Patient capital, investment money that can wait a few years before seeing a profit, is a must but hard to find in the current computing climate. Smith pointed out that, to counterbalance all of that is a reward that would even interest Mr. Gates. Smith also lectured the gathered crowd on the importance of intellectual property law to their fledgling empires. Most software copyrights and patents, he said, are not yet tested in courts. Many of them would not stand up if they were litigated, he said, because you cannot copyright an evolutionary advance in the state of the art, and that is what most code is.
Complex software contains algorithms that can be patented.
It would have legal protection. The small company will have the power to defend their patents against anyone, and reap the enormous profits that will result from the monopoly patents afford. Enter the scary and spooky domain, Smith invited his audience. The marketplace needs more productivity tools every year. Making decisions is what the computer does best.