Protests Delay European Software Patent Vote

vinsci writes "According to CNET News, 'The European Parliament has delayed voting on a controversial software-patents directive, following protests and criticism by computer scientists and economists.' ZDNet UK adds: 'Warnings that a controversial directive could devastate European software businesses have struck a chord with MEPs. The European Parliament has delayed voting on a controversial software-patents directive... the vote, originally planned for Monday, will now take place at a plenary session starting on 22 September.' Wired also has a story on the protests."

Comments

Yay for Europe!

[Anonymous Coward]

At least protests have an effect there. In the US, we need to protest tens of times to get the point across...

Re:Yay for Europe!

[bussdriver]

Even then, our protests go belittled in the media (unless record size) and are dismissed by the white house; which just uses a straw man.

Re:Yay for Europe!

[squiggleslash]

I agree with the latter, but the "(unless record size)" thing needs challenging. It's not the size, it's the message, that determines whether the protesters get belittled. I guess it ultimately depends on whether or not the press feel it's in their interests, or their owners interests, etc, to cover it.

Hundreds of thousands marched against the recent Iraqi action, for example, and in general the protests were fleetingly covered and all the protestors portrayed as nothing more than a bunch of extremists.

On the other hand, a handful of people protest against the first amendment, as with the recent Alabama Ten Commandments event, and it gets widespread and even supportive coverage.

Why? Well, one's opposing the government, the other's in favour of views associated with some of the more extreme members of the current government, and right now the Press, for whatever reason (insert conspiracy theory here), feels its obliged to prop up the current government - presumably looking at issues like media ownership rule changes as reasons to want a regime in the White House supportive of the press, or maybe just sensing a right-wing mood in the country, who knows.

I must say I've been disappointed in the five years I've been in America. coming from Britain. The press seemed pretty on-the-ball when I arrived, avoiding, for example, making the Clinton impeachment into some simple good vs evil match. But as time's progressed, the press seems to have gotten steadily worse, less and less rational and more and more ideologically bonkers. It's now almost as bad as the British press.

Humbert Wolfe satirized the British media in the mid-nineteenth Century:

You cannot hope to bribe or twist
thank God! The British journalist.
But, seeing what the man will do
unbribed, theres no occasion to.

It never got any better.

Its not just EU

[anonymous coword]

Imagine who will be next. What if Asia, Canada, South America, Africa, Austrilia were lobbying for software patents! This is an international problem, and it must be protested everywhere!

Please help.

[BillKaos]

Yes, we know you slashdotters are mostly American, as said before, but please, this is a CRUTIAL fact to European Free Software, so please, help us, help you, and support the protest: change your page.

Thank you.

Re:Devastating

[Nexus Seven]

India.

The US will put massive pressure on MEPs

[Thagg]

I believe that the reason that this is coming up with a vote at all is that the WIPO requires 'harmonization' of patent laws in all WIPO-member countries, and everybody is being encouraged to harmonize to the insane US status quo ante.

Let us hope that the EU can stick to their principles and stand up to US hegemony on this issue. It's not unrealistic to think that a software-patent-free-Europe could have dramatically stronger growth in software than it would have otherwise. Software patents will force force Europe into second-class status for decades.

The open source movement, and GNU/Linux in particular, has shown that software is fundementally different than 'things' -- people will create it on a large scale just for the pleasure of doing so.

thad

Re:Proportional patents?

[woodhouse]

That's exactly how the system works without patents. If it's difficult to implement, it's difficult to copy. A difficult algorithm will take years for anyone to reproduce unless they have the source code. No need to patent anything.

Re:Still...

[aastanna]

Well, it's not like they are going to implement the patents and they are only delaying the start date. They are delaying a vote, so it's still undecided.

To me it sounds like some of the people who might have voted yes on this issue may have realized how stupid they were being, and hopefully will re-examine the facts and have a change of hart.

Remember, politicians by and large won't understand the issue themselves, it's way out of their field, and it needs to be explained. For many years lobbiests for major corporations have been explaining the yes side, now some economists are explaining the no side and people are realizing the major problems with software patents.

Non-exclusive software patents?

[Michael Woodhams]

There is still a big problem so long as the U.S. is allowing these patents.

Scenario 1: Europe allows software patents.
Jan 1990-Jan 2004: Various people around the world use a borderline-patentable idea because it is obvious, but don't try to patent it.
Jan 2004: EuroSoft* file to patent the idea in Europe.
May 2004: AmeriSoft* file to patent the idea in the US.
Jan 2006: EuroSoft's patent is approved, and used to oppress the masses, including AmeriSoft. AmeriSoft's patent is either refused or is toothless because of this.

* All companies in these scenarios are fictional. Any resemblence with real companies of the same name, trading or defunct, is purely coincidental, and their fault for choosing such an obvious company name.

Scenario 2 - Europe does not allow software patents.
Jan 1990-Jan 2004: Various people around the world use a borderline-patentable idea because it is obvious, but don't try to patent it.
Jan 2004: EuroSoft considers patenting the idea, but would have to do so in the U.S. This would be much harder for them, and it is a long shot anyway that the patent office will be stupid enough to grant it, so they don't.
May 2004: AmeriSoft file to patent the idea in the US.
May 2006: AmeriSoft's patent is approved, and used to oppress the masses, including EuroSoft.

From our point of view, there isn't much difference between these scenarios, but clearly the European Parliment will prefer scenario 1.

