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EU Patents Won't Stay Dead
sconeu writes "Apparently the EC is ignoring the restart directive, and has placed software patents as an A-Item on the Council of Minister's agenda with an aim for approval on Monday." From the article: "The directive is pitched as offering greater protection for software developers. Opponents, including many in the European parliament, fear it will simply provide big players, including America's powerful and litigious software giants, with a very large stick to batter upstart developers and the Open Source movement." Update: 03/04 22:04 GMT by Z : And just as quick as you please Denmark stops things in their tracks. Denmark's objection means that there will have to be further debate before the patents get the stamp.
Is it just me or does it sound like Microsoft and other litigious American software giants has bought the influence of this European commission? I can only hope that the many countries involved will stand up and fight to at least hold debate on a matter that might ruin most small and mid sized European software companies.
Its not users who are broken, it's systems not taking account their likely behaviour and fixing it technically.
... for a second reading, can't they kill the measure then even if the Ministers approve it?
I just can't imagine a world of software where the guy that thinks up an idea has sole possession of said idea, there won't be any room for improvement or growth of software.
;-) I don't think India is part of the EU...yet.
At least in Europe
There is nothing wrong with patents per se, but rather the *reasons* why they are being called for.
The European computer patent measure seems to be aimed at stifling competition rather than encourage innovation - that is why it's not a good idea.
Unfortunate, the US patent system has the idea right but it's been misused into oblivion (with wonderful contributions from those granting patents, too) - but it was never created for the reasons that the European Computer Implemented Inventions Directive is being created for.
Damn unfortunate.
Why do Europeans allow a non-elected commission to determine economic policy? It makes no sense to me that a state would agree to hand out such important matters that, in my mind anyhow, require representation to do. Personally, I don't give crap about software patents, I'm more amazed the EU is run like this.
Burn Hollywood Burn
I'm wondering how long until there's a civil war in the EU from people who get sick of their new federalism.
500GB of disk, 5TB of transfer, $5.95/mo
batter (verb):
1. To hit heavily and repeatedly with violent blows.
2. To subject to repeated beatings or physical abuse.
3. To damage, as by heavy wear.
You're not as clever as you think you are.
The correlation between ignorance of statistics and using "correlation is not causation" as an argument is close to 1.
Who will earn the most money from this?
Who has enough money to be able to spend it to get this through because Linux is starting to gain popularity?
I won't answer either but we all know the answer.
I like muppets.
The people pushing for software patents have very, very, very deep pockets. As in billions of dollars. It is also in their financial best interests (and remember that publically traded corporations are obligated to maximize return on investment for their investors; whether they are ethical or not in the process is not part of the equation) to obtain strict protection for their ridiculous software patents.
Therefore, they will very patiently keep plugging away until either (A) they get their way, or (B) something drastic happens (like tossing those who push for the patents in jail, or amending the EU Constitution to ban software patents). I'm putting my money on (A).
With spending like this, exactly what are "conservatives" conserving?
Sure, software patents protect small developers. That's why Carmack's Reverse is patented by 3DLabs (who John Carmack doesn't work for, and received royalties from Doom 3 sales), one-click ordering is patented by one of the online auction giants, and is why we're seeing elements of standard computing operations being patented on a weekly basis.
How does the patenting of the components and standard processes of computing protect the small developers if the small developers are no longer allowed to freely develop?
BTW, in my original submission, I had compared the EU Patent Directive to Freddy and Jason.
Also commented on the fact that at least the EC is a bunch of honest politicians -- once they're bought, they stay bought.
General Relativity: Space-time tells matter where to go; Matter tells space-time what shape to be.
When the law is on your side, fine. When it's not, go ahead and do what you want anyway. What are they going to do, breakup your company? Hahahah!
try { do() || do_not(); } catch (JediException err) { yoda(err); }
Who cares for the law. The answer is to _still_ develop software against these malicious patents. If everybody writes OSS even when these patents are in effect, they can't stop anybody. In the EU or elsewhere. This outrage will not be tolerated by the real people who control(the citizens).
Apparently, the Danes have stepped up to kill this one! http://www.nosoftwarepatents.com/phpBB2/viewtopic. php?t=428
:wq
I'm not up on my EU procedures. Assuming it is approved by the ministers, does it still need Parliamentary approval? If so, and assuming it receives such, is there some type of court to which an appeal can be brought? Does the EU have any type of Judicial redress?
If brevity is the soul of wit, then how does one explain Twitter?
