Slashdot Mirror
Stallman on Software Patents
An Anonymous Coward writes "On Monday Richard Stallman gave a speech at the Cambridge University (UK) Computer Lab. Over at ZDNet UK they have a transcription of the speech - the most eloquent discussion of the subject I have yet seen. Software patents victimise developers, he says, but there are ways to get around them. The best part is his comparison of writing software to writing symphonies: 'Oh Beethoven,' they would have said in 1800 if there had been patents on music, 'you're just bitching because you've got no ideas of your own.'"
Patents promote a developing market. It encourages you to get your ideas out in the open.
Just because they are abused doesn't mean they should be abolished.
Do you like eating sound with your bare hands? I mean spoons could be weapons and abused!
From what I gather the biggest flaw with patents are the clerks not the laws. They allow things with blatant prior art or generally vague claims pass through. That is not in the spirit of the Patent office and shouldn't reflect on it.
Tom
Someday, I'll have a real sig.
Can Music be patentable? I mean software is just a bunch of zeroes and ones being processed and when they're in a certain order something cool happens. Music is just tones at different pitches and when in a certain order it sounds cool.
If one-click shopping is patentable, shouldn't one-hit rimshot be aswell? Why is copyright enough to protect music but not enough to protect software?
Wax-Museum Fire Results In Hundreds Of New Danny DeVito Statues
If you're in the patenting biz, or have some patents (copyrights, environmental problem, any sort of valuable asset/liability), it's worth alot to you. You will spend alot of energy [money,time,...] defending your interests and trying to make things go your way before the Courts, Legislatures, Regulators, media, markets, public opinion.
Your very-numerous prey/antagonists do many things. You little asset/liab is a small part of their lives. It's hardly life-or-death for most of them to put up with you. [Parasitic!] If they ever found out, they might not like what you're doing, but it's not worth enough to them to be worth fighting. A whole reservoir of opposition gets trapped below the inaction thresholdaa.
Now some people will always complain, and more do if the inaction threshold can be lowered [email & Internet]. But how do you _prevent_ the squeeky wheel from getting the grease?
Richard Stallman is very annoying. Often he comes out with rabid driven that just makes me want to shout "shut up you idiot!" for the damage it does to the OSS community. Then he comes out with eloquent, intelligent and thought provoking prose like this. Most annoying.
You don't know the difference between patent and copyright, do you?
Microsoft would make just as much money if the patent system was done away with... it would be just as illegal to copy Windows under copyright law, and, with the closed source code, it would be just as hard to reverse engineer.
Patents have little to do with open-source vs. closed-source, the majority of closed-source software is unpatented.
The issue is that if something was independantly discovered, the patent should hardly be granted since it doesn't induce anything that wouldn't otherwise happen.
McAfee patented Webservices as a whole !.
And now look at the second line of the article you're linking to:
We hope to dispell the myth that this covers all application service providers.
And now say the same thing again...
I hate to be the first to call "Bovine Excreta!" but you are so full of it it's a wonder it doesn't come out your nose.
How about the obscure legalese in which patents are written? The lawyers who draft these things are desperate to minimise the amount of useable information contained in a patent, with a great deal of success. Slashdot runs many stories claiming "XYZ Patented!" followed by hundreds of comments by qualified engineers who have scrutinised the patent and come out completely confused as to the scope of the patent claim.
Of course, yet again, all this is covered in the main article. Why don't you read the main article? Read the article, you pathetic apologist.
Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more, Or close the wall up with our American dead!
It seems to me that what they do is strike fear into the heart of all but the richest inventors, the legal fight to prove that you are not infringing a patent is more than most people can afford even when they are right. Patents encourage the small inventors to scrap the whole thing and just keep their day job, then everybody loses.
This is not an effect we need in the software industry where so much progress is made by individuals.
From what I gather the biggest flaw with patents are the clerks not the laws.
Software moves so fast that no prior-art system is ever going to be able to keep up. The only way to fix the clerk problem is to slow down the entire field to the point where they can cope. Sacking the idiot in charge of the USPO would help, too; paying clerks on the number of patents they approve is hardly professional or responsible.
