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"False" Open source Representative Tells EU Patents OK
Onno writes "Bruce Perens claims in this article
That a false free software/open source advocate claims to EU parlement that software Patents are ok. " This is a strange article on a lot of levels so I'm gonna avoid commentary. You definitely should read it though- it's just that odd.
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FALSE OPEN SOURCE REPRESENTATIVE CALLS FOR EUROPEAN SOFTWARE PATENTS
A false or misled "open source representative" has signed an industry resolution calling for the EU to allow software patenting, which has been sent to members of the European Parliament. Copies of the resolution are here and here . The European Legal Affairs Committee holds a plenary vote on software patenting this Wednesday, and may have been influenced by the false representation.
Graham Taylor is director of Open Forum Europe, an organization that is purported to work for broader acceptance of Open Source. Taylor has appeared at various trade shows in Europe, saying reasoanble things about Open Source, for the past year. Open Forum Europe is a division of IT Forum Foundation and InterForum. InterForum's membership includes a number of large companies that have a vested interest in the promotion of software patenting in Europe. Mr. Taylor's sponsor organization is well connected with the EU government.
I would encourage Mr. Taylor to evangelize Open Source software, something he's done successfully for a while. However, he does not have the credentials to represent the Linux, Open Source and Free Software developer communities, especially when he contradicts our extremely strong opposition to software patenting. While Mr. Taylor has been visible as a public speaker, it does not appear that he has any engagement with Open Source projects and developers, or that he brought this matter up with representative organizations such as the Free Software Foundation, the Open Source Initiative, and Software in the Public Interest. No legitimate Open Source representative would think of taking this sort of position with government without first holding a public consultation with the developer community.
Software patents could be fatal for Open Source software in the U.S. and Europe. Since we do not collect royalties from the distribution of our own software, we have no funds to pay royalties to patent holders. Rather than sue us to collect money, expect patent holders to sue Open Source developers to restrain them from distributing their software or carrying out further development. Companies that produce proprietary software would bring that sort of suit to kill us off as a competitor.
While we can sometimes work around a patented algorithm that we know about, the Open Source developer is not able to defend himself from patent infringement claims, even invalid ones. In the U.S., the cost of a patent infringement defense often exceeds US$500,000. The Open Source developer, an individual working on his own time, won't have the funds to defend himself. He will be compelled to settle with his accuser, regardless of the merits of the case, in order to preserve what assets the plaintiff deigns to leave him. The copyrights of his own software won't be among those assets.
We are especially threatened by royalty-bearing software patents that are embedded in industry standards. In many cases, it is impossible to achieve compliance with a standard without infringing upon the patented algorithms that are specified by that standard. Standard compliance is critical for interoperability, and thus software patents in standards can make an un-communicating island of a Linux system. For example, the IEEE 1488 FireWire standard is encumbered by patents that apply to the software interfacing to it, and a patent r
IEEE 1488 should be 1394.
Bruce Perens.
Linus Torvalds wants to incoroporate DRM, yet many others don't.
actually, you have taken it a little out of context... linus wants to code the ability for end users and distros to use DRM in the kernel; which may be a good thing for security (opposed to M$ reasons for DRM). he is not 'enabling' it. if i build a kernel, i can most certainly turn it off, and even if i run a DRM'ed redhat distro, i can STILL recompile and turn it off. in fact, i wont even need to turn it off, since off will be the default.
as to who is a representative, well we need more than one... RMS is willing, linus is not, and there are more movements than just GNU... open source groups also have head honchos and commities, and it is their job to sort it out.
the reason why these organisations (eg GNU, OSI) were set up was to allow them to take care of political and legal stuff in the big picture. if someone is really a part of the community, they will just keep coding and let those guys sort it out...
DNA is the ultimate spaghetti code.
That doesn't sound too bad. As Perens and rest of us are very worried about the future of independent OSS developers, some kinds of amendments might make the patent laws reasonable. I don't know.
For example, allowing strong software patentability and then relieving any OSS implementations from patent claims would actually make OSS a better choise than proprietary! Who would want to pay huge royalties when they can use an OSS implementation. On the other hand, such an amendment would create a loophole that would effectively nullify the patent laws as companies could release just the patented algorithm as a LGPL library.
