“If people had understood how patents would be granted when most of today’s ideas were invented, and had taken out patents, the industry would be at a complete standstill today."

--Bill Gates, hypocrite

Summary: Eamonn Fingleton is rewriting history in the US' top newspaper, insinuating that patents contributed to the rise of software duopolists

TECHDIRT SAYS THAT an "Author Claims That If Apple And Microsoft Started Today They'd Fail Without Stronger Patent Protection". What utter nonsense. The very opposite is true. So who is the revisionist? Masnick's site says "The NY Times has a slightly odd op-ed piece, written by Eamonn Fingleton, author of a book about how China is going to dominate the US economically."

If China is going to dominate, then it's because it's a producing nation. Patents don't matter much in this context. So-called 'knowledge workers' cannot dominate over labour forever, as the labour can relocate to domestic employers who reap all the benefits rather than foreigners doing so. Apple failed to convince the Koreans that it invented digital rubberbanding. Yes, Korean giant Samsung was actually defended by the biased US patent system, the USPTO. As this article helps show, Samsung is quickly becoming a front runner for Android, so this matters a lot. All that Apple can lean on now is patent regime of the US and some embargo instruments like the ITC, which is a subject we will address in a separate post another day. ⬆