Slashdot Mirror
More on the Microsoft v. EU Decision on Software Patents
bollow (a) NoLockIn writes "As
pointed
out on Groklaw, Microsoft has told the EU's Court of First Instance that
"certain of the communications protocols that the Commission requires it to
provide are covered by patents or patent applications and that it intends to
file, before June 2005, a large number of patent applications." In view of
this,
Poland's
courageous action against software patents is a great relief. There's an
online thank-you letter for Poland with
already over 10000 signatures."
Wow, 85 AC replies vs 3 real replies.
Let's hope someone patents AC spam so that they get charged a dollar everytime they wanna talk about something offtopic.
There has been a major security issue with Slashcode revealed this week. See http://www.slashcode.com/article.pl?sid=04/12/20/1 946225. I hope today's Slashdot troubles are not related to this...
Animoog.org
Nope. The major security issue is a cross-site scripting vulnerability. Basically, you craft a special URL to /seearch.pl and steal the password of those who click on the link. This is just a shitstorm of AC spam DDOSing the site. (I thought FormKeys prevented this?)
In theory, the interests of society ALWAYS weigh heavier than the copyright/patent interests of a company. Patents and copyrights only exist (in theory and law, if not in practice) because (and to the extent that) they benefit society.
This is explicitally described in places such as the US. Even though this may not be explicit with in the EU the assumption behind any law is that it must be to the benefit of the society it applies to.
The law allows patents and copyright in order to increase the number of inventions and works of creative writing.
Actually it's to increase the number of these which are in some way "published". Inventions/stories/etc which only exist in someone's head are of little use. The idea of both patents and copyrights is to provide an incentive for people not to keep their ideas to themselves.
If it can be shown ineffective at reaching that goal - or even worse, counter-productive -
Or even simply redundent, either generally or in specific area's of human creativity.
then patents and/or copyright should be abolished.
Either generally or in specific cases. An alternative to abolition is to change these so as to work better. e.g. attempting to determine what is an optimal copyright term.
It's a somewhat separate issue if courts have (or should have) the power to void or transfer ownership of copyrights and patents. Interestingly Microsoft is claiming that patents it does not even have (possibly have not even filed for) yet as a reason for failing to comply with a court judgment. Dosn't this mean that Microsoft is in "contempt of court"? Even that any patent office which continues to process the affected patent applications is also in contempt of court.
In the US, offering the invention for sale is certainly the equivalent of publishing it. From the date it was first offered for sale, you have 1 year to apply for the patent. If you wait longer than a year and the patent examiner discovers it was offered for sale, you are subject to a 35 USC 102(b) statutory bar which means your invention falls into the legal category of SOL regarding a patent.