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Fame and prestige gets you better jobs in academia. If you invent an algorithm worth the paper it is written on, at least.

Software patents can also keep a large number of programmers from earning money. If you are a programmer, software patents mean you can't just write your code without worrying if any snippet is patented. Most likely some of them will be, look at the patented web shop that the FFII annotated. Programmers shouldn't have to pay rent on algorithms, never mind whether they are trivial or hard, learnt from a textbook or self-developed.

Software patents are just that: rent on mathematical ideas, expressed in a way we call "algorithms". I don't see any benefit in allowing some individuals to collect rent from all the others for a resource (ideas) that can be easily duplicated, has powerful positive externalities and very low negative internalities (their side-effects are enormously and they good cost comparatively little to produce).

The truth is that everybody needs money, and most people have to work for it. The government shouldn't give anyone monopoly powers unless they can prove society, and not the rent-seekers alone, will also benefit from the trade. Software patents benefit the limited number of people who can afford them, not the majority of society, so we should not have them. This way we can all (that includes you) have more wealth, or as you said, money.

Just days before the European Commission's next hearing on patent policy that is still being hatched despite the last directive's overwhelming defeat in Parliament, several recent publications discuss developments of the law on Tux' home continent, and successful steps to avert software patents: The huge new book on "The War over Software Patents in the European Union" by the founder of NoSoftwarePatents has just been released for download. If you prefer a few hundred pages less, see the latest issue of the International Journal of Law and Information Technology for a scholarly article.

Pretty sure the reporter has it wrong... Europe has never allowed 'software patents' instead, they allow "Computer Implemented Inventions

What actually happened is "the European Commission has confirmed that the European Patent Office's (EPO) case law is not binding for member states... For the first time, the Commission has also clearly stated that computer programs are not patentable subject matter, without hiding behind the infamous "as such" cop-out."

Go to a reputable source for this if you want accuracy: European Commission: EPO Case Law Not Binding - Software Not Patentable..

This is a great development, it's far from the end of the story.

Besides in the USA, software is only copyrighted not patented (yet).

The USA will fall behind because ever more intellectual property will be locked up behind a multitude of corporations and individuals effectively ruled by lawyers who are more interested in earning legal fees rather than bothering to actually manufacture anything.

Other Governments and Europe's bureaucracies will not hesitate to forcibly acquire the necessary intellectual property needed get things done for large projects

Other countries and even Europe's parliament will also not hesitate to adopt more liberal intellectual property structures if you demonstrate that doing so will better benefit their economies as a whole, instead of just a few major corporations.

The USA administration and even more myopic major corporations will continue to let more and more manufacturing, service industry and development to be off-shored resulting in importing permanent poverty into the USA.

You want to see the future of the USA? Visit the remnants of Detroit motor city works, Ye Mighty, and despair

UGA sounded interesting, so I went Googling.
Guess who's trying to patent it?

It is provable that by softwares very nature, it is not a matter of patentability. Only by ignorance and intentional deception is it granted patents.

from http://wiki.ffii.de/IstTamaiEn

Physics of Abstraction (abstraction physics)

Abstraction enters the picture of computing with the representation of physical transistor switch positions of ON '1' and OFF '0' or what we call "Binary" notation. However, computers have far more transistor switches in them than we can keep up with in such a low level or first order abstract manner, so we create higher level abstractions in order to increase our productivity in programming computers. From Machine language to application interfaces that allow users to define some sequence of action into a word or button press (ie. record and playback macro) so to automate a task, we are working with abstractions that ultimately accesses the hardware transistor switches which in turn output to, or control some physical world hardware.

Programming is the act of automating some level of complexity, usually made up of simpler complexities, but done so in order to allow the user to use and reuse the complexity through a simplified interface. And this is a recursive act, building upon abstractions others have created that even our own created abstractions/automations might be used by another to further create more complex automations. In general, if we didn't build upon what those before us have done, we then would not advance at all, but rather be like any other mammal incapable of anything more than, at best, first level abstraction. But we are more, and as such have the natural human right and duty to advance in such a manner.