According to this article in the German IT magazine Heise.de (use the fish), the danish parliament has giving their minister for economy, Bendt Bendtsen, binding orders to request a complete restart of the whole negotiations.
The parliament of the Netherlands have giving their representative orders to support any demands for new negotiations.
Finally, the German representative would face sever pressure (he'd probably have to resign) should he ignore the German parliants demands for new negotiations.
As for many of the "new" EU members, they will probably not support a decision that might severly restrict their fledgeling IT economy - no matter how much Microsoft and the other "big players" try to lobby.
So, all in all, its as good as dead - at least for now.
+++ MELON MELON MELON +++ Out of Cheese Error +++ redo from start +++
Couldn't IBM, Novell and other organizations with lots of patents leverage these portfolios to combat the Microsoft way? If IBM would start a patent consortium around the patents they've opened up to the open source community, and a small company was part of that consortium, when the small company got sued by Microsoft IBM (and IBM's patents) would be there to help.
I don't get it.
When you look at www.ffii.org, you'll see all kinds of news like "[2005-03-04] FFII: Danish Parliament obliges Minister to renegotiate software patents in Council", "[2005-03-04] Polish Informatisation minister: we cannot fight alone", "[2005-03-03] FFII: JURI schedules software patents discussion on Monday", etc, etc.
http://www.ffii.org/
I expect it to be rejected actually.
Today, the danish comission of European affairs ORDERED their governement to not treat the new software patent directive as a "done deal".
The Dutch governement had earlier said it was hoping on a redraft opf the bill, but would not block the vote, something the German Governement had also done.
In the meantime the Dutch VVD also brought in a motion to try to get an amendment to bring "community patents into the bill, which then would have to be completely redrafted.
Source: www.webwereld.nl
I dont know about you folks, but I'm thinking: "It ain't over 'till the Fat Lady sings"
And I somewhat like the idea of a commons of patents.
Anytime you put a bad law or tax or whatever up for a vote.
It gets voted down. So the powers that be hold another vote. Repeat until the TPTB gets what it wants. No rule in place to keep you from asking over and over, like a nagging kid wanting candy.
Same thing in my home town over a property tax for schools. Put it up for a vote, and it's a no. Do it again. And again. And finally it goes through. And the school board starts doing backflips. Whee! A mandate from the masses!
Any truly fair system would hold a single vote, on a single topic - and then no more. Not forever, but for say...at least 7 years or so.
Weaselmancer
rediculous.
If the EU Parliament can make a stink about this autocratic move by the EU Council, and stop the power grab, it will be a larger victory for European democracy. This kind of abuse will happen all the time in Europe, making a sham of democracy as corporations and other interests make end runs around a subordinate democratic government. But if they can drive a stake through its heart now, democracy can rule a functionary state body instead. Europe has had centuries of warmup for a continental democracy experiment, including staging a mixed bag of results across the Atlantic. Now, as it is formally getting underway at home, is the time to ensure the balances are correct.
--
make install -not war
I'm all for protecting investments in software and ground breaking technology, but to which extent will Europe allow software developers to patent their ideas?
Will they allow obvious use of technology to be patented or will they be more restrictive than the US?
I think only time will tell...
If you can't mod them join them.
developments: Computerised inventions: the Commission refuses to budge
As heise reports, the Danish parliament has bindingly instructed their secretary of commerce to vote AGAINST software patents,
so the law can't be nodded through.
According to their parliaments some other ministers are instructed (more or less bindingly) to support another country's approach to restart the whole process:
Poland, Netherlands, Spain (had already voted against it in the last session), maybe Germany (but represented by some stubbor a..hat, so..)
Also it is likely that some countries that were neutral during the last voting (like Austria, Belgium, Italy) will support a complete restart.
This directive must be stopped at all costs. It still has to go through the European parliment and so really needs as many people as possible to write to their MEP's to stop this.
The consequences are frightening. It would be a serious blow for European software developers.
I live in Switzerland, which is not part of the EU, thank God, and given the EC blatant disregard for the EU parlimentary request to restart the process of software patents, I will make very sure, by the democratic means of public initiative, aka privately initiated referendums, which we have in Switzerland, that Switzerland will never join that bastion of corruption.
I do not want my country ruled by a cabal of easily bought unelected scum in Brussels, and, given the way things are going, I think there are many current EU members, such as the UK and Denmark that are wondering how they can get out of it as fast as possible.
If you look here: http://ffii.org/ there's some possibly better news.
