Regarding software patents, they did say they were following their own precedents of Benson, Flook and Diehr, and not endorsing State Street. Benson and Flook

Regarding software patents, they did say they were following their own precedents of Benson, Flook and Diehr, and not endorsing State Street. Benson and Flook are precedent for invalidating just about every software patent out there. Diehr clarifies that having software as an element of a claim does not automatically make that claim nonstatutory. If people paid attention to what those precedents actually said, then this opinion would be a slapdown of software patents. But since people obviously don't, it isn't. It would be interesting if a lawyer would weigh in and say whether there's some legal principle restricting the scope of what can be said in this kind of opinion, or whether the Court is just being a bunch of wusses.