Ed Burnette makes a point that hits home, with regard to software patents, and how engineers and programmers of modern companies are now being asked to write them:

Unfortunately, the joke is on all of us. It’s on our economy, as we let patents choke down innovation and increase fear, uncertainty, and doubt in an already uncertain time. It’s on our bottom lines, as we make busy-work for our expensive lawyers with their sparkling eyes instead of investing for the future. And it’s on our collective consciousness, as we force good and decent people to act against the better angels of their nature.

I wonder if the R Foundation has considered the implications of software patents for the R software.