Has there ever been some study or likewise that support patents, in the sense that they show an increase in innovation in areas that are patent regulated?
Religion is regarded by the common people as true, by the wise as false, and by rulers as useful.
IMHO, this is the effect the general political disinterest the population has here in the EU. It may be stronger than in the US, but it' still declining.
And it is now SO LOW that corruption rises steeply. This is corruption, isn't it? Not calling it corruption would euphemise it.
Maybe, people still care a bit about what the media say. The media don't say anything about 'smaller political issues', only the important ones.
But the media also decide what "important issues" are. For example they redefine that corruption is about privately using frequent-flyer-miles (not ok, of course, but corruption?), about contacts of politicians into red-light districts (wtf?!)
They let politicians talk about "high-tech", "information economy" etc.pp. But if important laws are proposed in this area, they do not notice or they do not want to notice.
If the Minister for Economic Affairs overrides decisions of the cartel office for apparently no good reason (as it happened here in germany), it's pictured as "saving the economy". Arrrrrrgh!
If they push this through, "we" should not stop trying to prevent software patents. We should lobby for the abolition of software patents then. But this will be hard.
Sometimes, I have the vision for 2020-2030 of some grey-haired FLOSS developers drinking tea together and being nostalgic about the wild times where software development wasn't illegal and fundamental rights were still respected.
But I can not, in any way, accept such a development.
They're eager to show that nothing is rotten in the state of Denmark. :)
I'm not good in groups. It's difficult to work in a group when you're omnipotent. - Q
is like a bad zombie movie, it just keeps coming back from the dead. Why wont you die already!
The Doormat
If you're not outraged, then you're not paying attention.
The French revolution. Those in power repeatedly ignore the cries of the people and defile common sense with their governmental decisions. The rich live their lives in naive luxury while those outside their homes are starving. Finally the straw that breaks the camel's back will fall, and the people will rise to usurp their so-called "leaders". Chaos will soon follow, and the rage, blood, and death will spread across the countryside like wild-fire...
Anything and everything just seems to be getting more and more messed up in the world of politics today. My only question is what will be the 21st century equivalent of the guillotine? Laser guns? Oh please, please let it be laser guns!!! =D
Hero of Allacrost, a FOSS RPG for *NIX/*BSD/OS X/Win
I guess there are a few, like James Gosling, but primarily it is software publishers, not developers that are thourhgly enamored with software patents, and one software publisher in particular that is a convicted abusive monopolist. Slightly off topic, but many readers may not know that RMS' conviction on the evil's of software patents was triggered by a spat with Gosling over some display update code. I don't remeber the exact details, but both Gosling and RMS had developed versions of emacs. Gosling's version had a display update routine that RMS like so he copied it with, he claims, Goslings permission via email. Gosling subsequently sold his version to Unipress who promptly threatened RMS with litigation. RMS just as promptly completely rewrote the offending code so not only did it not infringe, it worked better.
The BBC have an article on how the EU works. Apparently the parliament can sack the commission if they want to. Now that would be interesting.
/ eu _institutions/html/eu_parliament.stm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/shared/spl/hi/europe/04
Eh bien c'est rien que pour ça que je vais voter NON a votre p****n de constitution de m***e!! .. (based in EU or not)
Huh I'm feeling better now!
P.S.: Note to all euro-zealots witch will flame me for this : don't argue that "building Europe" will provide the "little peoples of Europe" more weight against the Big Bad Scary <insert_your_favorite_enemy_here>, we all know that this masquerade is promoting the interests of big bussinesses
Now _PLEASE_ flame at will!!
OOooowwweeeeooooooooweeeeeoooooooo
Braiinnnnnssss...... Musttt.... have.... younnnggg.... braaiiinnssss....which are destroyed by too many patents.... mmmmmmmphphphph..
at least until the new European constitution is ratified (if it is) the EU pariament has somewhat limited powers. While technically they can veto a decision by the Council of Ministers with an absolute majority vote, that does only apply to some areas of EU law, and the council is far stronger politically.
http://www.derossa.com/asp/guideEPworks.asp
What I mean by that is that if someone defines, say, a new crime and brings out laws against that crime, from that point on you can try people for breaking those laws. But you can't retrospectively try people who committed that crime before the laws against it were written.
Sure, patent law has existed for years but software patent laws are not currently recognised in Europe. If they do get through, by the same logic, no software written before those laws were enforced can come under them - is that the case or am I missing something?
Gentoo Linux - another day, another USE flag.
