The patent on SIFT expired yesterday

Re:The patent on SIFT expired yesterday by skunkworker on Sunday March 08, 2020 @10:51PM (#22522538)

Does this mean that OpenCV will be able to now include SIFT in the “free” modules. Or are there more roadblocks before including it?

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Re:The patent on SIFT expired yesterday by rsp1984 on Monday March 09, 2020 @06:27AM (#22524278)

I'm not a lawyer, but as far as I know expired US patents enter the public domain. After their expiration the described invention can be freely used by anyone for any purpose [1].

So I think the answers to your questions are yes and no.

[1] https://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/how-long-is-my-paten...

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Re:The patent on SIFT expired yesterday by amelius on Monday March 09, 2020 @08:39AM (#22524872)

Perhaps there are still patents in other regions (?)

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Re:The patent on SIFT expired yesterday by dr_zoidberg on Tuesday March 10, 2020 @09:52AM (#22535431)

As others commented, the only countries where software patents work are the US and Japan. So it'd be just Japan that could have a patent in place? Don't know theh details, and IANAL.

OTOH, I'd really like the patent to be inactive, it'd allow me to work worry free in a lot of things that I've had an interest in.

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Re:The patent on SIFT expired yesterday by abhgh on Tuesday March 10, 2020 @12:44AM (#22532783)

I really hope so. Including SIFT in OpenCV should be easy since they did have an implementation earlier, which they removed due to the licensing.

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