[d@DCC] RE: Anti-creator Greg Aharonian seeks the extreme: software only under patent, not copyright.

[Russell McOrmond]

On Wed, 15 Dec 2004, Chris Brand wrote:

> And so I come to the conclusion that a factor of 3 or 4 is maybe closer
> than Russell's "factor of 10", but that still means that a 20-year
> software patent should be thought of as comparable to a
> 60-something-year patent on a mechanical invention.

  I agree with your 3 or 4 factor of the life cycle of a
mental/information process implemented in software compared to a
manufacturing process.  This would suggest that if software patents should
exist at all they should be for a maximum of 5 to 7 year term.

  My factor of 10 related to the difference in lifecycle of software to
non-software literary works, not specifying copyright (expression) or
patent (idea) differences. While those who support the literary public
domain would be quite upset at a 200 year copyright term, I was just
suggesting that thinking 20 years was shorter than 50 for software forgets
that software live cycles are so much faster.  Comparing copyrights
live+50 and patents 20 years is to the software practitioner like the
difference between infinity-20 and infinity-50.

-- 
 Russell McOrmond, Internet Consultant: <http://www.flora.ca/> 
 Have you, your family, your friends (, your enemies) signed the
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