Great!
Software patents as a concept can still burn in hell.
As a kid, I wanted to be a lawyer and was also into computers, so I thought software patent law would be a good fit. About a year into my undergrad in CS I realized how terrible software patents are, so I ended the law ambition.
Screw software patents.
Patents in general should have mandatory licensing, because there’s no artistic concern. You did something clever? Great, here’s a pile of money. All you care about is the height. Do not hold us back.
Holding back software for twenty years is obscene. Twenty years ago, mobile gaming meant the Game Boy Advance. Twenty years before that, IBM PCs were still 5 MHz in 4 colors. Twenty years before that, microprocessors hadn’t been invented.
I disagree w/ mandatory licensing, because that gets complicated fast (i.e. what’s a reasonable price for licensing that patent?).
Instead, I think we should significantly limit patent duration. I think 5-7 years is a reasonable duration for a patent, with an optional, one-time renewal based on need (i.e. a pharmaceutical that won’t hit the market until after the patent is up). So you apply and get 5-7 years from the date the application is accepted (not patent granted), and then if you can’t reasonable get the product to market in that time but are actively working on getting the product to market, you can renew for another 5-7 years.
The same should apply to copyright, but perhaps with a longer initial term (say, 15 years?).
Copyright needs an unambiguous cutoff because it kinda has to be automatic. You can invent something and not patent it. Copyright is implicit.
Which is why it should be 30 years from publication, without exception. Possibly shorter.
How did they get US9772743 approved?
“Implementation of a movable control pad on a touch enabled device”I’m not used to hearing good things about EA, but good for them.
