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EU Study Looks At Software Patents
Cardinal Biggles writes: "A study into software patents commissioned by the EU seems to conclude that software patents are OK, it's just the U.S. Patent Office that sucks. It addresses Open Source, but seems to suggest that Open Source projects should get patents of their own, and finance their project using the licensing fees. Meanwhile, the European Commission has opened a public consultation on whether software should be patentable. The request for comments itself, IMHO, sounds not very neutral about software patents. You can get your comments in until 15-Dec-2000!" The study appears to be pretty thorough. And I advise any European developers who care to get their comments in about software patents! It's your career...
Assuming the summary is correct...
Finance Open Source projects through licensing fees?
Further proof that the Eurocrats are basically nitwits who couldn't get work in their own countries!
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You are a fucking moron.
I know people try to steal copyright, but authors have caught on, and now assert their copyright explicitly.
If copyright is breached, the owner can sue for plagiarism etc, without needing to get involved in patents at all.
I always though patents were meant to be applicable to products/processes, rather than documents - which is what source listings are.
Apart from from the copyright expiring (which may not be relevant in a fast-moving environment) what else makes this impractical?
There are much larger problems at hand in government's relationship to industry anyway (i.e. bribes seem to be de facto legal). Focus on solving those first, and then worry about details like patents.
We're on the road to Tycho.
I for one am going to write a snailmail letter both to my representative in the Parliament and the Commission (lucky to have one) and urge him investigate this matter and act against software patents. I've got a couple of friends whom I've managed to get to act as well.
The time to act is now!
My Second Vote Was For Gore
great comedy company.
This is why Stallman's Free Software vs. Open Source Software argument is so important. Free software can go to hell, as far as this study is concerned.
Screw the poor! Line the pockets of the rich!
oh...thanks. I guess I never really understood that.
The anti-salmon
#include <IANAL.h>
Patents cover the use of *methods* of doing something. And, in many cases, you need to use it commercially in order to infringe. OpenSource refers to a particular *implementation* of that method. It is possible to keep a method patented, and still release an OpenSource implementation of that method. People can get the software and play with it all they want, but they need to license the *patent* if they want to use the method embodied in that patent, regardless of whether they use the OpenSource implementation or roll their own. One example of this is the Visualization Toolkit (VTK) software library. Some components of this toolkit contain methods patented by GE Corporate R&D (where VTK was originally developed) and Kitware , a company started up by two of its original authors. The vast majority of VTK does not involve any patents, and all the code is OpenSource, but if you need to use one of the pieces that implements a patented technique, and you want to use it in a commercial product, you need to license the patent from whoever owns it.
Someone has to devise a simple and self evident argument that business people understand showing that software patents are bad for their business. (Clearly patents can be good for business, but ONLY for the business that owns the relevant patents and this is at the expense of ALL the other businesses that can benefit from the idea. Maybe a way to put it to a business person is "do you feel lucky?")
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Give me LIBERTY, or give me a check.
I've submitted about this study 4 days ago, but then it got rejected. Nice to see that it was about me, not the US-centered bias of the ./
okay, in theroy caopyrights expire too, but there will be none (in the US) that expire for the next 20 years or so... Patents expire, and in a fairly short timeframe.
When I think of all the old games that I used to love on my 8 bit atari, well all are copyrighted, and so I cannot legally copy them anymore. with 5-1/4 disks going bad all the time there isn't much that we can legally do to save those classics. If those games were patented instead, at least I could legally copy them. (Note, that I still don't think patents should apply to whole games, maybe the concept, but not the game)
I think that software patents should be allowed, but not yet! That is until we get to the point where a new software takes a lot of work to devolpe, and most concepts are worked out we shouldn't allow patents. Once things have settled down, sure you can patent your auto-spell checker in your word processor, because word processors as a concept a mature. However you shouldn't be able to patent a GUI menuing system because these systems are still undergoing research and are not mature. (This is an example, please don't disagree with the examples, disagree with the idea behing them)
Great games
From the article:
It is clear however that the United States provides the best test case as the United States has the greatest experience with patents on computer program related inventions.
1.On the one hand there is abounding evidence that the profitability and growth of independent and SME software developers in the States has often been to a significant extent dependent on possession of patent rights. (For how patents help, see above.)
2.On the other hand, there is deep concern
2.1 that patents are being granted on trivial, indeed old, ideas and that consideration of such patents let alone attacking such patents is a major burden, particularly on SME and independent software developers
2.2 that patents may strengthen the market position of the big players; and
2.3 that the computer program related industries are examples of industries where incremental innovation occurs and that there are serious concerns whether, in such industries, patents are welfare enhancing.
Perhaps we should adopt the UK's method of registering patents. Allowing BT to patent hyperlinking (in spite of prior art) would help 'the little guy,' as opposed to the oh-so-cruel-and-different US patent process.
Yes, our patent system is very f'ed up. So is yours. Have a nice day.
