Software Patents

Much of the information on this web site has not been revised since June, 1994. For more current information on software patents please visit the League for Programming Freedom web site.

Articles

• The Coming Software Patent Crisis: Can Linux Survive?
• Preparing for the intellectual-property offensive, Bruce Perens, 1998
• "Selling Wine Without Bottles", John Perry Barlow, WIRED, 1994
• Background article from Barron's
• Stac v. Microsoft verdict
• Compton's multimedia patent

Companies Opposed to Software Patents

• Oracle - Oracle's position is very well thought out and written.
• Adobe
• Autodesk
• Borland - Borland's public statements are very cautious due to ongoing litigation.
• Wind River Systems
• Synopsis

Companies Concerned by Software Patents

• Sun - Sun has pointed to a number of problems that currently exist with software patents, but does not have a company wide public policy.
• Time Warner

Companies in Favor of Software Patents

• IBM
• Intel
• Microsoft - Prior to the Stac v. Microsoft verdict.
• Taligent
• SGI - SGI's being in favor of software patents is a little hard to understand.

Other Documents

• Number of software patents granted
• Mitch Kapor's congressional testimony
• Example software patent disputes
• Opposition to software patents

Patents

• Examples of software patents.
• fix me... Small patent database - About half of the 2000 patent abstracts are software related.
• fix me... Database of software patent related files - picked up from various ftp sites out on the net.

The League for Programming Freedom

• San Jose submission: An Industry at Risk
• DC submission: An Economic Perspective

Other Sites

• Information Law Alert - an excellent source of intellectual property news
• Tom's League for Programming Freedom site
• United States Patent and Trademark Office
• Online patent search: U.S. Patent/Full Text 1994
• Electronic Frontier Foundation
• WIRED 2.03: The Economy of Ideas
• WIRED 2.07: Extras from "Patently Absurd" by Simson L. Garfinkel
• Sydney University FTP site

• Patent Act of the U.S.
• Patent Rulings of the U.S. Supreme Court
• Paris Convention for the Protection of Industrial Property (as revised in 1967)
• Patent Cooperation Treaty (1971)
• doesn't belong here ... Copyright Law
• GATT patent text
• Cornell Law School Legal Information Institute
• Index to Multilateral Conventions in pub/diplomacy