Slashdot Mirror
Euro Patent Restart Demand Repeated by Parliament
sebFlyte writes "ZDNet UK is reporting that the European Parliament's Conference of Presidents has ratified and repeated the demands of the Parliament for the computer-implemented inventions directive to be sent back to the drawing board, even though the Commission has refused to re-start it after previous demands. From the article: "It is not certain that the Commission will comply with the request of the Parliament, nor that it will use the opportunity to draft a good text ... The new Commission is not obliged to follow the Parliament's request and they might still try to keep all options open and ask the Council to adopt the agreement of last May without a new vote, so as to gain even more options for themselves."
...when a body which purports to be democratic does not listen to those who represent the people. We have spoken, we have shouted, we have sent you nasty emails. If the bill gets carried, it will indicate that the European Union is designed to give people the appearance of having democratic power with the parliament, while the real power resides with commission, who seem emminantly influenced by big business.
If the commish ignored the last demand, why would they pay attention to this one? Or is this just for the parliament to make their objections absolutely clear?
Also, question: Is the EU parliament in the end going to be, or are they right now, as pissed off about this as Slashdot seems to be? I mean, whether the parliament cares about patents or not, you'd think. In the U.S. if a branch of government got outright snubbed like this they'd probably wind up doing everything in their power to kill the idea of software patents forever, even if they didn't really care about software patents, just out of spite
The BBC coverage of this issue states that "The open source movement, of which Linux is the flagbearer, eschews notions of property and instead allows anyone to examine and tinker with the inner workings of software."
As a BBC license payer, I'm incensed that they could be spreading such FUD. Since when has Linux "eschewed the notion of property"?
Just because the open source community is vehemently opposed to software patents, doesn't mean that they don't support the "notion of property". Without such notions as copyright for instance, the GPL would be impossible.
Anti-EU people take this example to denigrate the integration process, but in fact it shows that MORE integration is necessary.
For instance the parliament still has little power, but without it this directive would have been passed months ago. Without EU at all, it would have been passed years ago under pressure from US-based megacorporations.
I'd say that even though the situation is dangerous, it shows that the European parliament is perfectly doing its job and representing the will of the European people, and counterbalancing the ivory power that is the Commission. In particular, kudos to Michel Rocard, former French Prime Minister and one of the main forces in this legislative fight. A friend of mine met him when he was just starting to discover the issue; and he was pleasantly suprised to find how he listened to anti patent arguments and quickly acquired knowledge and decided to act.
Actually, history indicates the exact opposite.
The U.S. grew its industry rapidly by running roughshod over attempts by the European countries to control trade secrets & other forms of intellectual property. The U.S. wouldn't be where it is today economically if it had taken European whining about patents, copyright & such, seriously. It's only recently, as the primary economic superpower, that Americans suddenly think it's a good idea for everyone to let them control the flow of ideas & technology throughout the world.
Software & business model patents are being used to crush competition, rather than provide any kind of innovation for society's benefit. True entrepreneurs make money by providing desired goods & services, not by getting laws passed which let them earn money through extortion.