Well, . . . The purpose of patents is to get things invented that would not otherwise be invented -- if something costs significant time/effort/etc. to invent and those costs would be difficult to recover by selling copies of implementations, patents increase the profit margin of sales and hence help cover costs. (That is the theoretical proposition anyway: it is not really proven by evidence.)

So would this particular invention have been made without patent support? (assuming the standard theoretical model) That is the question.

The purpose of patents is to advance public knowledge. It was understood that people would invent regardless (as people always had). But without patents inventors obfuscated, sealed devices, etc. And when they died, chunks of knowledge often died with them.

But inventors were reluctant to make their secrets publicly available for everyone to see and possibly copy. Hence the temporary monopoly was extended, not to make their job in the market easier, but as payment for sharing their knowledge with the public.

IIRC, the primary purpose of patents, since they were invented in 15th century Venice, has been to eliminate the monopoly of trade guilds. This was an issue well into the 20th century. But has software ever had this problem?

Exactly. By making their knowledge public.

> "But has software ever had this problem?"

While the history of software looks nothing like Renaissance Italy, the future may -- particularly in a hypothetical world without software patents.

Historically, the root of even arguably-patentable software is expressly unpatentable math that has largely been developed by publicly-funded institutions. So that even when, say, the Fraunhofer Institute was granted patents over parts of the mp3 codec, even absent the patent disclosure, it drew attention to the root math and gave rise to alternatives.

But looking forward the situation is more worrisome. As public funding has failed to keep pace, only the potential to patent research has brought in the private funds that have continued to drive innovation. Without that patent potential, there'd be little reason for anything beyond the hint of promising research to be shared publicly. It would be pursued privately, without published articles, without any public disclosure on the other end.

And given the trend for modern software research to manifest as internet-accessible services, it doesn't seem like there would even be an opportunity to reverse-engineer or decompile the ultimate products that such research generated. To say nothing of the rapidly increasing complexity of modern software and the increasing rate at which it's tied to custom silicon.

Consider an example: How in the world would someone be able to reverse engineer Siri in a world without software patents or the potential to patent publicly-funded core research?

The public has no access to the server-side source. We have very limited access to the client-side source. We have even less access to the client-side custom silicon [1]. Even if it were plausible for a not-for-profit effort to untangle a project of that magnitude, they simply do not have the access necessary.

[1] Though client side silicon is less integral in the current implementation, it's no stretch to imagine that Apple will continue to refine and accelerate its algorithms through heavier use of custom DSPs. Nor is it news to say that it approaches the implausible for not-for-profit efforts to reverse engineer modern silicon. And the relentless pace of fabrication promises to only make things more difficult going forward.

Scrolling to the left of the iOS home screen to bring up the search interface runs afoul of that claim as written.

As does scrolling in the built-in Google Maps app.

This kind of patent is bad for the industry because it is absurdly broad. Whether patents on UI are a good idea, or whether this is truly novel and not just an extension of the 'infinite scroll' of things like Google Maps, is almost irrelevant in comparison.

This is common among most patents -- overly broad claims that then specialize down to specific implementations. Most patent holders know not to claim infringement on the broad claims because it has a 100% chance of being invalidated.

That isn't infinite scroll, and it's pretty clear that the sudden awareness of this interface technique rose quite quickly.

After looking around a bit, it seems like the non-obvious use people are employing is applying the concept even where the content isn't a list which will expand at the top when you refresh, but rather some other form of content that will be replaced with the up-to-date version when you refresh.

Rotate 90 degrees and this concept is novel? Egads.

Further it's interesting how people could claim the obviousness of this despite the fact that there isn't a single known use before twitter started doing it (where it was then picked up by others). That's a pretty remarkably clear indication that it isn't obvious.

99% of software patents are bullshit that should never have been granted, with this patent being among them. However this patent is no worse, and is arguably better, than most that so many actually defend on here (hyperlinking phone numbers, for instance).

Assuming the patent holder chooses to license it at all. Perceived competitors may not get the chance.

(I'm assuming this is a design patent. If not, it's 20 years, not 14.)

I feel very strongly against software patents. My only comment is choosing this to complain about. As far as software behaviors go, it is more novel than most.

I didn't mean to imply to imply you were for them, though I see now that's what my wording did. Sorry about that!