Ctrl-Z: a return to the Supreme Court's software patent ban? (ars technica) [LWN.net]

Ars technica has published a lengthy history of U.S. case law around software patents which reaches the conclusion that the Supreme Court would be likely to be hostile to the concept. "The majority may not have intended to authorize patents on software. But Justice Stevens, the only Diehr justice still sitting on the Supreme Court today, wrote a lengthy dissent warning that the decision would have that effect. Stevens's prophecy was fulfilled by the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, which Congress created in 1983 and gave jurisdiction over patent appeals. Although the Supreme Court was still the ultimate authority on patent appeals, it rarely reviewed the Federal Circuit's decisions during its first two decades. As a consequence, the Federal Circuit became the de facto 'Supreme Court of patents.'"

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