So, to drag out and beat he proveribal Slashdot Glowing Dead horse.. I assume these glowing genes are patented by somebody? IANAL But I don't think gene patents apply to living animals Does this mean that if you buy these fish, breeding them will be illegal? Gene patents only apply to drugs and the like, anythign otherwise would be against all sorts of laws regarding cruelty to animals and the like. Do you think that once, rather than this just being something that affects farmers (in faraway states) and computer programmers (who the average person has to learn an entire new vocabulary just to understand what the programmers are talking about), once the whole you-can-patent-anything thing starts to affect "the average person" in a very clear, noticeable way-- "Here are some dogs, that you paid money for. But you're banned from letting them breed, because they happen to contain some invisible series of DNA codes that, despite being part of this dog's very life, is the intellectual property of some random corporation."-- do you think once we reach that point, maybe we'll finally start to see public backlash against how far the u.s. patent paradigm has gone? Again animals aren't software patents cannot apply against a living being, mind you that doesn't stop the pet makers from sterilising all the animals which could be a "technological measure" and thus using the DMCA to stop anybody from attempting to clone the animal, this could also stop anybody from pulling the same gene sequence and making their own, but it doesn't affect breeding as breeding is uncontrollable unless its through a technological measure such as sterilisation. Of course, if the people selling these fish want to keep their patents safe, they'd probably just make all the fish infertile. But then if all the fish are infertile, why are the environmentalists worried? Is it because they've seen "Jurassic park"? And what happens if some of the un-neutered versions somehow leak out on the black market (ebay)? Could they stop that? Is spaying a DMCA-applicable "method that effectively controls access to intellectual property"?