TWW
"Encyclopedia" is to "Wikipedia" what "Library" is to "Some people at a bus stop"
What I like is at the end of the article, he implies that part (or most, or all) of the problem is that the US patent system is based on patenting a Physical Process, and here we have people patenting Idealized Processes. Copyrights are more apropriate for the Idealized Process, or at least it's a closer fit.I'm sure he's not the first to notice this, and he won't be the last, but it needs to be repeated over and over until we get it though the US Goverment's Thick Skull(tm).
The simple truth is that interstellar distances will not fit into the human imagination
- Douglas Adams
If he actually said that about music, he deserves to be ignored from now on.
Of course people create original music all the time.
Sure there are a small set of notes, and only so many ways you can arange any two notes in any tempo.
After two notes, it is all in the arrangement, and composition.
Although I didn't see him mention this specifically, I think it's worth pointing out, given his discussion of music and the borrowing of material from other sources. In particular, how borrowing is important culturally.
One moment I recall quite clearly from my college years is the day in class when the teacher of the survey course in music asked the question "What makes American music American?" This was something I hadn't considered before, and the answer wasn't clear to me until he asked more precisely "Why is the 1812 Overture so distinctly Russian? Why is Appalachian Spring American?" The answer is that both borrow themes from the folk music of each country. The Russians knew that Tchaikovsky was writing Russian music because it had recognizable themes that reminded them that they were Russian. The Shaker melody in Appalachian Spring is something many Americans had heard many times before, when that piece was written. (And even moreso now, as "Spring" is itself a common piece of music to hear performed.)
So without the ability to borrow ideas and themes and work them into new compositions, music would be a barren landscape.
One could argue, similarly, that if we impose stronger and stronger restrictions on what we can build into software, then we are resisting the natural cultural synergy that results from algorithms and features being shared among the community members.
Curmudgeon Gamer: Not happy
If I, sitting in a darkened room with no internet access, design and implement a software solution to a real-world problem I can make money from it because copyright in the program belongs to me. No effort involved, copyright automatically belongs to me.
If patents are available as "protection" then wealthy corporations and individuals will take advantage of them, most of us won't.
Pretty soon I won't be able to sit in my darkened room anymore because I will have to conduct exhaustive searches on my ideas just in case somebody, somewhere, has a patent on one of its components.
Is this really the best environment in which to nurture creativity, innovation, self-reliance, etc? Or is it merely the best environment to enable wealthy corporations to stifle competition and get richer?
I think this analogy is a bit of a stretch. One of the problems with a software patent is that it can broadly cover A BUSINESS PROCESS. Let's say that a composer had been granted a patent for creating symphonies as "A method to glorify God through the use of music." That patent would preclude anybody else (for a set period of time) from glorifying God through the use of music (unless the method could be improved upon). This patent does not necessarily stop Beethoven from glorifying God and it does not prevent him from finding a better way to glorify God (even through music). While ultimately restrictive, even such a broad based example doesn't fully apply to the situation of the 18th century composer.
You can make an argument that says that protecting a composer who pioneered the glory of God through music is important, maybe patentable. But the REAL issue (in every patent argument I've seen) is that patents are being issued for processes where there is prior art and where the method does not qualify as "not-obvious".
The real issue for Beethoven (and all other composers) was copyright and royalties. Scores might only be distributed hours before a performance. Otherwise, they would be swindled and the composer could not get paid for his/her music. The strong (but not too strong) protection of copyright is a pillar in the Capitalist develompent of Intellectual Property.
sarchasm: The gulf between the author of sarcastic wit and the person who doesn't get it.
Patents are important and used by big companies but it's even more important for the small man.
As an individual you have no way to get fair treatment and payment from big companies without patents. If patents doesn't exists they will just grab your ideas (that you may have spent several years of your life on) and use their big pile of money to push and you are basically screwed.
