Watch how hard the man tries to make his 'invention' sound like a complicated idea (link).
The video relates to a very recent case and it was only made available a week ago. It should hopefully illustrate the obviousness of patents that get accepted nowadays, be them software-related or not.
At times it seems like what we deal with are many weak patents (on algorithms), valuations or speculations based on hype ("hey hi"), and stocks held by Microsoft and its own staff
As noted a few days ago, several times in fact, many people now recognise the importance of the FSF's mission, even if most people don't know what the FSF is