SCO Thread that will never die (was Re: Maddog at work.)

[Bob Bell]

On Tue, Jun 03, 2003 at 11:50:16AM -0400, Bruce Dawson <jbd at codemeta.com> wrote:
> Not to be splitting hairs, but one should be aware of terminology. Patents
> protect "mechanisms" - which are expressions of ideas.

    A good example is the RSA patent.  If you actually dig up the patent
(I'm not going to right now, but somebody else can), you'll find that
the RSA mathematical algorithm was actually not the subject of the
patent.  The patent was for using RSA to encrypt data communication.
A subtle point perhaps (what else are you going to use it for?), but
a key one nonetheless.

-- 
Bob Bell <bbell at hp.com>
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
 "It's easy to solve the halting problem with a shotgun.   :-)"
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