There is an identifiable and definable "physics of abstraction" (abstraction physics), an identification of what is required in order to make and use abstractions. Abstraction Physics is not exclusive to computing but constantly in use by ... well... us humans. Elements or facets of abstraction physics include the actions of abstraction creation and use, such as defining a word to mean a more complex definition (word = definition, function-name = actions to take, etc.), Starting and Stopping (interfacing with) of an abstraction definition sequence, keeping track of where you are in the progress of abstraction sequence usage (moving from one abstraction to another), defining and changing "input from" direction, defining and changing "output to" direction, getting input to process (using variables or place holders to carry values), sequencially stepping thru abstraction/automation details (inherently includes optionally sending output), looking up the meaning of a word or symbol (abstraction) so to act upon or with it, identifing an abstraction or real item value so to act upon it, and putting constraints upon your abstraction lookups and identifications (when you look up a word in a dictionary you don't start at the beginning of the dictionary, but begin with the section that starts with the first letter then followed by the second, etc., and when you open a box with many items to stock, you identify each so as to know where to put it in stock.)

Abstraction Physics has yet to be established/recognized in a broad "common acceptance" manner, similiar to the difficulty in the acceptance of the hindu-arabic decimal system (which included the concept that nothing can have value - re: the Zero place holder). It took three hundred years (from inception) for the innovation of the now common decimal system to overcome the far more limited Roman Numeral system. (NOTE: mathmatics and the symbol sets used are also abstractions and therefor a subset of abstraction possibilities and certainly an application of abstraction physics.) Though the act of programming is still younger than many who apply it, we are technologically moving at a much faster rate of incorporating innovations and better understandings of reality. There is a physics to abstraction creation and use which can be used

The European Commission and Parliament have done a deal which looks set to introduce a law that makes this kind of tracking a daily part of police work.

The "Data Retention Directive" proposes tracking all mobile phone and Internet usage, and storing this for 2 years, and (worst) making it available to police and other parties (possibly commercial ones), without much regard to existing privacy laws.

There is an FFII press release on this subject: http://wiki.ffii.de/DataRetPr051205En.

The FFII and EDRI are fighting this in the Parliament, but the directive has been shoved through very brutally by the Council, led by the UK. Basically the bureaucrats of the Commission, unhindered by any European Constitution, are creating laws by stealth, and this Big Brother directive is symptomatic of a take over of the national legislative processes by an group of unelected, unaccountable officials.

The UK Presidency had proposed a very brutal law, which went as far as requiring the logging of the MAC address of every computer connected to the Internet (yes, that blew me away too), and using the Good Cop/ Bad Cop approach, bullied the Parliament into accepting a "compromise" agreement that dropped all the references to terrorism, and added a bunch of waffle about human rights, but basically creates a pan-European database of every cellphone call, and every Internet communication. I've not yet had time to see whether TCP/IP end-points are also logged, but the original proposals definitely requested this.

Europe is rapidly turning into a police state that makes the US look like a haven of freedom and civil rights. The rejection of the European Constitution by the French and Dutch voters, though a nicely symbolic act, have left a power vacuum into which the grey bureaucrats of the Commission have stepped.

There are several here: http://swpat.ffii.de/patente/wirkungen/index.en.ht ml although it is obviously rarer for a project to have to completely shut down than just hobble their software.

When has Microsoft EVER leveraged a patent to stifle progress?

In 2003/04 Microsoft published patent license terms for CIFS which disallow the use ore [sic] reimplementation of this communication architecture by GNU software. In late 2002, Microsoft began dissuade corproporate customers from introducing GNU/Linux by pointing out that if they use free software nobody would protect them from being sued for patent infringement.

Although the directive was defeated, this hasn't changed the behaviour of EPO. The EU Commission is unable to control them.

Any invention that requires a large amount of upfront investment simply wouldn't happen if there wasn't some way to prevent competitors leeching off your R&D effort. This is so different from a new pizza topping that "order of magnitude" doesn't even begin to cover it.

