From: CurtAdams@aol.com
Date: Tue Dec 21 1999 - 11:03:32 MST
In a message dated 12/21/99 9:22:32 AM Pacific Standard Time,
bradbury@www.aeiveos.com writes:
> Patent protection is critical to enabling visionary people to get
> financial backing to test innovative ideas. You can't build
> a company fast enough to keep the wolves away from your markets
> unless you have legal means of protecting those innovations.
Really? Monoclonal antibodies were never invented?
Open-source software doesn't exist?
Lots of innovation happens without patents. Patents
slow innovation markedly by a) increasing legal costs
b) requing patent searches and c) creating complex
negotiating requirements to address all the possible
infringements. For an example of c), consider what
will happen to software innovation if the current
trend to patenting algorithms continues. We will
soon be in a situation where every dozen lines of
code is a possible infringment (oops, used an XOR in
those graphics). If any sizable program requires
negotiating on tens of thousands of patents, software
innovation will basically be impossible.
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