Is there something in the ether? Two people “near” me declare software patents potential “Weapons of Mass Destruction” yesterday and today, apparently having been struck by the idea independently: Patents as WMD’s from Mitch Kapor (Creative Commons is housed in his office space) and On Software Patents and WMDs from Ben Adida (who represents Creative Commons at the W3c).
Kapor and Adida have different scenarios in mind. Very roughly North Korea and Al Qaeda respectively.
See also Wikipedia on the software patent debate.
[…] any case, please join the effort of ESP and others to eradicate software patentsweapons of mass destruction. Ars Technica has a good introductory article on […]
[…] Mass Destruction of Software Patents. Though still hyped, software patents have turned out to be weapons of attrition. “WMD” is typical of delusional fear-based talk in the free/open source software space. Make and more importantly promote better software, move on. […]