The Death of Nearly All Software Patents?

"The Patent and Trademark Office has now made clear that its newly developed position on patentable subject matter will invalidate many and perhaps most software patents, including pioneering patent claims to such innovators as Google, Inc. In a series of cases including In re Nuijten, In re Comiskey and In re Bilski, the Patent and Trademark Office has argued in favor of imposing new restrictions on the scope of patentable subject matter set forth by Congress in article 101 of the Patent Act. In the most recent of these three — the currently pending en banc Bilski appeal — the Office takes the position that process inventions generally are unpatentable unless they 'result in a physical transformation of an article' or are 'tied to a particular machine.'"

http://yro.slashdot.org/yro/08/07/24/1458215.shtml

My current favorite comment in the comments there:

By that same logic, doesn't that void patenting genes as well, as Genes are natures version of software?

Click to expand...

I hope this is a sign that the patent office will stop granting patents on knowledge & the way the universe already works and get back to their original charter.

Thanks for the heads-up!

Someone on slashdot already commented: the huge monies (lobbyists...) tied up in SW patents are going to come out swinging against this one. I'll believe it when I see it; and I expect some legislation upcoming soon to preserve the status quo...

What wonderful news!

I can think of nothing sillier than the idea that an idea can be said to belong to only one person, regardless of how many people have the same idea.

Daniel

Well software is a good start to much needed patent reform. Hopefully genetic patents will be invalidated soon too as well as other types of imaginary property.

Keep in mind that the PTO does not set the 35 U.S.C Section 101 Patentable Subject Matter legal standard. It was, in fact, the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (the Federal Appellate court for the bulk of patent related matters) in State Street that got the law to where it is. The PTO has slowed the prosecution of such patents with a number of devices, but again, they do not decide the scope of the law. In re Bilski will result in an en banc Federal Circuit decision regarding Section 101. But that may not be the end of it. The Supreme Court has taken a number of cases on appeal in key areas of the patent law (injunction presumptions in eBay, Section 103 Obviousness in KSR, are two major examples) from the Federal Circuit and reversed them dramatically changing the way some of the law works.
Note also the PTO's recent attempt to promulgate new regulations relating to prosecution (for example limiting the number of continuation applications) has been enjoined by a District Court in the EDVA. So in general, the PTO is perhaps not the best place to look for "reform."

I'd imagine it would get pretty unworkable if you didn't straighten this all out.