Software Patents Before the Supreme Court

The Supreme Court has granted certiorari in Alice Corporation Pty. Ltd. v. CLS Bank, International.  Here is the Federal Circuit's opinion.  The SCOTUSBlog case file on the case is here.  Bloomberg.com reports here, and the Electronic Frontier Foundation weighs in here.

The issue before the Court is:

Whether claims to computer-implemented inventions – including claims to systems and machines, processes, and items of manufacture – are directed to patent-eligible subject matter within the meaning of 35 U.S.C. § 101 as interpreted by this Court.

The EFF takes a favorable view of the cert. grant, noting that there is a problem of "low-quality" and "abstract" software patents.  Whether software is too much of an abstract idea to be patentable subject matter will likely be the crux of the issue, and it will be interesting to see how it turns out.