Slashdot Mirror
Demonstration Against Software Patents in Europe
bram.be writes "On April 14, FFII is organising a
walking demonstration in
Brussels against the legalisation of software patents in Europe, as
well as a legislation
benchmarking conference. Like in August last year, these events will be accompanied by an
online demonstration whereby webmasters are asked to close their websites
in protest. The reason for the renewed protest is that after the
European Parliament voted for a
great directive, it
is now the Council of Minister's turn, whose working party proposes as
'compromise' to simply discard all good amendments and on top of that to
even make program publication an infringement. Already more then 1300 sites participate in the online demonstration. Among them are some big sites like KDE, the GNU Project and the Gimp. Also, on April 15 the European
Greens/EFA group is organising a Euro-LUG
party inside the European Parliament, 'with a view to enhance the
networking among the free software community in Europe [...], to inform
the EP about what free software is, how it works and which ideas lie
behind.' Speakers will include Gwen Hinze (EFF), Jon Lech Johansen
(DeCSS), Georg Greve (FSF Europe and Alan Cox. Prior
registration is mandatory for this event."
Will /. participate?
People say I'm crazy, I got diamonds on the soles of my shoes...
Living in London, isn't there some way I can participate? Surely this is being organised as some sort of Europe-wide demonstration in several key cities? How else can I join a protest if I don't have the time, money or inclination to fly over to Belgium?
Please enlighten me... Would this make it possible for MS to get a patent on office suites?
Sig Nature
I say patenting software is OK, as long as the patent law only allows you to patent certain things in your software that will stay unique to it, so that it doesn't become a case of 'I can't use this function in my competing program because (x) patented it'
One thing that could make patents on software a little more palatable would be to reduce the protection period to something that makes a little more sense on internet time. If a software patent was valid for say 3 years after filing this should give a good head start to any bright ideas and make it possible for the market to get full interoperability/documentation within reasonable time.
So many people would vote for option (1) just because they want slashdot.org to go away that it would skew the results
Here are some points in favour of the EU legislation:
1- software patents already exist, have been granted and so on (e.g. GIF in the US, for example, but others in the EU) - in the EU, it was confirmed by the Vicom case;
2- the legislation is _merely_ codifying case law practice into statutory to law to reduce the level of confusion (so you don't have to refer to case law);
3- despite the presence of software patents (e.g. gif), the progress of linux and open source has _not_ been hampered - in fact, in most cases, the presence of patents causes people to make workarounds, some of which are _better_ that the original patents (e.g. GIF -> PNG/JPG; VRRP -> CARP/PFSYNC);
4- stopping this legislation will not stop software being patentable because it already is (see 1 above);
5- not allowing patents for software means that you remove individual rights to the protection of the fruits of their labour - you _enforce_ an "open" social model on their inventions;
The FFII information is pure FUD - "for the last few years the European Patent Office (EPO) has, contrary to the letter and spirit of the existing law, granted more than 30000 patents " because the terms of the EPC (european patent convention) have been clearly interpreted that it is only software _as such_ (e.g. a whole program) not (a) systems that incorporate software as an element, or (b) technical mechanisms within the software.
If I invent a new compression algorithm that is patentable, sure I want to _have the choice_ to either (a) patent it and make money from the patent, (b) dedicate it to the public domain for all to use. If FFII had their choice, then my freedom for (a) would be removed, for some "specious" allegation that software patents are hindering innovation, when, in fact, the swathe of open source software and internet protocols/technology are evidence that software patents have not done anything to hinder innovation.
I don't want rights to my inventive creations to be removed. I want the choice, and what I want the open source community is do is to educate me on how to use my choice, not to impose it upon me.
Our protesting does absolutely nothing to sway them. We are a minute component of society with no financial clout and no connections. They most likely wouldn't miss us if we all up and vanished. We cannot cause enough trouble to cost people their offices, and our demise would please a lot of people who DO have money and connections. This is not an issue the public is worried about - they have other concerns than software.
Not that I disapprove. It's still better than nothing. But we need other contingency plans, because as far as the governments are concerned the loss of open source would not be a major one, and they will not respond to us. If we want to be effective, I think we need to look in another direction.
Specifically, if software patents are to be given power and we can't stop it, I think we should propose an compromise. If they are going to go through with this, they need to also create a mechanism by which people can document for the patent office intellectual property without any of the large fees associated with the patent filing process. This new filing path wouldn't grant the filer any unique rights to the IP - it would, however, constitute documentation of prior art which has been filed with the patent office and they are responsible for when considering new tech patents. This is the only answer I can think of which might hault the granting of absurd patents. Allow us to document all our ideas cheaply in such a way as to block patents being granted which involve obvious ideas. I would call it a Declaration of Prior Art. The filer doesn't need to be the one who had the original idea - just someone who can properly describe and document it. Then, if the patent office grants a stupid patent, we can point them to files in their own database that rule it out.
So by all means protest the patents, but remember They Don't Care. What we need instead is a method to impact the workings of the patent office. So let's lobby for the addition of a Declaration of Prior Art section to software patents. We can argue that it would help the patent office do its job, and I don't think anyone would actually have the guts to publicly state they want to take advantage of the patent office's ignorance in this field. Let's try and lobby for a mechanism where we can help the patent office be unable to grant stupid patents. That might actually provide us with a defense when (not if, IMHO) they eventually get software patents through. There's just too much $$$ behind software patents - I have zero expectation the political system will stop them based on anything like ideals. So let's get practical, and look for ways we can do more than just protest.
