Greg Sterling shares a blog post from the Patent Law Blog that says that “the Patent and Trademark Office has now made clear that its newly developed position on patentable subject matter will invalidate many and perhaps most software patents, including pioneering patent claims to such innovators as Google, Inc.”

Does this mean that PageRank and search algorithms are going to be dissolved under these new restrictions — since the claim is that they may inhibit future development? Yesterday, during the Daily Search Cast, Danny Sullivan said that the Google PageRank patent has changed so much that this is a nonissue, so perhaps not.

It’s really hard to say that this will happen. I suppose that where there is no wiggle room, the patents will be revised to avoid being invalidated.

With regards to Google PageRank, if it ever does go away due to governmental restrictions, will they lose much? It won’t be a competitive disadvantage, forum members say. PageRank is not that substantial in the grand scheme of things.

Forum discussion continues at DigitalPoint Forums.