I think the whole debate in the software developer community is very one sided and most peoples concerns are more about the abuses (in the US) than patents themselfs.
The existance of patents and the abuses are two different things.
Actually yes you can.
See you have probably never invented an algorithm before but breaking new grounds is always important.
Look at the RC5 block cipher or JPEG compression codec. RC5 is the product of years of research and at the time was very unique as far as ciphers go. It was a welcome addition to the field of cryptography. Then JPEG, before that sending photorealistic images meant sending 100's of KB of data at the least.
In utopia patents are never filed, but unfotunately we don't live in utopia. You have to make money to survive and that means securing your legal rights to make money off ideas or inventions you yourself researched. Actual money was spent to design RC5 so why shouldn't RSA have the right to secure it for the purpose of licensing?
I always find it ironic that people want to make money in software, but find that when others charge for it its off-beat.
Tom
Someday, I'll have a real sig.
Now patents are about ideas.
And that's where the problem lies. If you look at the current patent system in most Western countries, it is about protecting process, not ideas. Even the infamous business patents protect a process by which a business objective is achieved. When I went to law school, our intellectual property prof always insisted about the difference between patents and ideas. And then suddenly the legislator introduced these patents on software ideas..
The problem with software patents is that you're not really protecting a mean of solving a problem, you're actually protecting the very idea that such or such problem exists and that it should be solved by some automated process. This is wrong. If I invent and patent an embedded microwave window defroster, it doesn't prevent you from inventing a different approach to solve the same problem. In the software world I would prevent you from addressing such problem in the first place.
And this in my view goes against innovation, disclosure and publig good, all honorable objectives for which the patent system was created in the first place.
No its called being second. If the idea was truly obvious e.g. took zero effort to come up with, then ya, but lets not mistake things
Look at RC5 [sorry I'm a crypto nut so I have to pull from what I know]. Its a trivial looking cipher and doesn't look like much design was put into it. You might think that was "an obvious design" e.g. not worthy of a patent.
Don't let simplicity be mistaken for obviousness.
In your case you might have a legitimate claim, but you have to realize that its no the spirit of the patent system to lock out obvious ideas. I'd say get others on your side of the story and see if you can invalidate the patent.
Tom
Someday, I'll have a real sig.
> Intellectual property is fundamental to the peaceful progress of such societies and, without them, everything does break down to the very concept of "might makes right" that RMS claims to fear now.
... ?
And your proof is
Methinks you need to read:
Against IP
The Libertarian Case Against Intellectual Property Rights
But-- to take a counter-example-- consider engines. We've been using internal combustion engines for a long time. To come up with a better engine-- one that runs on water, or chained hamsters, or the moral power of virginity-- would be a huge effort. Ten years and three billion dollars. Why bother doing it? Because you can patent your invention, and for a period of time you can have the exclusive right to build it, or you can collect royalties from other folks who build it. Without patent protection (so the theory goes) nobody would bother building new kinds of engines.
So my go-kart company buys your engine, and connects a drive train to it. Now my product is a go-kart powered by a foobar104 model 1 engine. This is fine. Software companies do this all the time. I don't neccesarily mind this, credit where it is due, you get a return on your investment.
Now if i want optimise my go-kart. I put a supercharger on your engine. I use special high performance spark plugs. I bore out the cylenders, and put in brand x valves that have less chance of sticking under the conditions my go-kart will experience. Its still a go-kart powered by a foobar104 model 1 engine. But the engine was modified. You still get your return. Its not a new product. Im allowed to do this.
Joe down the street decides that my modifications are perfect in his dune buggy. He doesnt know how to modify the engine himself, so he buys the engines ive modified to put in his dune buggies. This is still allowed. Joe now makes dune buggies powered by the foobar104 model 1 engine. You still get your return.
foobar104 is also a songwriter. (S)he (sorry not sure of your gender) has an extremely popular song called foo love. I can't buy a copy of foo love, and change the tempo and the fix the grammer, and sell it on my CD. Thats protected by copyright law. Joe cant buy my cd singles, and use the modified song in his CD. That too breaks the same copyright rule.
