Slashdot Mirror
Patent Nonsense
ziriyab writes: "This article from The Guardian, after a few paragraphs of corporation bashing, gives an interesting history of two countries (Switzerland and the Netherlands) who flourished without IP laws. The article, while not necessarily suggesting that the abandonment of patent protection is an essential precondition for development, seems to indicate that it can, in the right circumstances, be an effective tool."
Eben Moglen is
If you read the article, you'll notice that the periods in question were over 90 years ago, so arguing about what's happening in the computing field is kind of irrelevant.
For that matter, where are any billion dollar tech startups, these days? How many of the companies you mentioned will still be going in 100 years time and be the same size as Nestle?
I found these points interesting:
;-)
;-), despite the fact that it was originally identified in 1986. If this isnt prior art, I do not know what is.
;-) . It will show huge proportion of "patented" sequences have prior art.
Novartis was one of the companies which successfully lobbied for the European convention allowing companies to patent genes
New global trade rules have also allowed big corporations to patent crop varieties and, in effect, the genes of plants, animals and human beings.
Even without going into ethical debates, gene patenting is notoriously dubious. The standards that these companies apply to patenting genes is very poor at best. My patent law is not up to scratch, so i would be happy if someone could point me in the right direction on this. However, my genetic knowledge is rather good
Essentially, companies (such as novartis) cast a very wide net when patenting genes. Alot of the time, they dont actually do anything particularly pro-active when attempting to discover them. They essentially take a pool of all genes expressed in a certain tissue ("mRNA") and randomly sequence these genes. And then slap a patent on them. This is quite clearly discovery. Furthermore, it is cheap, non-directional, quick and easy.
Originally, companies like novartis argued that cloning genes would take a strategy of e.g. specifically identifying genes causing a disease. This takes alot more effort and money, and is more likely to have medical significance. Therefore it is easier to argue that patenting is to some degree fair.
However, the first strategy is quite clearly against patenting law (even the stretched definition for gene patenting). For example, I often see "patents" for DNA sequences of the gene MYB (which I know quite well
This is a result of the essentially random, "wide-net" strategy the companies are utilising. Even worse, it is trivial to check (using a homology search) whether there is "prior art" on a gene or not. But the companies do not do this.
BUT I COULD. And may well do. I have been thinking about comparing the database of patented DNA sequences against those in the public domain (It will take some time to set up, which i dont have right now, and significant computer resources, which i dont have right now - help anyone? reply to this as above email wrong
But who would I go to with these results? Could the companies be held responsible? If, so what would be the result?
Either you are:
./) seem to care about Kazaa.
1) Trolling
2) Blatantly misinformed
Adressing the second case:
I doubt this poster knows much about the world at all. (The use of the Bushesque term 'Netherlandian' says it all)
Switzerland is a major player (with respect to it's size, of course) in pharmaceuticals, banking, and engineering.
I'll give you an international high-tech firm that is from Switzerland: ABB - a major (second largest?) firm in robotics, power plants, power transmission etc.
Tech start ups? Well a lot of people (especially on
The prime source of information about software patents in Europe is the patents mailing list on the AFUL web site (french free unix user group).
Some information is also available on the APRIL web site (french association for research in free software).
In particular, to date, all the big (poll-wise) candidates to the french presidential election have expressed their opposition to software patents, see in french Haro sur les brevets and Tous les candidats dans l'opposition.
And of course the EuroLinux web site and FFII web site (Foundation for a Free Information Infrastructure ) have links to a lot of ressources and interesting readings.
We, european citizens, are seeking ways to get other european countries take position against the current proposed european law that opens the gates of unrestricted software and ideas patenting.If you're willing to help the cause, please contact your local free software association and try to get some activism in place together with the established assiociations like the FSF Europe. If you are French or German you can even make a tax-deducible donation, it may help the cause too.
--
Laurent Guerby <guerby@acm.org>
I live in The Netherlands myself and while I generally disagree with the whole patent process
(especially in the US) I must point out that The Netherlands and Switzerland have a very different
economy than the US. Their economies are based primarily on trade and services (banking,
insurance, transport).
So it's not that big of a surprise to see how the patent laws developed differently from the US in
these countries.
Your ignorance is both appalling and apparent.
Please go read any history book about the Dutch resistance in WWII. Holland may be a small country, but it is factually baseless to claim they "sign[ed] on for the third reich".
There is a reason why the Dutch study english and not German in their schools. (Even before WWII).
A comment like this can only be posted by an "anonymous idiot"..
There is a patent system in Sweden, unless 'patent system' means something highly specific/technical of which I'm not aware. Patents in Sweden are handled by Patent och Registreringsverket.
Belief is the currency of delusion.
Actually a lot of their research depends on basic science done in publicly funded institutions. For example, the HIV virus was isolated by scientist at the NIH and equivalent organization in France(I know there is some controversies there).
If you actually look at the budgets of the large drug companies, they spend more on marketing than research. For example see this article.
...richie - It is a good day to code.
They don't give much historical information, apparently. But I'm not very good at German...