"I object to doing things that computers can do." -- Olin Shivers, lispers.org
what is the point of this? I mean the sites that are being taken down are already anti-patent and the people who visit it are also already anti patent. How often does anyone here even visit the GNU website? we have a minority of the people in a minority group (those who use OSS ) protesting this. i see it as ebinf as effective as me shutting down my site in protest of law x... no one who aready does not does not care will care.
The war with islam is a war on the beast
The war on terror is a war for peace
That i can protest the way in which my country has joined the EU without even asking the public, once?
In the UK they've never EVER asked the electorate if they like it, I don't, exactly because of crap like this which is forced upon us, unlike in the UK, there's always your own MP to take this up with, in the EU there's no one to talk to, but does my goverment care about this? NO.
Does the EU care? NO.
The whole EU thing is wrong, and a massive mistake, stuff this software patent crap lets just protest against the crap that the EU stands for as it is.
This isn't anti-European, at all, it's anti-EU.
Though fundamentally different from patents, the EUCD is another broad reaching directive that consistently hurts EU consumers' basic rights... I have (very) recently started a site at anti-eucd.org to rally support against it.
Why stone tablets? The law of the jungle is older, and much simpler: If you can't eat me, I'll eat you.
cpghost at Cordula's Web.
Secondly, these losers aren't against patenting the obvious, they're against patents per se.
Look at www.ffii.org. Neither are they only against patenting the obvious nor are they are they against patents per se, they are against software patents. While many are critical about the consequences of patents in other areas, few suggest abolishing all kinds of patents. There are many arguments against patents on software and business models, both theoretical ones (algorithms are, like scientific theories and works of art something different from technical inventions) and practical economic ones (software patents stifle competition and innovation).
I suggest they stop patent protection of all European companies and make freely available all intellectual property of: a) European pharmaceutical companies b) European car companies c) European software companies (SAP, etc.)
Here in Basle, where the headquarters of Novartis are, they certainly wouldn't be happy about that. It's a bit radical, but it might be a good move. As a response, US and Japanese patents in Europe would also be invalidated. There would be cheaper products more competition and fewer patent disputes. On the whole, the European economy would probably profit more, because it seems the largest patent portfolios are in the hands of US and Japanese companies.
But such radical steps aren't necessary, it would be enough if the US and Japan abolished patents for software and such general things as business models and both they and the EU prevented trivial patents in areas where patenting makes sense in principle.
And right under the poll results, bullet number 3:
"This whole thing is wildly inaccurate. Rounding errors, ballot stuffers, dynamic IPs, firewalls. If you're using these numbers to do anything important, you're insane."
True,a country cannot export a product to eg. the USA if the product infinges IP, but what about all the tools equipment and everything else that went into it's manufacture?
The western roman empire destroyed itself. True, germanic barbarians overtook rome, but not by some mighty battle, they just strolled into a city that had forgotton the basics, such as how to defend itself. The rest of the empire had even forgotton how to administrate itself.
Nowdays the western economic empire has given up on making wealth by producing things, and likes to make a living by owning the rights to produce things. The western empire will slowly but surely forget how to produce things, and then find that new things are being produced elsewhere using technology they don't own.
In the long term who is going to innovate, the people who are producing today or the people spinning as much money as possible out of what they produced yesterday?
And if you thought that was boring you obviously havn't read my Journal ;-)
Software patents are bad for the economy of the country which allows them.
Imagine this future scenario:
Say, America has software patents and Europe doesn't. Now the American companies can't use the software recipies of their competitors (you lose your patent if you don't enforce it if I remember correctly) and so their software is not as good as it could have been without the laws. The European developers can program without the cost of researching their source code or the cost of buying permission of using patented source and can use the best solutions for their software designs.
European software will, slowly but surely, become better and cheaper than American software and American companies won't be able to sell their software successfully in Europe unless they make a special "High quality European version". Because software is mostly used to streamline business processes. Business in America won't run as smoothly as business in Europe because european business' are using more, and higher quality accounting/production/etc. programs. American economy takes a hit.
Private software user in America won't buy software from US companies because it's inferiour to the software they can (illegally) get from Europe. They pirate either the software made in Europe or the "European version" which they can't legally buy or they import the "illegal in US" Open Source programs. US software sales and services are down because of software patents, American economy takes another hit.
Small companies make up more than 80% of all businesses in any given country. In the US, small software companies will die because of software patents, only a few big ones will survive. Software companies will abuse their positions to increase their profits at the cost of their consumers, American business'. American business' won't be able to buy as much software as they like or will have higher operating costs because of it. The few American companies that sell software won't bring in as much economic activity and taxes as a lot of small software companies + big companies. American economy takes another hit.
Other countries like China which present billions of dollars of potential income for the US won't buy American, they'll buy EU or build their own software. Even less economic activity for the US software industry. American economy takes another hit.
The worst thing the European politicians can do for their countries is to allow software patents in Europe. Europe will lose it's competitive advantage over the US software industry. Even worse, their position will be much weaker than that of the US. Because software patenting has been going on for a while in the US, US companies have the most, and the most important patents on software. US companies will be able to kill off most EU software companies using their patent portfolio's and that would be a bad thing for the EU citizens. I think that an EU politician that votes in favor of software patents is either incompetent or influenced by big US software companies.
Software patents are only good for a few big US software companies, bad for everyone else in their country.
Software patents are bad for the economy of the country which allows them.
- -- Truth addict for life.