IBM and Google are sort of helping us, but in an odd way. They're soaking up patents for APIs used in many open source projects such that if you want to sue tho

IBM and Google are sort of helping us, but in an odd way. They're soaking up patents for APIs used in many open source projects such that if you want to sue those open source projects, you'll have to contend with IBM and Google. It's not cool that they have to do this, but that's certainly helping many open source projects as well as Linux. Groklaw has been fantastic in exposing the fallacies of software patent lawsuits. Stallman -- we owe a tremendous debt to him in this regard. But the way America works, nothing really moves in this lousy country unless you band together into a Political Action Committee and lobby Congress with perks. That's how the software patent law got created in the first place, no thanks to Microsoft, Apple, and Lotus, who got that ball rolling. And imagine how we sound to a politician. Companies like Microsoft and Apple get some time with politicians easily, and make the pitch that they just want to protect the competition from reselling functionality that they offer. I can see a lot of dumb politicians supporting that idea, especially when compared with the pharma industry. And then we anti-software patent guys come in -- first, we'd be lucky to get a couple seconds to say hello. Second, our pitch would be that software patents stifle innovation, rather than grow it, but would have little proof. Also, every other technology industry has a patent law, so the Congressmen would be like, "Why not software, too? Why should that be so special?" And if you try to tell them that sometimes there's like only 4 optimal ways to do a given task sometimes, and therefore we shouldn't be punished for it, they just wouldn't grasp that concept. If you run to the Republicans, they would consider you anti-capitalist. (And I say that even though I mostly vote Republican.) If you run to the Democrats, they would say that these big companies like Microsoft and Apple bankroll their campaigns, so there's no way they would not support those proprietary agendas. There's no way out except through the courts. In our agenda, we come off as a bunch of disorganized geeks, and politicians don't seem to mix well with geeks, especially disorganized ones. In the proprietary, pro software patent agenda, they come off as established businessmen and millionaires, so politicians love them. If anyone has a better idea, I'd like to hear it.