If foo love covers new ground conceputally, say he expresses his love for misquitos. I can write a new song called I love misquitos, only i explore further into it, say i love gay misquitos. I use his concepts, in my own original way. this is allowable.
Joe loves this. He writes a song about loving gay misquitos. This is still allowed. The concept transfers. loving misquitos (straight or gay) is not patentable.
This is where patents get sticky with software under the current system. Software is both patentable and copyrightable. I buy foobar104soft's misquitolove engine (c) US patent number baz. I can't make a gaymisquitolove engine mod and sell it to joe, because i violate his copyright. Fine, is cool, foobar104 doesnt like it, i respect it.
So I engineer the new gaymisquitolove engine that uses the misquitolove concepts. and get my ass sued because i violated his patent. So because of this foobar104 has his cake and eats it too. Unless i pay him lots and lots of money, I can't make my gaymisquitolove engine. This is where the problem lies. Software is the only industry that allows this. Its fairly rediculous.
To live till you die is to live long enough. -Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching
Patents would cover aspects of the implementation of the idea. For example, the use of a bow run across tight strings to produce sound might be a patent. Stretching animal skin across a hollowed cylinder could be patented. These might limit the choice of instruments a composer would utilize in his production if agreements could not be arrived at but, remarkably, both the composer and the patent holder seem to nearly always find some terms if the invention and idea are truely useful. It would be folly for a composer to consider how to create a 220 hertz tone from a stretched catgut while writing his composition so RMS' comparision is specious at best.
Whoa, wait a minute. The "ideas" in tonal music are the sequence of harmonies and tones. The "implementation" is a certain set of notes played on certain instruments. What the hell are you talking about?
I guess you have not studied or played much music. You are completely ignoring musical ideas and focusing on the physical instruments.
If there were patents on music analogous to software, you'd see patents on things like "patent on a pleasing resolution of dissonant tones on a piano" or something. Then if another composer wanted to use the same tonal resolution in a violin symphony, he'd probably get sued, even though his implementation (notes and instrumentation) is totally different.
Yes you can get sued for copyright violation, but this is much more stringent, you have to actually copy a recognizable melody directly. If you use the same notes but with different durations or tempo you'll be okay (of course nothing will surprise me these days, but all the music copyright cases I've seen had to cross a fairly high bar).
In fact, I WISH patents were like you describe. i.e., you can only patent code in the context of keyboards and mice and such, and NOT algorithms.
> One does not patent ideas, one patents implementations.
WRONG! People file patents, even on hardware, before there is a working prototype. The "nuclear submarine" was patented well in advance of an actual working one, by Feynman, because his employer told everyone to file patents on their ideas. He did it for a lark and was surprised when the U.S. military called him up years later, watning to speak to the expert: The guy who patented it!
This kind of thing happens all the time. In software, you can get a patent on just about anything. Just describe it. You don't need to show working source code.
You can also patent a "business process", or an idea. Hyperlinking is an idea. Even an implementation is really the idea of putting certain parts together in a certain way.
If you don't like the music example, consider if one could obtain a patent on "legal arguments". That would throw all those IP lawyers for a loop. What about defense attorneys? "Sorry, you can't use that argument, my law firm hasn't licensed it to you. Guess your client is going to fry."
> his belief that no one should own the fruits of their own labour if they are not tangible.
That's not quite it. Rather, try "no one should be able to prevent all others from using an idea". Patents work on a first-file, first-served basis. Independent reinvention or PRE-invention (you invent but don't publish, someone else gets the patent) won't let you profit from your very own labor if someone else gets the patent first.
Besides that, you don't have a god-given right to a profit, period.
> voluntary creation of rules governing how people will deal with each other and conduct trade
So why is the Tax Code in the U.S. 46,000 pages long? Are you voluntarily agreeing with the DMCA, or SSSCA/CBDTPA? Well, guess what, I *disagree* with those, and I don't want the government to force cooperation at gunpoint.
