Let's Limit the Effect of Software Patents, Since We Can't Eliminate Them
Patents threaten every software developer, and the patent wars we have long feared have broken out. Software developers and software users - which in our society, is most people - need software to be free of patents.
Context & Ripple Effects
The abolitionist wing of this debate has been building for years: TechCrunch made the case for eliminating software patents outright in 2010, Google argued in 2011 that the patent system is stifling rather than protecting innovation, and Ars Technica pressed EFF in June 2012 to stop hedging and call for full abolition. The threat is not abstract — it traces back to Microsoft's 2007 patent claims against free software, which showed what an incumbent could extract from developers holding no patents of their own.
First-order effects
- Every working software developer is exposed right now: the article's premise is that the feared patent wars have already broken out, meaning litigation risk attaches to ordinary development, not just to companies with large defensive portfolios.
Second-order effects
- Advocacy groups like EFF face pressure to choose between the pure position (Ars Technica's call for outright elimination) and this more achievable limiting agenda — a split that determines where developer energy and donations go.
Third-order effects
- If 'limit, don't abolish' becomes the consensus ask, the fight moves from principle to mechanism — narrowing what software patents can cover and how far they reach — which would redraw the cost-benefit calculus for startups deciding whether to build on patented techniques at all.
The trend: The software-patent debate is migrating from an all-or-nothing abolition demand toward pragmatic limitation, as reformers accept that elimination is politically out of reach.