I really don't believe the pro-patent people would want such loopholes, so it's unlikely that they would support very broad amendments. More likely, they might support amendments that deny suing of individuals while allowing suing companies such as Red Hat and other companies packaging and selling OSS. Such solution would make no difference to the OSS community, as the success of GNU/Linux strongly depends on the commercial exploitation of OSS.
You picked a bad argument there Bruce.
Mozilla or any other OSS program is able to display GIF's - what they cannot do is create GIF's without a license.
But I still agree that software patents are a bad idea.
Bruce
Bruce Perens.
The nature of technical innovation is that ideas are built on top of other ideas. Progress is incremental and relies on previous discoveries. Software patenting prevents this.
Bruce Perens.
Bruce
Bruce Perens.
Bruce
Bruce Perens.
Read this.
It's not precisely about software patents, but can easily be applied to them: patenting software is like privatising the road network.
Bruce
Bruce Perens.
Bruce
Bruce Perens.
Bruce
Bruce Perens.
http://petition.eurolinux.org/
The petition itself is a good example of a letter for an MEP and there is a page that will tell you everything you should know on software patents in 15 minutes.
He's really the last one I'd suspect as a crypto-fascist.
bruce
Bruce Perens.
No, the problem is BEING ABLE TO INTEROPERATE with other computer users.
Now, can we stop shouting?
1. Software patents are currently not allowed in Europe.
That means, that in Europe there is no Amazon One-Click patent, no SCO lawsuit, no Charles Northrup or this, this, another one from Bezos patenting web ads, a Bezos patent on discussing products online, software versioning, submarine patents, AOL...
2. This law will allow software patents if it passes.
3. It has a clause that would monitor the effects on OSS, and maybe, if negative effects are decided to be happening, try to limit those effects.
4. Some dude nobody's ever heard of claimed to represent OSS community and said it's a good idea.
5. Some other dude said the dude in 4 is full of it in a posting on his home page.
6. said posting got slashdotted
7. You are here.
home page
Someone tell me what is "trolling" in this post:
It would have helped a lot, I think, if people like Bruce Perens had worked as part of the Free Software movement instead of confusing the issues with all the talk about Open Source. Not only that, the FSF has a clearly articulated and prominent (i.e. linked from their front web page) stand against software patents. Perhaps Bruce could work with OSI to get a similarly obvious kind of thing over at opensource.org. In fact, I can't find anything about patents at all on the OSI site. So it's easy to see why this European Open Source guy would be confused.
Otherwise, I guess it's okay to bash RMS all day long, but question the OSI or Bruce Perens (respectfully I might add-- I never once called him a "sell out" or anything like that, but people regularly get modded up for calling RMS a dirty hippy) and I'm a troll?
Or does the OSI have a clearly articulated, readily available stance on software patents and I'm completely stupid and missed it? Well?
I do not have a signature
What is your problem mr jewish supremacist?
Dont look over anyones shoulder at an ATM because you might get arrested when you try to arrange a lynching for some poor soul who has 1488 as his pin number.
I can see how patents worries can completely stop open-source development while it appears they don't really stop closed-source. And I would agree this is unfair.
Conversely I am not sure if I would panic so much. Surely Linux violates many hundreds of patents, it is just impossible to write working code without violating patents. And you can probably do just what we do and ignore it.
Someone tell me what is "trolling" in this post:
:)
Looks more like grotesque ignorance than trolling, but slashdot doesn't have a "grotesquely ignorant" mod.
It would have helped a lot, I think, if people like Bruce Perens had worked as part of the Free Software movement instead of confusing the issues with all the talk about Open Source.
Since Bruce has been writing Free Software since before the label "Open Source" existed, and was involved with the Debian project back when they were strongly affiliated with the FSF, and is considered the primary author of the Debian Free Software Guidelines, and is a former Debian Project Leader, and is currently on the board of directors of Software in the Public Interest, the parent organization for the Debian Project, and since Bruce has resigned from the OSI (which was really ESR's baby) over philosophical differences, I think it's a little unreasonable to criticize him for the OSI's failings.