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Neither software nor computer programs are explicitly mentioned in statutory United States patent law.Patent law has changed to address new technologies, and decisions of the United States Supreme Court and United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC) beginning in the latter part of the 20th century have sought to clarify the boundary between patent-eligible and patent ...
A patent applicant may include a copyright notice or mask work notice, but only if it also includes the following authorization, expressly permitting the reproduction of the patent: [9] A portion of the disclosure of this patent document contains material which is subject to (copyright or mask work) protection.
Policy debate on software patents has been active for years. [1] The opponents to software patents have gained more visibility with fewer resources through the years than their pro-patent opponents. [2] Arguments and critiques have been focused mostly on the economic consequences of software patents.
A software patent is a patent on a piece of software, such as a computer program, library, user interface, or algorithm.The validity of these patents can be difficult to evaluate, as software is often at once a product of engineering, something typically eligible for patents, and an abstract concept, which is typically not.
The graphics, sounds, and appearance of a computer program also may be protected as an audiovisual work; as a result, a program can infringe even if no code was copied. [11] The set of operations available through the interface is not copyrightable in the United States under Lotus v. Borland, but it can be protected with a utility patent.
The patent (option) will have value to the buyer (owner) only to the extent that the expected price in the future exceeds the opportunity cost of earning just as much in a risk-less alternative. Thus patent rights can be thought of as corresponding to a call option and may be valued accordingly.
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There have been no dispute settlement procedures regarding software patents. Its relevance for patentability in the domains of, for example, computer-implemented business methods, computer science and software information technology remains uncertain, since the TRIPS agreement is subject to interpretation, [4] like all legal texts.