+5:offtopic,but anti-American
Damn right. With blaring examples like the Cue:Cat's base64+XOR "encryption method", and Amazon.com's "One click shopping", it's a wonder that the government hasn't taken action to refine the requirements for a patent. Then again, Congress is really delayed as it is (debates, quorum calls, and filibusters; oh my!).
On a side note, for the person who wanted to patent the "no click banner ad", you've been beaten to the punch. A web casino already did something like that two years ago with a Java applet; whenever you hover your pointer over the banner ad, your browser goes there. However, it got annoying as hell and died.
"Ancillary does not mean you get to rule the world." --U.S. Circuit Judge Harry Edwards, speaking to the FCC's lawyer
From the article: Interested parties, the public at large and Member States are invited to comment until 15 December 2000 on the basis of this consultation paper.
Most /. readers work with free software in one way or another; therefore we are interested parties. So where do we add our comments? I saw no "Reply" button or anything on the page.
Will I retire or break 10K?
Ok I think US Patent Office has been doing the MOST STUPID THING. However the proud of the European Commission on claiming that US Patents fail because they are technological arts is even more dumb.
What is software? A technological art. The windows, mouses, clicks, arrows, links, pages are all ABSTRACTIONS. Once I wrote here to pick some guy from Amazonia and to show him what we see on our screens. I wonder what he would say.
All software and even hardware is a mixture of mathematics, logic, empirics and our capacity to abstract. Tell me what is the command ping. Can anyone tell me exactly say what this thing is? Yeah most would say "it tests the link between two computers". But take a look at your early days and try to remember how hard it was to understand the "ms", the address names, the IP numbers and all the sequence they made. Ignorance? Correct. Until the abstraction reached you. So that you forget to remind that "ping 127.0.0.1" may not fitunder such definition. So you correct to "link between devices". However lo always remains a software abstraction as it possesses no real device.
I think that US Patent Office had VERY GOOD INTENTIONS when first it started to patent software. And it was correctly patenting them as they are in fact a technological art. Only short-sightness spoiled things. US Patent Office should clearly not to be blame on this. No one could ever dream on what computers would turn into. Yesterday, they were simple algorithms you launched through punch cards and got results in a printer terminal. Today they are Second Reality. A world that even substitutes our existing one and even dominates it. A world getting deeper and deeper into Abstraction. A world no Dali would ever imagine in his wildest dreams.
Now technocrat Europe tries to make a bigger error. My, my, software development will be possible only in Russia. No wonder that now we are already on the top. No kidding people! Try to take a look at this:
http://chronicle.com/free/v47/i08/08a04301.htm
And btw: Patenting software and even hardware is FORBIDDEN here. They are considered as Works of Art and fall into copyright laws...
... and it wouldn't be an open open source platform. Nor would any license that tried to do such a thing be enforcible in any real way. I'm sure if RMS thought he could get away with it, he would try it.
I wonder who they talked to about this. The comments about open source are really glaringly ignorant. Even the trade rags haven't said anything this stupid in a _long_ time.
Hello AC.
Check out the Scandinavian countries. They're all run by socialist governments with the highest standards of living in Europe.
Is that something you've read, or are you speaking about how it was 15 years ago?
I'm living in Sweden right now, and I wouldn't call our government 'socialistic' (even though they do so themselves). Neither would I say that we (still) have the highest living standards in Europe. I think it would have been possible to keep it up, if our bankers back in the 80's had a bit more brains. But, you can't change history, only learn from it, so I'm looking for a country where I won't have to pay enourmous taxes just to get nothing back
Then the corporate attorneys would speak. I specifically remember Borland's corp attorney saying what a wonderful thing software patents would be. Towards the end of the "hearing", a developer pointed out the fact that the overwhelming majority of developers present had testified against the idea and Lehman, an attorney, mused about how interesting that was. Damn lot of good it did - he knew a great welfare-for-attorneys scam when he saw one.
They really shouldn't call them "hearings" - "ventings" would be a better term since the outcomes tend to be pre-determined.
Software patents - did I mention I'm agin em?"
.int is used for international entities. I've seen it here, and the UN. Unfortunately, its not available for sale, otherwise I would have so tried to get 'unsigned.int' ;-)
Objects in the blog are closer then they ap
A world getting deeper and deeper into Abstraction. A world no Dali would ever imagine in his wildest dreams.
Actually, Salvador Dali had some really cool ideas that he expressed through his works of art. One of my favorite paintings by him is titled somethig like -"nude, or computer image of a $1 bill at 25 feet". It's a digital scan of a $1 bill with the resolution messed around that looks like a nude, but when you get far enough away for the resolution to be right, it's Jefferson (or whoever is on the $1(US) bill).
Dali was a thinker and a philosopher who communicated through drawings and paintings. If you get a chance to check out his works esp. from his later years he has some cool insights into DNA and computers and what the digital world will become. His paintings are amazing anyways, and you realize that there are some cool underlying ideas, but when you read the titles, the ideas come out even clearer.
He's actually a very recent artist, and was alive and working when the first computers were coming into existence. I'd love to have him still around today to get his insights into technology and the universe.
