🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <PHR.92Nov17033415@napa.telebit.com> phr@telebit.com (Paul Rubin) writes:

...
   Regarding RSA in particular, remember also that the motivation of
   patents is to provide an incentive to invent: the public gets the
   benefit of the invention in exchange for the inventor getting a
   limited monopoly.  But RSA was invented without this incentive (we
   know this because nobody thought to apply for patents until after the
   invention was already published, which is why it is not patented in
   Europe, where applications must be filed before the invention is
   published).  So in exchange for the monopoly, the public in this
   case got *nothing*.


Oh, I don't know about that.  The European public got rather a lot,
and don't even have to pay royalties.  Come to that, PKP don't even
have a monopoly.  A limited monopoly, limited to within the US, yes.

"The public" != "The population of the US".

Paul
--
Paul Leyland <pcl@oxford.ac.uk>          | Hanging on in quiet desperation is
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Tel: +44-865-273200  Fax: +44-865-273275 | Thought I'd something more to say.