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Technology Stocks : MSFT Internet Explorer vs. NSCP Navigator
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To: Charles Hughes who wrote (14383)11/24/1997 4:01:00 AM
From: damniseedemons  Read Replies (1) of 24154
 
>By the way, anybody want to comment on why there is no company like Microsoft in biotech, building a monopoly by cruising behind the other players and copying them? Hint: Patent Law.>

So? For a drug, there's basically one active ingredient that makes it work. In software, there are a zillion ways to do the same thing. Big difference. You can't patent an idea, but you can patent a chemical.

Another analogy with drugs: If a drug works by a certain method, that method can not be patented, though the exact chemical that invokes the method can (so like you can write software that does the same thing in a bunch of different ways). For example, we have a class of drugs called antibiotics, all of which do the same thing; however hundreds of different chemicals are used for that purpose. Could you imagine if someone could patent the antibiotic action, instead of specific drugs???
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