Sorry, waaaaay OT, but I can't have ya dissin the S.D.
"A witty saying proves nothing." -Voltaire
Patents may secure a company's income, while at the same time, the patents will prevent eutopian software configurations. Are we saying, as a community, that we would prefer to run shitty, expensive software? Let's leave this door open. dolo
Fix?
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If it says "Troll" on this post,
I successfully annoyed a nerd herd!
I highly respect Dali's works and they are among those I like most. However I think that the father of Surrealism would get pretty scared about what we are doing now. Sincerly it is a pitty that he died too early. In terms of computer revolution I mean. I wonder what he would think about this mess we have today...
:)
S. Dali in 2000: "You see? I was right!"
People should realize that there is absolutely no conflict with patenting open source (or even free, RMS-style) code. The endemic problem that FSF and open source addresses is proprietary code, which is, in fact, almost the antithesis of patented code. Almost.
A patent is a disclosure. It is a public document that clearly describes an artifact or a process so that other people can use it. Along with this disclosure, however, comes certain rights granted to the inventor. The rights to monetary rewards, primarily.
Something that's proprietary is not disclosed. That's what non-disclosure agreements are all about. The real problem with proprietary code is that they usually come with licenses that stipulate that users must not reverse engineer, or modify that code.
The GNU Public License is rather like a patent in that it makes the source code a public document that allows others to make use of the process. It just goes much further than a patent, however, in that permission is granted up-front for anyone to use the code. The one (big) proviso is that those who modify it or distribute it must respect the rights of others to do exactly the same thing you're doing (I know it's a bit more complex than that, but that's the basic intent).
Given this, there should be no problem patenting open source or GPL'ed code, although I seem to recall some small stipulations about monetary cost in the GPL. So that might limit your ability to get monetary rewards. However, there is no limit imposed by a patent on that.
If you patent some code, but you waive your rights to some reward or control, then it basically becomes public domain. That would be pretty silly, though. It would only make sense to attach some sort of license with it.
Standard disclaimers apply: IANAL.
Footnote: It just occurs to me now, as I write this, that there may be restrictions on what you are allowed to license, depending on whether a patent exists for that thing, even if you are the owner of that patent... Anybody here know about these details?
Accountability on the heads of the powerful.
Power in the hands of the accountable.
For everyone that didn't know, there is an online petition which is trying to stop exactly this. Everyone go and sign it to try and make sure that software patenting doesn't happen in Europe
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SaZZer "Life is a lesson, you learn it when you're through", Limp Bizkit, M:I-2 Theme
I have occasionally fantisized about patenting some useful technique, and then publishing a license that says:
You may use my patent for free if and only if your code conforms to the GPL.
This would give the GPL (at least as it applies to the patented technique) real legal teeth.
The bug is that I can't figure out where the money needed to file suits to enforce the license would come from.
To a Lisp hacker, XML is S-expressions in drag.
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Since I have an idea simmering in the back of my mind that is based on my dissertation work and that I suspect will be very valuable once I get it together, I definitely like the European perspective. My idea is very unobvious and will take significant work to develop. The problem with the US PTO appears to reflect cluelessness about what is obvious rather than pure wrongheadedness.
Who... by the way... have made a quiet killing extorting money from any company that attempts to make software which can generate GIF images.
That should be almost any company..
There is at least one that I know of that didn't do this.. the program was called ImageFx (it was for the Amiga).. Apparently Unisys (perhaps trying to look 'beneficial' to the world?) included a clause in their licensing that said that any code in the public domain would be exempt from the extortion^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^Hroyalty payments...
Like all good image processing programs, ImageFX is modular - so the maker (I think it was GVP) immediately stopped releasing ImageFX with the GIF filter... then uploaded the filter onto AmiNet, releasing it as PD!
Ahh.. I love that story.. it still brings a smile to my face..
The hackers broke through the base64+XOR "encryption". However, they didn't circumvent, misuse, or even use the :Cue barcodes. Therefore, they didn't violate the DMCA! Damn, I wish that the lawyers knew this one.
"Ancillary does not mean you get to rule the world." --U.S. Circuit Judge Harry Edwards, speaking to the FCC's lawyer
redundant? How can a third post be redundant? it wasn't particularly insightful or anything...but redundant? wth?
also....i understand the license agreement and all with opensource products, but can't that be done in some way other than actually patenting a piece of software? there should be an "antipatent" or something.
The anti-salmon
They're essentially hosed. Even if the patented part is not fundamental and can be removed to get around your patent, they're in a legal battle they can't afford nor win. And after you did that to the first project leader, other people will be very careful to take over the project.
Software patents are dangerous for Open Source projects, because it's so easy to check if they infringe them. Closed Source is a lot safer because nobody knows what's inside.
Patents made a lot of sense in the age of the steam engine, when they were invented. They prevented somebody from looking at your solution, copy it and get away with it. They're much less useful for ideas (that's why you can't patent them), and software IMHO is a lot closer to ideas than steam engines.