Software patents are a bad joke, thanks for being one of the pioneers of the worst thing to happen in our field.
If you'd please review https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and stick to the rules when posting here, we'd appreciate it.
Edit: although you haven't been posting often, your previous two comments also broke the site guidelines:
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37714505 (Sept 2023)
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35166528 (March 2023)
We have to ban accounts that post like this, and I don't want to ban you, so if you'd please fix this that would be good.
> I decry the current tendency to seek patents on algorithms. [...] There are better ways to earn a living than to prevent other people from making use of one's contributions to computer science.
The Art of Computer Programming, Volume III ( via https://lwn.net/Articles/132926/ )
At the end of the startup, there was a 20 minute phone call, where I had to decide to either keep my patent and probably ruin my chances to marry the love of my life, or to sign over the patent, take some cash and stock, start my new life with my fiancé, and hope that I could come up with another patent that good later in my life. I chose wisely.
What's more important is if you're doing something good with whatever gains a patent may be providing you; but I also what detriment there may be and how much in fact your patent (and others) actually suffocate and slow the advancement of humanity and the quality of life for all.
But if that's your baseline, can I come with a Colt and shoot you in the back? "If I had been Agnus McVee..."
And BTW, James Marshall died penniless in a hut. The gold rush destroyed his business (a mill) and he never found gold again.
1. You're basically patenting algorithms, which aren't supposed to be patentable.
2. There seems to be an assumption that anything new is unobvious and therefore patentable. And in computing that isn't really the case.
I have no programming training but still independently invented lz compression. Something that is deemed patent worthy.
3. A patent is supposed to describe how to actually do the thing. Software patents by and large don't do that.
2. Again, why is that different for hardware?
I really wonder why my friends who studied mechanical engineering have the privilege of making money with their inventions, while I cannot ...
A piece of hardware designed with a ruler and protractor is indistinguishable from one designed on a computer.
Re 2. If you 'invented' some trading cards based on HN members. That would be new in the sense that it's never been done before. But that doesn't make it patentable. We all have a sense that that's just an obvious iteration on a theme. But trading cards based on HN members, on a computer somehow becomes patentable.
You can make money from your invention. There's still copyright. If you want to take an algorithm and turn it into an actual product, provide an implementation then I'm not averse to patenting.
Currently we're in a situation where you could come up with the idea of listening to music 'on a computer' patent that very broad, basic thing. Without putting any work into an actual implementation.
That isn't an invention, it's just an idea.
Maybe that should be the requirement then, instead of saying "software patents cannot exist, but hardware patents can".
Hardware patents just cover algorithms that have steps involving arranging atoms.
>2. There seems to be an assumption that anything new is unobvious and therefore patentable. And in computing that isn't really the case.
It isn't really the case in anything. That no one has bothered to patent yellow wrenches with beveled edges doesn't mean they should be patentable. That the software equivalent is currently more likely to be granted isn't really an issue with the idea of patenting software.
>A patent is supposed to describe how to actually do the thing. Software patents by and large don't do that.
That's an issue with particular software patents, not one particular to patenting software.
Yes. Further steps have been done. Its the difference between copywriting the idea for a book, and copywriting an actual book.
>That the software equivalent is currently more likely to be granted isn't really an issue with the idea of patenting software
It's an issue with the current incarnation of software patents.
That's like saying IC cars aren't bad for the environment because we 'could' fuel them all with biofuels and have a carbon capture thing on the exhaust.
In the real world an IC car can rightfully be criticised for being bad for the environment.
>That's an issue with particular software patents, not one particular to patenting software.
Again, the issue doesn't have to be inherent to be valid.
Only if by "idea for a book" you mean "comprehensive description sufficient to exactly reproduce the book".
>It's an issue with the current incarnation of software patents.
No, it's an issue with the patent office's current process for approving patents.
>In the real world an IC car can rightfully be criticised for being bad for the environment.
Yes, but that doesn't mean a car is worse than a truck.
Potato potahto.
>Yes, but that doesn't mean a car is worse than a truck.
Is the truck a metaphor for hardware patents?
That depends if the trucks actually do run on bio diesel and have a full carbon capture and particulate filter fitted.