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EU & US Patent "Syncing"
Christian Treczoks writes "Software patents are threatening Europe, too. The EC said "we want software patents to harmonize with the US", but the public - private persons and small to medium businesses - objected. So they made an "Analysis" of the replies.
Effectively, 91% are against patenting software, but, as the majority of the proponents are important business figures, it's a draw. " Mmmm...corporate interests. "Fun".
So those people who are primary to developing software, the engineers, the programmers and the companies that pioneer new software approaches, are all against software patents. In other words, those whose intellectual work will be patented, are against patenting it.
Compared to the primary producers of software, lawyers, lobbyists, bueorocrats and corporate controllers, those who are secondary to the software are in favor of patenting software.
Those who didn't actually make the software want it patented, those who did, don't want it patented. This is a very messed state of affairs when the producers choose to give up these IP protections of what is really their intellectual property, though maybe not in a legal sense, and those who are leeches, who don't actually make it, want these patents. Obviously software patents are not made to help those who do the intellectual work, but the corporate interests. And the sad thing is, the leeches are winning.
Now, I'm not a major fan of Ayn Rand's ubercapitalist ideas, but her assement of the morality of leeches in Atlas Shrugged is pretty accurate, and useful here. The corporations are asking for government welfare to the rich, and that's a bad thing. This isn't the way that value gets added to a system, it's a way those who leech can keep their lower-value systems the standard. No sensible economic or moral philosophy is in favor of this, so why does everyone follow it? The only answer I can think of is greed and stupidity make an excellent team.
Erik
"You," Bite me.
"Each and every one of you." Bite me.
Restrictive Approach - Opposed to most software patents Members - Students, academics, engineers, start-up companies
Liberal Approach - Apply traditional patentability criteria to computer-implemented inventions Members - Lawyers, established industry players, government agencies
Isn't it interesting that the groups of people which traditionally are responsible for the greatest amount of innovation are almost unanimous against the idea of software patentability. Yet the rhetoric used by the other groups to defend software patents always seems to revolve around "protecting the interests of those who innnovate". Are we really to believe that the segments of the population responsible for the greatest volume of innovation are that clueless as to their own interests and the interests of continued innovation?
While there is something to be said for harmonizing policies, I am not sure that it is in anyone's interest (other than that of large corporations) to use US laws as the basis of that standardization.
We cannot achieve a global concensus on REALLY important things like environmental issues (not that the politicians have ever really tried) and this is the sort of thing that they are working towards?
Ask yourself - does the world really need a global DMCA?
*** Where are we going? And what's with this handbasket?
It looks like IBM thinks that the current EU standard regarding software patents should be used. (And if I am correct the EU standards are MORE RESTRICTIVE than the current US standards.)
But then again I could be worng.
When these matters come up, we (as a community) should be able to state our case without foaming at the mouth, without resorting to childish namecalling, and without necessarily advocating tearing down the establishment in a violent manner.
Politicians - it's no secret - have a vested interest in keeping corporations happy.
Our task is to frame the discussion not in terms of Big Corporations vs. Open Source Hippies and Academics (as the report seems to), but rather to frame the discussion in terms of what will truly foster innovation, while protecting the legitimate intellectual property of the creators.
Only if we can convince legislators that they are doing what's right for the advancement of society and the economy will we allow them to see past their corporate contributors' interests.
We need the so-called open-source leadership to collate their arguments against software patents, present them in a manner that reflects well on the community, and encourage open-source advocates to use the arguments when communicating with legislators.
I know it sounds like placing a premium on groupthink (which is something that open-source tends not to encourage), but until we get organized about our message with respect to software patents and intellectual property matters, we will continue to be marginalized as crackpots, academics and children.
"Hmm - there seems to be a lot of responses against patents. Let's drop the ones from those Open Source nuts... There's still too many. Ok, so now drop all those sent to us indirectly. Yes! Look everyone! A majority of people support patents!"
Another example is in the pie charts showing the proportion of each type of organisation in each group. SME are 16% against and 13% in favor off patents. They say "It is interesting, however, to note that the proportion of SMEs is similar in each case." This gives the impression that SMEs are evenly split. Given that the number of responses against patents dwarfed those in favor, this really means that SMEs were similarly heavily opposed to patents!
There was also the matter of the report categorizing patent opponents as "younger". This makes it easier for people to dismiss the opinions of those opposed to software patents.
I'd say if you get a new idea, you have one week to exploit it and then it's public domain.
Patent Laws, have the potential to move us into the high tech version of the dark ages, where science ceases to move forward for fear of persecution from the church...er I mean corporations.
besides writing my congressman, I see civil disobediance as the best way to resist this. I don't have the time or resources to loby congress because I have to make a living and barely do that well. Companies HIRE POEPLE to work on lawmakers FULL TIME. how can this reflect the vote of the people?? please hackers, keep on hacking, break those codecs and protocols wide open and save the future of humanity!!!
"The Most Fun Possible on 4 wheels" is at SunBuggy in Las Vegas
And considering I will never be in "fair market" position to sell my software like Microsoft does, how is any patentability helpful to anyone except companies who have large war chests and near-monopolies?
Until the focus of innovation is understood to be Intellectual Process and not Intellectual Property, we will remain in a legal morass under the thumbs of corporate giants.
Too bad more big corps aren't politicized AGAINST sw patents. Back in the Iron Age IBM led the charge against sw patents, rationalizing that they could make their money in hardware if they could more easily incorporate ideas from other's software. Today many businesses are in a similar situation, but they're not lobbying effectively in their own interest.
I think the U.S. should sync up with Europe. We should drop software patents to match up with Europe.
Donald Knuth invented some of the most important computer algorithms in the early 60's. If he had patented them then, computer science research would have grinded to a halt. Searching, sorting, databases, he did it all. Hell, he might have even had a patent on the concept of good programming. http://sunburn.stanford.edu/~knuth/
From the article:
From our research we conclude:
There is no evidence that European independent software developers have been unduly affected by the patent positions of large companies or indeed of other software developers. (We return to this point below when discussing the position in the USA.)
European independent software developers are making disproportionately little use of the patenting possibilities open to them compared with the use made by large companies and by US SME and even independent software developers.
There is increasing but still relatively low use by European independent software developers of patents in raising finance or in licensing i.e. in getting an invention through to being an innovation of benefit e.g. to consumers.
There is considerable evidence of concern by European independent software developers about the potential effects of patents on the development of computer program related inventions.
If you don't protect yourself with available laws, who do you think is going to?
Dancin Santa
Just to give you a clearer idea on how patents and other so-called "intellectual property" rights are assigned, in the projects that I lead the federal funding agency retains absolutely no rights to any patents or copyrights that result from the research. All patents and copyrights that result from my research are jointly held by me and the university that employs me. This is typical of government funded research performed at universities and associated non-profit institutions.
I believe the situation is somewhat different at the government labs, such as ORNL, LANL and ARL, where the government may very well retain an interest in resulting patents and copyrights, but I do not know the details for those situations.