Patent Number: 6,264,560
Sheldon F. Goldberg got a crazy patent for …
“Method and System of Playing games on a network.”
What does this mean?
This guy has a patent on playing games on a server online? He somehow patented the idea of
playing computer games. This blows my mind.
Current IP lawsIP law are rules for securing and enforcing legal rights to invention.
Because Goldberg has a patent, this allows him to demand money for anyone who attempts
to upload games to a server. This limits small business that are making games to upload their
games to a server without paying hefty amounts of money to Goldberg.
What are people saying?
-Threating small online gaming websites
-Claiming to own basic online gaming architecture
Big Picture?
This hinders growth for small gaming companies to grow. As we learned in class patents tend
to restrict growth rather than create it at least in the software world. In Software patents
there is so much new technology that requires infringing on other software patent laws. We
all need to do what New Zealand did and make software patents illegal.
https://www.eff.org/press/archives/2008/0
https://www.eff.org/patent-busting/sheldon-f-goldberg1/30