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[personal profile] jducoeur
I was surprised but happy when I got a forwarded copy of this news alert from the Wall Street Journal the other day:
The Supreme Court ruled that two inventors' patent of a method of hedging weather-related risk in energy prices can't be granted. The high court unanimously agreed with a lower-court ruling that said a process is eligible for a patent only if it is "tied to a particular machine or apparatus'' or if it "transforms a particular article into a different state or thing.''
The happiness was muted, though, when I read what actually transpired. Suffice it to say, this abstract is almost precisely wrong, or at least fabulously misleading: while the Court did shoot down the Bilski patent (as hoped), it did so on deliberately narrow grounds, and explicitly did *not* support the lower-court ruling. Indeed, the ruling was pretty disappointing for those of us who would like to see the software-patent regime simply scrapped.

I'm normally inclined to assume incompetence rather than malice, but I have to say that my suspicions about the WSJ have been growing lately. Ever since it got bought by Rupert "I'm not evil, I'm just a businessman" Murdoch, I've been noticing the slow trend towards it becoming a mouthpiece for his political views. So despite myself, I'm acidly looking to see if there is an agenda -- a Fox-News style reason to try to scare people into pushing for more extreme positions. Anyone have a reason to believe there is one?

(no subject)

Date: 2010-06-29 06:17 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] goldsquare.livejournal.com
There has long been two papers to consider: the opinion pages of the WSJ, and the news. Which was this?

Opinions Page Is Opinionated. But not factual.

(no subject)

Date: 2010-06-29 06:21 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] goldsquare.livejournal.com
Also worth noting was that the SCOTUS said "this patent too broad" but didn't set definitions, and DID throw it to the lower courts. The lower courts will likely set a new standard for determination: based largely on the commentary.

It is not, really, the place for the SCOTUS to say how a Patent is approved: so its right that they didn't create a mechanism.

But software patents are likely to be sharply restricted. And the cost of defending them just went UP.

(no subject)

Date: 2010-06-29 07:58 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] metahacker.livejournal.com
Every time I read the WSJ I come away stunned, because the articles are written from a point of view so divorced from reality as I understand it that I worry. And always in the same direction--very slanted toward how business is defending itself against ever-harmful government intervention, how short-term measurements are the only way to judge the success of a company, and relating the things you should have done yesterday that would have made you rich (but do them today anyway so you can make the early birds even richer).

I consider all of those to be harmful messages, whipping the market into a frenzy. I imagine this is very beneficial to stock brokers and others who trade for a living.

I wonder how much of this is just playing to an expecting audience, and how much is purposeful programming. But at some point, the moral effect is the same.

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