Comments on: More patent nonsense: Microsoft loses in Office custom XML appeal http://www.itwriting.com/blog/2027-more-patent-nonsense-microsoft-loses-in-office-custom-xml-appeal.html Tech writing blog Sun, 12 Feb 2012 21:04:12 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 By: Clyde Davies http://www.itwriting.com/blog/2027-more-patent-nonsense-microsoft-loses-in-office-custom-xml-appeal.html/comment-page-1#comment-154780 Clyde Davies Sat, 26 Dec 2009 11:58:14 +0000 http://www.itwriting.com/blog/2027-more-patent-nonsense-microsoft-loses-in-office-custom-xml-appeal.html#comment-154780 This sort of story <i>really</i> raises my hackles. The original purpose of patents was to encourage innovation and its public disclosure by guaranteeing an exclusive revenue stream, not to allow people to screw others for as much money as they like. I fail to see how an adaptation of a well-established programming technique - indirection - could be said to be truly innovative. And this observation probably applies to a lot of other software patents. If someone were to devise a novel algorithm to search text in less than linear time then that <i>would</i> be innovative. This is more a case of whoever gets there first. Custom XML might be little used but that isn't because it doesn't have much potential. As you know I work in the pharmaceutical industry. Microsoft has been working with scientists throughout academia and the industry to help produce Chem4Word http://research.microsoft.com/en-us/projects/chem4word/ . Is this project going to be kyboshed now because of a highly questionable claim on intellectual property rights? This sort of story really raises my hackles. The original purpose of patents was to encourage innovation and its public disclosure by guaranteeing an exclusive revenue stream, not to allow people to screw others for as much money as they like. I fail to see how an adaptation of a well-established programming technique – indirection – could be said to be truly innovative. And this observation probably applies to a lot of other software patents. If someone were to devise a novel algorithm to search text in less than linear time then that would be innovative. This is more a case of whoever gets there first.

Custom XML might be little used but that isn’t because it doesn’t have much potential. As you know I work in the pharmaceutical industry. Microsoft has been working with scientists throughout academia and the industry to help produce Chem4Word http://research.microsoft.com/en-us/projects/chem4word/ . Is this project going to be kyboshed now because of a highly questionable claim on intellectual property rights?

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