Richard Stallman Quotes

I think software patents are a bad idea. Many patents are given for trivial inventions.

Fighting patents one by one will never eliminate the danger of software patents, any more than swatting mosquitoes will eliminate malaria.

Our strategy in dealing with patents in Mono is the same strategy that any other software developer would take. In the event of a patent claim, we will try to find prior art to the claim of the patent.

In a recent decision of the Supreme Court, not made, however, by the full court, and concurred in by only four justices, it was held that the seller of a patented mimeograph could bind the purchaser to use only his ink in the machine, though the ink was not patented.

Every piece of software written today is likely going to infringe on someone else's patent.

At Linkabit, we put little effort and energy into patenting things.

The reforms proposed by the Patent Reform Act of 2007 are precisely the type of congressional action needed. The Act will remove obstacles to growth and restore balance to the patent system.

In the early days of the software industry, people cared about copyright and didn't give a damn about patents - they copied each other willy-nilly.

The software patent problem is not limited to Mono. Software patents affect everyone writing software today.

With the rise of software patents, engineers coding new stuff - whether within a large software company or as kids writing smartphone apps - are exposed to a claim that somewhere a prior patent is being infringed.

I've fought court battles over my inventions before.

In an industry with highly sequential innovation, it may be better for society to scrap patents altogether than try to tighten them.

Patents are being used to wage war in the digital world, and as a result, patents have become a toll gate on the road of innovation.

I think you would find almost anyone who stands up for their patent rights has been called a patent troll.

I've never filed a patent lawsuit. I hope never to file a patent lawsuit. That may be unrealistic, but it would be great if I could avoid doing it... Lawsuits are a ridiculous way to do business.

I would have had my patent long, long ago, and it would have run out long, long ago. I would have made, maybe, $100.000, much less that the patent has brought me now.

Patent battles have become a strong catalyst for mergers, reducing competition in various domains. The largest corporations, with gigantic patent portfolios, routinely enter into cross-licensing agreements with their largest competitors.

Software patents, in particular, are very ripe for abuse. The whole system encourages big corporations getting thousands and thousands of patents. Individuals almost never get them.

Taking out a patent is an invitation to a lawsuit.

We believe that patents exist to reward the inventors of truly outstanding ideas, not to allow big businesses to stifle competition with an ever-growing tide of trivial, incomprehensible, overreaching patents. We will stop the abuse of patent law by raising the bar on how innovative an idea has to be before it can be patented, and by prohibiting patents on software, business methods, concepts and works of nature. We will require a working model to be provided to the patent office before a patent is granted and we will strictly enforce the current rule that patents are invalid if they are "obvious to someone skilled in the art".

The patent system was established, I believe, to protect the lone inventor. In this it has not succeeded. … The patent system protects the institutions which favor invention.

If the government objects to monopoly prices for new inventions, it should stop granting patents.

There's no such thing as a legal right to break patents in the United States.

An e-bike is like headphones, you can say you have patents, but people will still copy.

The criminalization of file sharing is pathetic. It's so pathetic, it's almost funny. Imagine if the radio people would have lobbied for a federal law enforcement agency to raid all homes for illegal transmissions of moving picture experiments in order to stop the invention of television. It's ludicrous.