I think what we need is special cheap non-exclusive patents. (Perhaps the name needs working on, as it is somewhat oxymoronic as it stands.) It would not allow the "patent" owner to prevent anyone else using the idea, but would provide assured protection against anyone who filed for a patent on the same idea at a later date.

Scenario 3:
Jan 1990-Jan 2004: Various people around the world use a borderline-patentable idea because it is obvious, but don't try to patent it.
Jan 2004: EuroSoft* file a non-exclusive patent on the idea in Europe.
May 2004: AmeriSoft* file to patent the idea in the US.
May 2006: AmeriSoft is unable to oppress EuroSoft because of the patent. Anyone else is able to claim to be using EuroSoft's patent on the idea, not AmeriSoft.

This could all be achieved without government intervention just by publishing in a Journal of No-Longer-Patentable Ideas. (Or web-site. Are there such sites? Easy Karma to the person to post links to some.) As IANAL, I don't know if there would be any benefit in official government recognition via the patent office.

Possibly there could be some allowance for the patents to be used defensively only - i.e. you can only prevent someone using your patent if they are trying to prevent you using one of theirs. I can see a Family Economy-Size Can-o-Worms down this path, but it may still be better than the Barrel-o-Worms we're dealing with now.

Economic advantage to Europe?

[Anonymous Coward]

Software patents look like they cost software development companies plenty to manage. I would suspect that they would cost the economy even more in lost innovation.

If so, Europe shouldn't introduce software patents as Europe would get a competitive advantage over the US.

Major european companies would still need to build a dossier of software patents by applying for software patents in the US. These would be needed for trading with US companies - "We will charge you $1 royalties on ours, if you charge us $1 for royalties on yours". Also they are needed for the threat of legal attack, as a protective shield against attack (patent or otherwise)!

Re:Devastating

[Cassius105]

America has a strong software business yes

but thas because software patents benefit large corporations

what they damage is the actual quality of software

If we have software patents thrown out here in europe then we should start to enjoy a higher quality of software

because software sold in europe wont have to abide by software patents so developers can use all the software methods they know of to make the best possible software without any worry of being sued or anything

while in american you will still have software restricted because companies have to abide by patents in the design of it

Im not a business man so im not sure if european software companies will make more money than american ones

but on the consumer end it will be alot better in europe because out software will be free of patent restrictions

Quick intro to the situation:

[ciaran_o_riordan]

The committee responsible for this proposal is called JURI, it is made up of 65 MEPs. On June 17th, they voted on the final wording of the proposal. The vote passed by a small majority.

The next stage in the legistlative process is the plenary vote. This is the Big Vote where all 625 MEPs get to vote. In addition to Yes/No, the MEPs are also presented with a list of possible amendments. For this proposal to become acceptable, a vast array of amendments would be necessary (it's rotten to the core).

So 70 amendments were tabled and many protests happened. MEPs were inundated with post and email about this proposal. So much contraversy arised that the European Commission decided that the proposal was obviously not ready for a final vote. So the proposal has been handed back to JURI, and a more agreeable proposal has to be returned.

So now we have to contact just the MEPs on the JURI committee, and tell them how we want them to vote. "Vote No" is not an option, MEPs don't vote No without a very good reason. Proposals are expensive, translation to 12 languages etc., MEPs view rejection as a big waste of EP resources.

Most MEPs know that this proposal will be bad for our economy but they do not understand the whole situation, so we must tell them. (us knowing the whole situation is a prerequisite for this)

Our MEPs are asking us to tell them how to vote(!) and how to change/amend the proposal. We can win this one, but europeans aren't used to fighting our governments, were much more used to laughing at the US government.

So we were caught off gaurd. We've done extremely well, I think we can win this, but people have to continue to put in their free time and learn how to deal with this.

For complete beginners, it's probably too late to become effective (we have 3 weeks). For half-way-there's, keep workin'. (mail me if you need to clarify something, my email address is not hard to google for.

And the people are letting this happen?

[TyrranzzX]

There's a definate pattern here;

1: Decide to take vote at xx date, lobby heavily to get politicians behind bill

2: Mass outcry, politicans decide to not pass the bill or to wait for a vote, as it'd be political suicide to do otherwise.

3: Mass outcry dies down, corperations keep the politicans pockets lined waiting for the proper time to reintroduce the bill (when the protesters have something else to go after in otherwords. Divide, conquer, etc).

Rinse, repeat.

What should be done here is the protesters start protesting the mans power and start questioning their loyalty to the people, in other words, politically assassinate the bastards. They'll eventually get it passed if they keep on trying to pass it. Just as carp and a number of other provisions are continuously barragged at congress year after year, month after month which ties them up for doing anything other than actual leadership, just making deals and selling our rights away.

Microbloat Rules

[ralphh]

Here in the US, I'm afraid to release some stuff I've done. My lack of proof of when and where I got my ideas could lead to a) someone "reinventing" my ideas and patenting them (as in M$ vs. Burst.com, even though Burst actually has patents and ducumentation, as well as decent lawyers) or b) being sued because I've unwittingly created something that resembles someone's patent.

And don't forget we have a sleazy outfit suing businesses too small to fight back basically for using FRAMES on their web sites. There is plenty of similar nonsense going on.

How could this not be affecting innovation and holding back the US software industry? Isn't this at least partly why M$'s toy software is now running virtually all US businesses, and not at a bargain price, might I add? Re the economy, there are other forces at work here, but the M$ monopoly absolutely is not helping things.