Re: Results of "downloading compressed program images" request

[Craig Burley <burley@gnu.org>]

>The purpose of patent law is not the single issue of public disclosure. It
>has several purposes, all of which are intended for the pubic good. My point
>is that one of those purposes is to stimulate the invention process by
>providing the inventor the exclusive ownership of the invention for a period
>of time. This is not a trivial function of patents. Whether it is as
>significant a function as public disclosure of the invention "secrets" is a
>matter for theological debate. 

("pubic good", heh ;-)

I'm unaware of anyone claiming the exclusive-ownership aspect of
patents is "trivial".

I stand by my statement, and suggest that, if you don't have references
to post to illustrate your thesis that patent law was created to
*stimulate* invention, perhaps you don't have sufficient information
to make these claims.

What I stand by, until I read authoritative info to the contrary,
is my notion that patent law was created to encourage publication
of processes.

And, to *prevent* such publication from discouraging invention, the
"carrot" of exclusive ownership is provided.

In other words, publication is the *purpose* of patent law, while
ownership of patents is an important *mechanism* by which that
purpose is implemented.  (Other mechanisms could have been selected,
with better or, probably, worse results, but the purpose would
have to remain for the law to be worthwhile.)

Again, this is my impression based on actually *reading* historical
information on patents, and I haven't done that for about 10 years.
My information might be out-of-date, or my recollection poor,
but I need more than your claims to get me to go review the
historical record.

>But today, the stimulus factor is VERY non-trivial. Most every feature of
>modern computers were invented with the expectation that patents would
>protect the profits of the patent owner. There are companies that do nothing
>except invent and sell inventions. They produce nothing but ideas and
>patents! Obviously these companies would not exist without patent law. 

If you mean *software*, then you're wrong that "most every feature"
required patents.  In fact, most every feature was done either without
patents, or would have been done anyway without them.

If you mean *hardware*, especially manufacturing techniques, then obviously
the companies that exist only to create patents would not exist, but the
inventions themselves would mostly have been created and used -- as trade
secrets, or mere secrets.  That's especially true for manufacturing
processes, but also for products released to the public since the
days when it was easy to reverse-engineer (digital) hardware.

What patent law has given us (for processes, complicated hardware,
etc.) is a fairly ideal combination: we get to see how all these
things are put together, making it much easier to improve on them;
while the inventors still get quite a reasonable value put on their
(public) inventions.

>As for the compensation of computer engineers, if you think that we are paid
>like gods, then I will keep looking for another religion. I don't know any
>computer related workers that are anything other than middle class
>economically. Other than in Silicon Valley maybe, you can't even break into
>six digit saleries! I know plumbers that make as much money. But maybe I
>should be sending your company a resume rather than debating this point? ;)

A substantial portion of the population of this country *are* paid
like gods, when considering the history of human civilization as
we know it.  Many of the jobs have been so paid for decades at
least, centuries of even millenia in many cases.

Computer programming is a skill that was, until very recently,
unlikely to be particularly well-rewarded until the last 20 years.

Hence, I think it's fairly reasonable to be grateful we live in
this time.

        tq vm, (burley)