Funny fact about US software patents:
- software can be patented
- math cannot be patented
- all software is basically math
(very simple interpretation, but it scales)
- software can be patented
- math cannot be patented
- all software is basically math
(very simple interpretation, but it scales)
Charcoal burns and produces heat. Water boils when heated. It produces steam. Steam has a larger volume. The increase in volume can move a piston. A piston attacked eccentrically to a wheel causes it to rotate about its axis.
All these things are natural facts that cannot be patented. But put them together to solve the problem of turning fossil fuels into mechanical energy, and you've got a steam engine.
The difficulty with complaining that patenting software is patenting math is the difficulty of complaining that patenting steam engines is patenting facts of nature. The patent is for the application of facts to solve problems, and that applies equally to facts of math as it does to facts of nature.
Now patents may be a bad idea, or perhaps a good idea badly executed, but that is a different argument. I assert that if you can patent the application of nature to create a steam engine, you ought to be able to patent the application of math to create a program.
But this is all theory. What's patentable isn't what you read in statute or SCOTUS opinions. What's patentable is whatever can cause you legal troubles.
It seems to me obvious that the software "machine" which encodes or decodes video should be a patentable device. The trouble has less to do with patentability of software in general, and more with a) the lifespan of the patents, b) the ease with which they are acquired, and c) the time and money required to oppose and strike down a patent which should never have been granted in the first place.
- Books can be copyrighted
- Words can't be copyrighted
- All books are basically words
Though I think you can make a much stronger case than the OPs simple analogy.
His argument is weak, but you are attacking something else.