pg puts forth a similar view in his essay on software patents: http://www.paulgraham.com/softwarepatents.html http://www.paulgraham.com/softwarepatents.html B

pg puts forth a similar view in his essay on software patents: http://www.paulgraham.com/softwarepatents.html http://www.paulgraham.com/softwarepatents.html But I don't think that logic applies here. Sure, if you're a small operation going head to head with some huge corporation, that attitude toward patents makes perfect sense. But that's not the order of things in scenario; Apple doesn't see small app developers as their competitors, rather they see Google's Android and possibly Microsoft's Windows Phone 7 (and the manufacturers who build the corresponding devices) as their competitors. So Apple's most likely use for these patents is to threaten developers building apps for Android and other non-iOS platforms. And that, in light of Apple's recent history of patent abuse, gives startups every reason to worry.