DISQUS

It distresses me that iTWire does not seem to have read the full document before commenting on it (just the abstract). I read a bit more and it appears to be describing something more specific than simply page up/down.

I don't know if this particular invention is is too obvious to be patented -- I'm not qualified to say. I'd be interested in hearing an opinion from a patent attorney who works with this type of invention.

Patents are a complicated issue and I don't have a fully formed opinion about them (and I work for a company that holds a lot of patents). But I find a lot of the discussion about them not to be very helpful. With respect, it often seems like woefully uninformed conjecture about so-called obvious or wacky patents or is thinly-disguised anti-patent posturing dressed up to look like an argument. (TechDirt is a fine example of these offenses, in my opinion.)