Celera and the DOE

The Washington Post describes how the Department of Energy and Celera have made a cozy deal whereby the DOE will assist Celera in their genome-mapping efforts, and Celera will extort billions of dollars from the rest of the world by patenting that genome.

Comments

Not as bad as it sounds

[Alik]

I belive that gene patents suck; to me, they represent a statement of ownership over human life, a practice which went out of fashion a hundred years ago. I also buy into the well-known arguments that they harm research and innovation.

Nonetheless, as far as that latter argument, this agreement will probably not be a big deal. If the government has joint ownership of all things produced, they have the right to license it for free use to all persons who receive Federal research grants. Since those grants drive the majority of academic research, researchers aren't hindered. Private firms will, of course, have to pay Celera its fifteen pieces of silver, but I fail to see ethical problems there beyond the existing patent issues.

too bad

[Tairan]

genomes don't make power. Why is the DOE looking into this? What are they going to get from it? We all know the government doesn't do anything for free.