amount of innovation in the field of software comes from
    small-time, independent programmers who would very often be either
    forced to compromise their interest in their innovations by selling
    their intellectual property interests to a firm that did have the
    resources to pursue a patent or be locked out of protecting their
    rights to their creation if they were either unwilling to compromise
    those rights or unable to interest someone in financially backing them.

    Patents, with the substantial cost of researching and producing an
    application, dramatically favor those market players who have the
    financial resources it takes to get them.  In the software world,
    the richest players are often not the most productive innovators.
    I think that reasonable persons will agree that the tremendous amount
    and variety of innovation produced by the smaller players in the
    game is a Good Thing.  I'll leave it to you to figure out whether
    the public would be well served by a system that puts the independent
    at such a disadvantage that it would often be no longer worthwhile
    for them to try to compete.