Most software patents I have seen patent the result, not the means to reach that result. A normal patent is for a specific way to reach a result. I can patent

Most software patents I have seen patent the result, not the means to reach that result. A normal patent is for a specific way to reach a result. I can patent my specific "illumination device" (light bulb), but I can't patent "illumination of a space" (lighting a room). To bring up a well known softare example, Amazon has a patent on one-click shopping. There is no way to create another way to let customers buy things with a single click without infringing that patent, because the patent is for the result (order & payment of goods with one human-computer interaction) not the way it's implemented.