...is it possible to find the people who pushed hardest for the draconian version and begin publishing criticisms of them, to push them out of power ?
remember this is only an example of their undemocratic mindset. removing the people who are influenced by what are essentially bribes from the USA will help prevent same/similar from occuring in the coming few years.
it is essential to record the names of the people under the influence of the US corps. and hold their feet to the fire/defang them in the coming months..whatever happens monday.
Who wants to abuse this patent system so we can piss off MS with their own tactics? all we need is alot of paper and time and we can patent everything from the spoon to the windows OS!
I like muppets.
The members of the commission.
Since telling it nicely doesn't work, and telling it with lots of money is out of the question, we should find other ways to uhm...convince them. The first step is to peel them out of this anonymus term "European Commission", so they can't hide in it.
Just because I can imagine doing a hippopotamus, doesn't mean I'd like to do it.
Article 52 of the EPC excludes programs for computers from patentability and the patent establishment has had to fabricate some very dubious and contrived arguments to get the directive this far and justify over 30,000 illegal patents issued by the EPO.
I shall now sit back and await the flood of comments from all the Slashdot readers who know nothing about the EU and even less about patent law.
vote with your wallet, DO NOT buy any msft or any other closed source software, stick with only FREE/OpenSource GNU/GPL products, eventually the greedy corps will get the message...
Residents are advised to stock up on shotguns and ammo, and to aim for the head. Scientists are still undecided on whether the outbreak is caused by an engineered virus, a near-earth asteroid fly-by, or bureaucratic incompetence.
If you had super powers, would you use them for good, or for awesome?
And how do you define a software patent? Not all applications have a bit at the top of the page that says "this is a software patent", patent agents are a sneaky bunch.
They're eager to show that nothing is rotten in the state of Denmark. :)
;-)
You forgot Polland!
You can't take the sky from me...
Or,
batter - A mix of flour, water, milk and eggs used to make a flat round cake Often referred to as a pancake.
i'm getting nervous here.. when will those stupid lobbying idiots ever stop? my guess is they wont stop until europe has the same draconion pro-drm and patent laws that yankee land has. damn micro$uck. if they pass this bullsht i emmigrate to antartica. When will those big DRM-loving american corporations ever realise that these kind of blackmaling and lobbying antics dont go down too well here. there is nothing stopping poland from veto'ing it again. i think this will keep going forever
Becoming a republic won't help rid you of your royal family.
Just look at us: we've never had a royal family in our whole history as an independant country, yet we still have the Kennedys.
www.eFax.com are spammers
" IMHO, this is the effect the general political disinterest the population has here in the EU."
/ e/ ar52.html
Try to see it from their view:
They think that TRIPs requires that software be patentable, that software is *currently* patentable due to the requirement in TRIPS and that the Parliament don't understand the current situation. They also think they are protecting European software companies from Asian competition.
So the politicians in the Commission think they are doing the best for Europe. They think they're the good guys because the lobbyists tell them they are!
To me & you its different.
Software isn't patentable because its mathematics. New ideas in programming are treated as discoveries not inventions currently and don't come under TRIPs at all.
This is clearly written into patent law and the EU Patent office is ignoring the law when it patents software:
http://www.european-patent-office.org/legal/epc
Part 2.c
"The following in particular shall not be regarded as inventions...discoveries, scientific theories and mathematical methods...and programs for computers"
From our world view software patents would be a disaster, no way to determine prior art, no way to defend against obvious patents because of no prior art, mathematics locked up for 20 years, blocked from most markets due to patents....
Ah those crazy vikings
They come down from their fjords and terrorize the capitalists of Europe.
Good work boys....
-- -- -- -- -- --
Wi nøt trei a høliday in Denmark this yër ?
See the løveli lakes
The wøndërful telephøne system
And mäni interesting furry animals
Including the majestik møøse
AC comments get piped to
If the directive goes into 2nd reading in the Parliament, a 2/3 majority is needed to amend it. That is 2/3 of *all* MPs, and hardly 2/3 of the MPs typically show up. So, once the directive is accepted by the EC, that's probably it.
It is even more ironic since this is the original directive with most of the parliaments amendmends removed. Too me this is mindboggling. It not even so much about the actual software patents anymore, it is about the credibility of the European Democracy.
So, some lobby ridden small group of european ministers can effectively and apparently easily circumvent any decisions of the parliament (the only elected body).
I am an European and I say:
SHAME ON YOU EU! This is not a modern democratic process, this feels more like a banana republic.
