« Computer programs are not excluded subject matter?? | Main | Migration to blogger »

02/23/07

Another huge damages award..

It is with great sadness (even though it is Microsoft) that I have to inform readers of the news of the US$ 1.5 billion award of damages against Microsoft for the claimed infringement of a number of patents of Alcatel-Lucent relating to audio conversion to the MP3 format.

What a waste of time and money. What good is this doing to the IT industry when we end up patenting mathematics simply because we process the maths via a computer rather than our minds. Although Microsoft is paying (I have little sympathy), really society as a whole pays every time we grant a software patent and every time an award of damages is made. Science is not promoted by the monopolisation of mathematics and mathematical models.

For another view of why we shouldn't have software patents, read the views of a software developer who created the well known MP3 encoder, BladeEnc: here 

Posted by Cristian at 1:33 PM
Categories: Swpatents