> Why do I lose my right to do something because you write that thing down before I do? The inherent problem with patents and (to a lesser extent) copyright is

> Why do I lose my right to do something because you write that thing down before I do? The inherent problem with patents and (to a lesser extent) copyright is that they attempt to fix one problem and as a side affect enforce this too. Playing devils advocate for a moment; a society without patents is unfairly weighted (in terms of invention) towards BigCo. i.e. you get a lot more innovation but only those with big cash can do something with it - and not necessarily by paying the inventor. Under current law things are potentially unfairly balanced to the patent holder. I realise that in practicality it is still weighted towards BigCo anyway because they can fund lawsuits etc. There is, surely, a balance between the two extremes (I don't believe we have it at the moment). As it happens I think we need to be careful considering the broad concept of patents. We are all familiar and, probably, all opposed to the idea of Software Patents in their current form (or at all). However making software is reasonably trivial - and getting a patent is, thought relatively costly, not too difficult. This is not entirely the case in other industries; which makes a slight difference (in the sense that the investment for software development is generally lower for an individual inventor)