FSF has now filed an amicus brief in Bilski, and they too ask the Supreme Court "to affirm that software ideas are not patentable":End Software Patents (ESP) executive director Ciaran O'Riordan explained, "Every software patent is a restriction on software developers and users of computers, and there are currently 200,000 software patents in the USA.

"It's nice to actually feel welcome, because, for many years I was like the boogey man at conferences. People would come and present their software and they'd show what new features they'd coded in the last year, and then I'd come along and say soffftwaaaare paaatents. I'd have to tell everyone to be scared."