That's why there exist a variety of post-grant procedures to challenge the validity of issued patents. The examination system is a filter that balances cost wit

That's why there exist a variety of post-grant procedures to challenge the validity of issued patents. The examination system is a filter that balances cost with error rate, timeliness, accessibility, etc. A 'flawless' examination would be so expensive and lengthy as to be inaccessible to a vast majority of people, and we'd be here complaining about that. The worst examples of bad software patents are largely behind us now, as they were a product of an era of rapid technological change and a dearth of qualified examiners in the mid to late 1990s and early 2000s. Many of those have been defeated in litigation or are starting to fall out of their 20 year windows of exclusivity. And while this case may be frustrating for us to read, do keep in mind the ground truth of what has transpired. A person has completed a bureaucratic process with a government entity and received a piece of paper. Nobody has been sued by this patent (that we know of from this blog post) and the patent owner has not profited a dime (again, as we know of from the blog post. At this stage it seems premature to get all up in arms about it.