Lambda the Ultimate

More political or economical than technological - software patents again:

Kodak wins Java lawsuit

It returns to court next week to seek $1.06 billion in damages from Sun Rochester's largest employer claimed during a three-week trial that portions of Java infringed on patents Kodak purchased from Wang Laboratories Inc. in late 1997. The patents describe a method by which a program can "ask for help" from another application to carry out certain computer-oriented functions. That's generally similar to the way Java operates, according to Kodak and other experts.

Will dinosaurs kill each other with patents? Who will be the last saur standing? I know of a three-letter acronym company (not SCO) with a huge patent base - will it subsume all the (interesting) others (de facto, if not de jure)? How will it affect the progress?