Patently braking

Sunday, 4 Dec 2005

Rick Jelliffe:

In economics we have a theory called the velocity of money. A nation’s prosperity is not only dependent on the amount of money, but how much it circulates: if you have the richest country in the world but can only spend money once every 25 years, you may as well be in a poor country. In software, the same principle applies: the “velocity of ideas.” Software patents effectively reduce the velocity of ideas, since software is ideas. An impeded velocity of ideas hinders everyone.