Have you ever wondered...

November 28, 2006 10:56 AM

1) Why does Adobe (and others) include patent numbers when its programs start (ex. Acrobat)? 2) What is the specific term that refers to the notion of swaying an opinion of something by describing it in certain terms? (Ex. These are absolutely stunning wildlife photos!)

3) Does anyone remember a Mefi comment that touches on the idea that today's "social conformity/peer pressure" has taken the place of yesteryear's freedom restricting laws? The comment had a profound effect and for the life of me I cannot seem to find it (IIRC posted during the summer).

posted by Clementines4ever to Human Relations (5 answers total)

(1) and (2) ought to be separate questions, and (3) is about Metafilter, so ought to be in a Metatalk thread not AskMe.
posted by matthewr at 11:02 AM on November 28, 2006

I'll answer your first question. According to the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office:

A patentee who makes or sells patented articles, or a person who does so for or under the patentee is required to mark the articles with the word “Patent” and the number of the patent. The penalty for failure to mark is that the patentee may not recover damages from an infringer unless the infringer was duly notified of the infringement and continued to infringe after the notice.

So, presumably Adobe displays patent numbers in its About boxes or splash screens so that they can sue you and recover damages should they ever discover you infringing on one of their patents.
posted by RichardP at 11:33 AM on November 28, 2006

Yea, they provide notice for precisely the reason RichardP said: you can only recover certain types of damages for infringement if there was notice. So some patent lawyer was very careful to tell them to put the numbers there.

(I am a patent lawyer, but I am not *your* patent lawyer. This is not legal advice.)
posted by raf at 11:39 AM on November 28, 2006

Mod note: I removed the metafilter question, ask it in metatalk if you'd like to
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 11:46 AM on November 28, 2006

Question 2: Semantic slanting.
posted by MadamM at 5:34 PM on November 28, 2006