Blogline requirement 1

For my first blogline article, I would like to comment on something from http://slashdot.org/
The article's link can be found at http://yro.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/03/11/0539237&from=rss

Inventing the Telephone, Independently
Posted by Zonk on Saturday March 11, @01:26AMfrom the i-invented-the-hippo dept.

An anonymous reader writes "There is a nice article about the history of the telephone at AmericanHeritage.com. Most of us know that Alexander Bell beat Elisha Gray to the patent office by mere hours to claim credit for the invention of the telephone, but did you know that two other inventors can also claim the invention, including Thomas Edison? Similar disputes about independent invention and patent ownership can be found regarding the television, the airplane, and the automobile. Maybe it really is true: the economic benefit of encouraging patents is like that of encouraging window breaking."

I find this extremely interesting in light of what we had discussed in class concerning the issues facing blackberry. Patent trolls with no intention of developing a product for their technology, are pushing patents through the legal system like crack to an addict. It isn't right for the technology producer to be penalized because there is a patent on a future application to a new technological breakthrough.

The system as it is now is a limiting force that restricts free thought and needs to be revamped. This is no longer the past. The way things used to work to keep order and fairness is no longer beneficial to a society with the right to create.

For more info- check out http://righttocreate.blogspot.com/2006/03/broken-windows-broken-patents.html