So IBM is giving developers unencumbered access to 500 of the company’s 40,000 patents.This is all well and good. But like others, I have to ask whether software should be patented in the first place. Once again, like others, I believe that copyright law, which prevents unauthorized copying, is the right way to protect software, not patents that cover techniques and ideas behind the software.Patents on software technologies could have the effect of stifling innovation and scaring off developers from building something new. Who knows what may fall under a patent and what might not? Do we leave it for a judge to decide? Lawyers, and not technologists, may end up making the decisions on what gets built and what doesn’t. Recently, Sun Microsystems lost a patent lawsuit sought filed by Kodak over technologies in Java. Sun ended up settling the lawsuit, but Kodak wasn’t even the originator of the patented technologies in question; the patents were granted to Wang Laboratories and later acquired by Kodak. I’ll bring up some analogies I’ve heard before, years ago: What if there were patent restrictions on the QWERTY keyboard, or the positioning of the gas pedal to the right of the brake in an automobile? Users would have had to learn to type or drive several different ways, so they could use products from different vendors and not be locked-in, so to speak.Developers as well should not be held hostage to patent concerns over techniques and ideas. Vendors ought to be making money on selling the best products, not on obscure, arcane patents. Technology Industry