Maybe, but most of the patents we see filed these days are comparable in their complexity to the new pizza topping. I could start listing them by thousands from Amazon's one click shopping patent to these, but I'm not going waste my time on it. What I'm saying, is that there a are some huge flaws in the patent system that unless they get fixed, they make the whole idea of patents stink.

Scenario one: I'm writing software. I come up with a brilliant idea and put it in my software. When I release it, someone pops up with a patent and says I have to pay royalties.

Scenario two: I'm writing software. I come up with a brilliant idea and put it in my software. When I release it, someone else steals my idea for their own software and releases a competing product.

Both of these scenarios are clearly wrong, but no patent plan thus far has dealt with any way to prevent both cases. Overuse of software patents creates the first scenario, while lack of software patents creates the second.

Your "brilliant thinkers" rant is quite amusing.

Concerning your simple solution to all the problems with (software) patents: people have been saying for decades already that all problems with the patent system can be solved by just doing this or that (better application of novelty/non-obviousness requirements, more funding of patent offices, better training of patent examiners, patent pools, ...).

The fact is however that today, things are as bad as ever. And that's not just my opinion, but that of Dr David Martin, CEO of M-CAM, a company specialised in establishing the value of patents and technology transfers.

Until that whole mess is sorted out, the patent system is costing the software economy millions and millions of dollars in patent application fees, costs of setting up licensing deals, fighting lawsuits (have a look at the last slide) etc.

So I suggest you with your brilliant mind first work out the economic model and studies that shows that with your adjustments the patent system is in fact overall beneficial (as opposed to the current situation), then get it turned into a law in the US, that we see whether it in fact works in practice and that only then we start with the legalisation of software patents in Europe under the same regime.

Until then, I prefer not to have that whole administrative and juridical burden imposed on the European software market. And I don't see why people shouldn't argue for removing the burden in the US as well.

Other Governments and Europe's bureaucracies will not hesitate to forcibly acquire the necessary intellectual property needed get things done for large projects. That's how the European airline industry managed to get the Concord, Euro-fighter and even the latest Airbus built.

Other countries and even Europe's parliament will also not hesitate to adopt more liberal intellectual property structures if you demonstrate that doing so will better benefit their economies as a whole, instead of just a few major corporations.

The USA administration and even more myopic major corporations will continue to let more and more manufacturing and service industry be off-shored resulting in importing permanent poverty into the USA.

You want to see the future of the USA? Visit the remnants of Detroit motor city works and despair.

The USA will fall behind because ever more intellectual property will be locked up behind a multitude of corporations and individuals effectively ruled by lawyers who are more interested in earning legal fees rather than bothering to actually manufacture anything.

Other Governments and Europe's bureaucracies will not hesitate to forcibly acquire the necessary intellectual property needed get things done for large projects. That's how the European airline industry managed to get the Concord, Euro-fighter and even the latest Airbus built.

Other countries and even Europe's parliament will also not hesitate to adopt more liberal intellectual property structures if you demonstrate that doing so will better benefit their economies as a whole, instead of just a few major corporations.

The USA administration and even more myopic major corporations will continue to let more and more manufacturing and service industry be off-shored resulting in importing permanent poverty into the USA.

You want to see the future of the USA? Visit the remnants of Detroit motor city works and despair.

Last Monday, the FFII and NoSoftwarePatents.com jointly won the CNET award for Outstanding Contribution to Software Development in Europe.

This award for the anti software patents movement is both very welcome and very well deserved. When the European Parliament rejected software patents on July 6, it was a great victory. Not only for the open source movement, but for all European businesses that use or produce software. It is nice to see this recognized in this manner.

One To Win

We also have a chance of winning another award in recognition of all activists who have spent countless hours on making the swpat victory happen.

The founder of NoSoftwarePatents.com Florian Müller has been nominated as a candidate for the title "European of the Year" in an open Internet poll organized by The European Voice, a weekly magazine that focuses on EU politics.

