Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!ub!dsinc!bagate!cbmvax!amix!vanth!jms From: jms@vanth.UUCP (Jim Shaffer) Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.misc Subject: Re: More about the patent treaty ( forwarded message from gnulists ) Message-ID: Date: 24 Mar 91 22:44:02 GMT References: <48518@nigel.ee.udel.edu> Organization: The Search For Terrestrial Intelligence Lines: 28 In article <48518@nigel.ee.udel.edu> @utrcgw.utc.com:mark@ardnt1 (mark) writes: > >Currently, the US Patent Office is supposed to reject patent >applications for an idea that is an obvious combination of several >well-known ideas--a "mosaic of references" to prior art. Article 11 >explicitly forbids rejection using this criterion. This would cause >an upsurge in the number of absurd patents, not just in software but >in every field. Large companies would be most able to take advantage >of the new rules, further increasing their power over small >competitors. > >(You would generally expect negotiators to aim for a treaty that >requires little change in their own country's system. However, the US >negotiators pushed strongly for this part of Article 11. They thus >attempt to push through a change in the laws of their own country, >bypassing the usual legislative system.) Wonderful. I used to laugh at the conspiracy theorists who said that the "New World Order" was going to be fascist. But now I'm not so sure. (This isn't the only reason, of course.) -- * From the disk of: | jms@vanth.uucp | "You know I never knew Jim Shaffer, Jr. | amix.commodore.com!vanth!jms | that it could be so 37 Brook Street | uunet!cbmvax!amix!vanth!jms | strange..." Montgomery, PA 17752 | 72750.2335@compuserve.com | (R.E.M.)