Anthony Kennedy (US Supreme Court Justice) on software patents
Anthony Kennedy, or Justice Kennedy, is a judge on the US Supreme Court.
Kennedy wrote the opinion of the court in Bilski v. Kappos (2010, USA) and in KSR v. Teleflex (2007, USA).
Official statements
The Bilski hearing
it’s difficult for me to think that Congress would want to — would have wanted to give only one person the capacity to issue insurance
I wonder if he thinks the same about giving only one person the capacity to write video playing software.
Discussing Diehr, Kennedy says:
[...]you don’t know much from that language. But that was something that you could touch, that you could see, that looked like a machine, the substance was different before the process and after the process.
Kennedy agreed with this statement from Justice Stevens:
Stevens: I don’t understand why that isn’t just the application of a process, which – which is not itself patentable subject matter, to a particular machine that can use process