If he wins either the big "European of the Year" award, or the category "Campaigner of the Year" where he is also nominated, it would be a nice PR victory for the anti-swpat movement.

Also nominated in the "MEP of the Year" category is Michel Rochard, the former French Prime Minister who championed our cause as rapporteur in the European Parliament, where we won on July 6.

If you want to donate a few mouseclicks to the fight against software patents, you can go to and register your vote. Only one vote per person.

Note that you have to vote in all the categories, or your vote will be disqualified. For the most part it doesn't matter who you choose in the other categories, but there are a few bad apples (from an anti-swpat perspective), so here are some suggestions. But it's Campaigner, MEP, and European of the Year that are the important ones.

1) Commissioner of the Year:
Don't vote for Charlie McGreevy, who is the commissioner who tried to ram software patents down Europe's throat.

2) MEP of the Year:
Vote for Michel Rochard, who won for us in Parliament.

3) Statesman of the Year:
Avoid Blair, Schröder, and Juncker because of how their respective governments behaved over the directive (especially Juncker, Luxembourg). This leaves the candidates from Italy, Poland or Spain to choose from.

4) Diplomat of the Year:
Don't vote for Nicolas Schmitt, who is part of the Luxembourg government that handled the swpat issue so disgracefully and anti-democratically during the Luxembourg EU Presidency.

5) Campaigner of the Year:
Vote for Florian Müller, NoSoftwarePatents.com

6) Business Leader of the Year:
Pick one.

7) Journalist of the Year:
Pick one.

8) Achiever of the Year:
Pick one.

9) Non-EU Citizen of the Year:
Pick one.

10) European of the Year:
Vote for Florian Müller, NoSoftwarePatents.com
Although one could argue that Michel Rochard would be just as worthy from our perspective, I think it sends a stronger and clearer message if one of our activists wins the award, rather than a politician that is involved in many other issues as well. As it would be very damaging to our chances of winning the most prestigious of the awards if the anti-swpat vote is split on two candidates, my recommendation is Florian Müller only.

For more information about the nominees, see the presentations at the award site here. The poll closes on November 11, and the award will be handed out at a gala dinner hosted by former EU Parliament president Pat Cox later that month.

Europe's bureaucracies will not hesitate to forcibly acquire the necessary intellectual property needed get things done for large projects. That's how the European airline industry managed to get the Concord, Euro-fighter and even the latest Airbus built.

Europe's parliaments will also not hesitate to adopt more liberal intellectual property structures if you demonstrate that doing so will better benefit their economies as a whole, instead of just a few major corporations.

It covers all Intellectual property crimes, including criminalizing patent infringement.

The items covered are the same as 2005/295/EC
http://wiki.ffii.de/Ipred0504En

So it would make it a criminal offence to infringe a patent. No kidding, imagine Philips Siemens, Nokia and their officers all vulnerable to a criminal infringment of some 'smiley' patent.

Here's a working link to the Hamburg court order. Unfortuantely I don't speak german either. Maybe someone else will jump in and translate. I thought about using an online translator and typing them in by hand, but the occational funky accented characters would have been a real pain in the butt.

Anyway, based on the english discussion at your other link this does not appear to have any big relevance to the anti-patent issue (my main concern). It seems more of a nuciance issue over some commentary about some particular company.

-

Any chance you could post the court order, or indicate what these 8 items are, or where they can be located online? /blockquote> Hamburg court order. It's in German though. I don't speak German myself.

or whatever else you can come up with to help clarify the conflict?

Look here. If you follow links to ffii.org pages and they don't work, replace ffii.org with ffii.de to get them to resolve for now.

There may also be a follow-up article about it on news.zdnet.co.uk today.

try

http://wiki.ffii.de/
http://swpat.ffii.de/
http://nutzwerk.ffii.de/

try

http://wiki.ffii.de/
http://swpat.ffii.de/
http://nutzwerk.ffii.de/

try

http://wiki.ffii.de/
http://swpat.ffii.de/
http://nutzwerk.ffii.de/