> Intellectual property is fundamental to the peaceful progress of such societies
Right, without trademarks, where would we be?
Come on, "IP" is too vague. Do you mean copyrights? Those work very differently from patents. You can write a program and profit from it with copyright. A patent means no-one else could even use the idea.
Most of Europe doesn't have software patents. Guess where Linux originated?
You know why Microsoft hasn't gone after people with its patents yet? Because IBM, Sun, Oracle, etc., etc., all would squash it with their own patent portfolios. Patents DON'T promote progress. Big companies cross-license with each other as a defensive measure. They only enforce patents to keep small start-ups from ever becoming viable competitors.
> everything does break down to the very concept of "might makes right" that RMS claims to fear now
Guess I might as well break it to you. The world is like this already. Big companies ("might") pay legislators to enact new laws ("right") and now it's a felony to watch your legally-purchased DVD on your Linux system. Norwegian teenagers are thrown in jail at the behest of the MPAA(merica).
Soon, in the name of protecting "intellectual property", the CBDTPA will make it illegal to sell the computer you are now using. You could use it to become a PIRATE!
Post Comment
Perhaps the biggest problem with the PTO is that it persists in granting patents for obvious ideas.
An example is the Mark Williams patent for a solution to the "endian" problem... you know - big endian machines store integers in a different order than little endian machines.
As it turns out I am able to provide prior art. But perhaps the most important fact is that the whole issue of a patent for this is bullshit. The simple observation is that if the order is different, then change it. Similarly one can convert between notations as well - IE. If the notation is different then change it to the best approximation.
Using this idea one can convert between IBM mainframe floating point and IEEE floating point as used in the PC or even to CDC floating point.
None of these conversions are worthy of a patent.
Similarly, suppose some bright engineer had decided way back when the computer was first developed to patent the "JUMP" instruction. Where would this have put the industry?
The harm that patents do is underestimated. But if one takes a longer view then it becomes clear that we're dealing with the criminalization of the art of computer programming.
The current state of the US Patent system aside, there's no real difference between a creation in software, and a creation in hardware. People often make the argument that software is like music, or that it's just a mathematical expression and therefore shouldn't be patentable. This is neglecting the fact that anything you make in the world is exactly the same, it's both expression and and math. Calling software pure expression, like music, is misleading because music has no constant function that it performs. It does different things to different people. Sofware or Hardware perform exactly reproduceable tasks each and every time. What do you think an internal combustion engine is? It's the application of a bunch of pipes, some processing, and an interface. So is your word processor. You can talk about any piece of software or hardware in the same terms. Just because we don't normally start out with the mathematical representation of an engine when we build one doesn't mean that it's any different. It just means that the domain that you work in is different. The reality inside a computer is not the same as the reality you work with outside. Outside requires you to work with physics, which is just a layer of abstraction for math. Computers have their own abstractions and rules. And yes, there should be separate rules to get a software patent. It should be a lot harder in my opinion, because the amount of work to do something with software is a lot less than it is outside. One has to keep in mind the different levels that the two systems work at. Right now it seems like the current level of software patents are like if we tried to patent a drinking glass, or some basic form, like a wheel. We're still learning the basics. So, in granting a software patent, the artifact in question should be something Way Out There. Or it shouldn't be trivial changes to basic ideas.
If we had the patent system back when we were inventing wheels and levers, we'd have retarded our progress by not allowing the critical mass to develop, where the basics of the world around us were made apparent to everyone. I think we're at the stage in computer development of wheels and levers. We need to let everyone in on the secrets that we stumble upon. I'm not saying we shouldn't have rewards still. We can still give limited monopolies or other benefits, just for shorter periods and with fewer rights.
All you need is proof, and a few hundred thousand for the lawyers to show the proof to the court.
Plus risk that the decision will go against you anyway.
A patent is a temporary monopoly on a process granted in exhcange for a description of how it works. This means that software patents ought to include source code for whatever program is being patented, and pass into the public domain after 20 years (or however long the patent is valid).