> I am not against patents. I am against the granting of patents for non-inventions. Agree, to the point where I could let this summarize my view on patent rel

> I am not against patents. I am against the granting of patents for non-inventions. Agree, to the point where I could let this summarize my view on patent related problems. There is obviously something wrong with the USPTOs cultural definition of obviousness. Part of it is as you say that they see patents as the only prior art (in practice - I know it's not so in theory). But another part is that they seem to think that the slightest difference in comparison to prior art suddenly makes it non-obvious. That's ridiculous. The obviousness of a patent claim has to be judged in light of prior art. The test should be that the difference is non-obvious "to a person skilled in the art".