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Petition update, 26 February 2007

More details from petition creator

Software patents are used by convicted monopolists to threaten customers who consider using rival software. As a result, patents stifle innovation.

Patents are supposed to increase the rate of innovation by publicising how inventions work. Reading a software patent gives no useful information for creating or improving software. All patents are writen in a sufficiently cryptic language to prevent them from being of any use. Once decoded, the patents turn out to be for something so obvious that programmers find them laughable.

It is not funny because the cost of defending against nuicance lawsuites is huge.

The UK patent office grants software patents against the letter and the spirit of the law. They do this by pretending that there is a difference between software and 'computer implemented inventions'.

Some companies waste money on 'defensive patents'. These have no value against pure litigation companies and do not counter threats made directly to customers.

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• Philip Pratt
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