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Difficult for a farm boy like meDifficult for a farm boy like mePosted May 5, 2005 11:28 UTC (Thu) by tjasper (subscriber, #4310)In reply to: Difficult for a farm boy like me by NRArnot Parent article: Software, reverse engineering and the law
Perhaps also, patents should have a much shorter lifespan - like two years - before being made public. Software develops so fast that they should relate to the lifetime of the product. When cotton gins were invented, patents were useful for half a lifetime, enough for people to benefit from the invention. With software, if it is patentable at all, then it should be for half the life of the product and four years is about the useful life of a software product. After two years, the patented software should be made public for the greater benefit of all, just as patents do/did for more mechanical based inventions for everyone in the past.
Just my $0.02 worth
Trevor
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