how in hell such patent got issued? Were the patent authors the first to invent menus? Less than 20 years ago? Obviously not. There is pretty easy solution -

how in hell such patent got issued? Were the patent authors the first to invent menus? Less than 20 years ago? Obviously not. There is pretty easy solution - don't issue patents when there is previous art. In addition - lets have the technical patent protection period to be shorter than 20 years. Say 5 or 10 years. That would allow the real inventor of menus ~40 years ago to enjoy the meaningful patent protection when it was making sense.