[christopherolah]

> To say software patents are invalid or software can't be patented really puts software programmers at a disadvantage relative to other fields of science and innovation. Why should pharmaceutical companies, civil engineers, mechanical engineers, and all other disciplines have the right to patent their inventions -- but not software engineers?

One thing to keep in mind is that, say, mechanical engineers works aren't covered by copyright. They need to apply, pay, and only get it for a short period of time. The advantage they get is that it's general...

Right now, software developers have both, which doesn't seem fair to me.

Besides, right now copyright is way stronger than patents... Though I don't think this should be the case (I'd like to have, say, 5-10 year copyright).