Patents on .....gas pedals and software; posting from Google Docs

OK, this is the first time I try to publish directly from Google Docs.

This is interesting, because it seems that most of my online work is being moved to Google. Which is both good and scares me a little.

Good is being that me, as a sorta advanced user, moving to Google means that they have pretty good products. Search, mail (and especially spam filtering), Blogger (beta), RSS reader, analytics and now docs are all Google products which I now seem to use more. I do think they are good products for the type of usage I use them for, and they are good in more generic sense.

But what scares me in all this, is the thing that all my actions on the net, or at least many of them, go through one same central place, which is being Google, which in reality gives them all the info about my habits online, and also a lot of information about me as person. That, in fact, scares the hell out of me - if Google becomes evil one day, they could hurt many people as me. And what if they require a payment for all these? I don't believe this will happen, but it might.

Now, to the matters. I've found interesting article, about some obscure patent, given for ...."gas pedals, the kind that make trucks go when drivers step on them...".
Apparently, the outcome of the trial may serve as a precedent for other patent issues, so many companies, including Microsoft and Johnson&Johnson, tried to override the courts' decision.

But, what's to gas pedals and software licenses?

Quote: "Alliteration aside, we’ll defer that question to somebody with a law degree or at least a working knowledge of patent law. But, it’ll be worth following how the Supreme Court treats this case given that Microsoft is playing both sides of the fence here -- dangling the patent sword above the head of Linux while at the same time politely asking the Supreme Court to make it harder for patent squatters to hit tech companies."

Link to full article is here .


Feedback is appreciated.