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Statements from venture capitalists

This list is just the vocal venture capitalists against software patents.

Brad Feld

[...] patents on software are a massive tax on and retardant of innovation in the US.[1]

Art Reisman

Patents should never be awarded to: 1) ideas; 2) processes, recipes, software programs.

Todd Vernon

Many think that Software Patents are stupid. I conceptually agree with this statement. Having spent what seems like millions of hours constructing these, baby sitting them, defending them; it is really all wasted time and effort, at least in a conceptual sense. There is no way for a software engineer or system architect to have any idea what exists out there to either copy or avoid (whatever the motivation).

Laura Creighton

Software Patents have not protected the Small inventor from the Big Company -- instead they have made legal expertise an additional barrier to entry into the software business. And they scare investors like me out of investing in software businesses. In the United States there are plenty of companies whose fervent desire is to become successful enough to make their founders comfortable -- and no more successful. They are trying very hard to remain 'too small to be worth suing'. This does not benefit Society either.

Fred Wilson

Brad Burnham

Jason Mendelson

Chris Sacca

[T]he average Silicon Valley start-up or even medium sized company, no matter how truly innovative they are, I have no doubt that aspects of what they're doing violate patents right now. And that's what's fundamentally broken about this system right now.[2]

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