According to the definition of business method patents given by the United States Patent and Trademark Office, business method patents refer to: devices and corresponding methods used in business operations, government management, enterprise management or the generation of financial data reports, which cause data to be significantly changed or complete calculation operations after processing; devices and corresponding methods used to change data processing or calculation operations when providing goods or services.
Take an e-commerce website as an example. The website implements the sale of copyrighted publications (traditional publications and digital publications). It has a certain implementation method, which is a kind of logical method in thought. If it is written through software and combined with computer implementation, then such a technical solution, as long as it meets the three characteristics of a patent (novelty, creativity, and practicality), can be fully requested to be protected in the form of a patent.
This also involves the issue of software protection methods. Usually, software can be protected by copyright or patent. However, the focus of software copyright protection is the expression method, which is the organizational form of the programming language. Usually, only the same structure or the same substance can constitute infringement.