Non-Practical Entities: Business Method Patents and the Digitization of Culture

Abstract

Business method patents are a special class of patents that allow companies to assert ownership over technologies and the ways in which those technologies are put to use. Looking at the history of business method patents in the United States and the recent resurgence of this type of patent activity in the mobile and handheld computing sectors, I argue that business method and related software patents act as quiet quests for control over information and cultural practices. Business method and software patents highlight how certain actors use moments of technological change to secure economic and cultural advantages through law and regulation. Instead of fostering innovation and rewarding inventors, these patents are an impractical form of intellectual property that seeks to mimic traditional conceptions of physical objects in an era of digital goods. This article serves as a call for scholars undertaking research on the migration of media and culture to new digital formats and devices to consider how patents act as protocols that pre-inscribe devices with certain features, gestures, and meanings. As an increasing variety of cultural goods such as music, movies, and books migrate into digital formats online, business method and software patents have significant implications for the production, circulation, and use of digital commodities.