can software be patented?? Is there any opportunity for becoming an inventor in IT?

[little_tiger]

Hello all,
Can software be patented? I heard that some people say software cannot be patented and some people assume software patents as the obstacles to innovation. Is that true??? However, some people say different things.
Can you guys give me an accurate answer based on government official websites? Thanks.

[fss]

Patenting software is a huge bundle of fail. The short answer is "yes, you can patent software," with a whole bunch of asterisks. Read over the Wikipedia page to get an idea of the issues facing software patents.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Software_patent

[schip666!]

As the proud holder of software patent #5,995,974 I would have to agree with "fss"...

After multiple consultations with varying groups of lawyers we ended up with a patent document describing something whereof I couldn't quite grasp the function...even though one of my block-diagrams is included in the actual application. It is now wholly owned by IBM who probably don't realize that they hold the key to years of litigation against anyone who attempts to load a user defined function into a data storage application.