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Originally Posted by Xenophon
A few comments on patents...
First, the standard of 'obviousness' really isn't obvious. That is, the relevant question is not "what is obvious today?" but rather "what was obvious to an average practitioner in that field at the time the patent was filed?"
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There are many patents that fail both standards for "obviousness".
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Second, while patent clerks are indeed swamped with new patent requests, that's not the main problem. The big issue is that the patent office is very good at searching for prior art by looking at existing patents, and very bad at looking in the broader scientific (and trade!) literature for prior art.
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Thirdly, the patent office has a very hard time hiring examiners who know software (in particular). This really handicaps their examination of software patents, and especially their determination of what is "obvious."
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It's a combination of not having the resources to do thorough research (being swamped) as well as not having examiners with the expertise required.