selling out the rights as their primarily (and I'm willing to bet, only) business. This could even be taken to the extremes of actually patenting simple methods ofhandling data, such as say, mouse support. Now, it can't happen to mouse support as it is today, but inthe future, something undoubtably will replace the mouse as the preferred method of input, forinstance, in what may be a virtual reality future, the glove might be the input device. Anyway, say it did happento mouse support. Every single program that uses mouse support would have to pay a fee for therights to do so. This would result in higher software prices (aren't they high enough?), and reducedquality in the programs, as they have to worry about the legalities more (Del Guercio 22-24). Needless to say, the patenting of software is not a widely loved policy, mostly embraced by largecorporations like Lotus and Microsoft (Tysver "Software Patents"). Smaller companies and most often consumersare generally against it. Even with all the legal problems I've mentioned that arise with current laws, thatsnot all. The complexity of software protection laws brings up a large degree of confusion. I myselfthought that copyrights lasted 7 years until I read this. I asked 15 people in a chat room on theInternet what they knew about software protection laws, and only one of them knew that software could bepatented. 12 of them thought that it cost lots of money for a copyright, which it doesn't. It's $20 for acopyright at most, and $10000 at most for a patent. 5 of them thought that software copyrightslasted 7 years (hey, it's a popular misconception, I thought so myself at one point). And last but not least, 10of them believed that there was no laws regarding the copying of software (there are, but they'revirtually ineffective). Now that you know all about the legal and business aspects of software protection,lets take a look at how it can affect you. Sa...
