As an American I was under the impression that the European Union decided that software methodologies were not patentable.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Software_patent Even if someone files a patent - infringement cases are not enforced by the government patent office but by the patent holder. Often patents are filed which are invalid because of "prior art". Then when the patent holder goes after some one for infringing the defense is to prove prior public existance of the technique. The patent does not last as long as a copyright. for US patents after 1995 the term is 20 years which conforms to the world patent policy. Prior to 1861 US patents had terms not exceeding fourteen years with an additional seven year extension. >From 1861 to 1995 the term of the patent in the US was 17 years. So software patents issued prior to 1988 should have expired. This may apply to a lot of DOS related patents. This wikipedia article is a pretty good discussion. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Term_of_patent_in_the_United_States ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Bonnie Dalzell, MA mail:5100 Hydes Rd PO Box 60, Hydes,MD,USA 21082-0060|EMAIL:bdalz...@qis.net freelance anatomist, vertebrate paleontologist, writer, illustrator, dog breeder, computer nerd & iconoclast... Borzoi info at www.borzois.com. Editor Net.Pet Online Animal Magazine - http://www.netpetmagazine.com HOME http://www.qis.net/~borzoi/ BUSINESS http://www.batw.com ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ _______________________________________________ Freedos-user mailing list Freedos-user@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-user
