Answering Gene Quinn, Patent Attorney – Updated

“From a conceptual standpoint why not allow for software to be
patented. What is the harm? I know many of you reading this have
now gone into an apoplectic rage, but conceptually why should
software be treated any differently? Isn’t the problem that
patent offices, particularly the United States Patent Office, are
increasingly doing a poor job of finding relevant prior art and
weeding out what is new and non-obvious from what is old and
obvious? If prosecution were more meaningful, what is the harm in
granting software patents? I see none because there is none….

“Software is not a mathematical equation, nor is it a
mathematical language. How anyone who writes software or professes
to understand software could argue to the contrary is beyond me. Do
people who write software actually think they are sitting down and
writing mathematical equations and stringing them together? It is
absurd to have such a narrow view of software. When you write
software you are trying to enable a device, such as a computer, to
provide certain functionality given a certain stimulus. So you are
writing instructions for a computer or other device and explaining
how the computer or device needs to process information. You do not
explain how to process information with mathematical
equations.”

Complete
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