> Who is to say what is and is not patentable? (Do you cede that government has a
> stake in all ideas???) If you want to keep TOTAL rights to something, DON'T
> make it public at all.
Exactly why Coca-Cola has never patented their recipie. To do so would be
to put it into the public domain after X years expired. A patent at least
makes sure that the details are shared with the common community after a
period of exclusive use by the inventor. Without patents, there would be a
great many more trade secrets.
I guess I am saying that patents can also be a longer term benefit. Maybe
someone will take it upon themselves to research expired patents and get
these techniques into Open Source programs just to bootstrap these
technologies into the mainstream public domain.
George Bonser
The Linux "We're never going out of business" sale at an FTP site near you!
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