A popular word processor in Japan to be "destroyed" due to patent dispute over "help function". (I'm imagining a government vet inserting a syringe into the source code.) "The patent involves Matsushita's Help Mode function, which gives on-screen instructions."

http://computerworld.co.nz/news.nsf/0/3BDE72837B1DD5BBCC256F9C0070E506?OpenD...]

also:

http://www.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/getarticle.pl5?nb20050202a3.htm

It raises the question of whether all the world's word-processors could be subject to a legal destruction order at the same time. I strongly suspect that all the world's word-processors infringe some software patent held by some body. What a demonstration of the "benefits" of software patents that would be!

Good grief,

Malcohol.

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