If they really do succeed in making software patentable in EU, would their next step be making linux illegal? not just BSing since free stuff can threaten commercials
I am harvesting funny/good quotes. Please help by putting them in your sigs
If so, why not appoint a new commission and negate their actions on patents?
"The directive is pitched as offering less flexible application development, remove open-source software and provide a state of freeze in application development"
b.t.w. why does EU force Microsoft to remove i.e. Media Player to increase competition, when they a few months later might introduce something that would kill all competition to companies such as Microsoft
And what do they have to show for it? Nothing. A promise of possible laws, but at least half the lawmakers opposed to their ideas.
Despite their billions of dollars, they can still be stopped with modest effort by a mostly unfunded group. They don't really have much power, they just want you to think they do so you'll give up fighting them.
Will they have their way? Hell no. Right now the lawmakers are pushing ahead with the proposal ONLY because backing down opens up a can of worms: it means any future agreement between the EU countries becomes meaningless, since countries can still back down after the meeting has completed. Right now this is not truly the case, not if the meeting was concluded succesfully.
So this battle has nothing to do with software patents anymore. It is now about how decisions are made, and what the value of these decisions is. And the people making those decisions very badly want to keep that power.
If you can read Dutch, read all about it here.
I see many posts about Europeans not being interested in politics and the European parliament in Brussels being corrupt.
I 'd like to remind everyone out there of the many Europeans who are very active in protesting against patents like the people of NoSoftwarePatents and the Federation for a Free Information Infrastructure, encouraging people around Europe to get a hold of their MEPs and making them aware of the importance of the matter.
Hey a lot of us went to Brussels (with bananas!) to protest February 17, there where busses organised even from Paris.
We write, fax and mail our politicians, even send them fresh fruit to show how much we care about this!
Because if there is one thing parliaments _really_ hate, it is that kind of thing...
Mebbe even a correct answer. If I'm lucky.
The EPO has ben merrily granting "illegal," unenforceable software patents for some time now. Patents that have no legal force 'cause software-specific patents are not presently valid. How they get away unpunished with THAT is another good question. (Or maybe it's a "god" question, the way I initially typed the word...)
Should the software patent directive be adopted, all these presently-unenforceable, meaningless existing pieces of paper will become valid, enforceable patents under the laws then in effect. The fact that they were granted long ago won't mean they aren't valid then. True, they will *expire* sooner than if they had been issued on or after the directive date.
The difference wrt a "new crime" is that the hypothetical later-criminalized act began and ended before it became illegal. The patent document represents a continuous grant of protection over a defined period rather than an act performed at an instant of time. In that sense, it's rather more like an ongoing activity that becomes criminalized (example: ongoing financial suppor of an organization that gets outlawed. Past support not a crime, continuing support is/will be a crime.)
"My strength is as the strength of ten men, for I am wired to the eyeballs on espresso."
They'd just reword things enough (however barely enough) to make it qualify as a different issue and resubmit over and over. And since the people who are doing this are often paid (sometimes by the public) to do this and nothing else, they have lots of obstinacy (and usually money) to work with.
There's a [mailing list http://lists.ffii.org/mailman/listinfo/in-parl/] here. The Indian ordinance needs to be ratified by Parliament yet.
Another interesting tidbit from the article:
This is a discussion from Poland's representative. It looks like it will really be up to the Danish and German representatives to establish a clear majority to remove the patents item from the A-List.
Always do right. This will gratify some people and astonish the rest. -- Mark Twain
I was going to give up believing in democracy, but then I realized I did that a year ago already.
You can't simply say, "patents are good," or "patents are evil," or that they hinder or encourage innovation. It's not that simple.
In the right environment, patents really do give the inventor a chance to make enough money from inventing to go on and invent more. Furthermore, others can read those patents and build on those works through alternative methods, licensing, or waiting for expiry. That's why we have patents - according to the US Constitution.
In the wrong environment, patents are used as a roadblock to slow innovation in the marketplace to a pace that the market leader can handle. That's where we are, now.
The real long-term winners out of this move are India, China, and anyone else smart enough and big enough to not adopt the current patent regime wholesale. For instance, I'm sure China is going to accept some level of IP reform, in order to trade with the rest of the world. But I'm equally sure they're going to tweak the accords to give them internal freedom of action, and use access to their internal markets as a bargaining chip to do so.
The net result of this is that later this century, innovation is going to fly in these other countries, and move at a Microsoft-accepted pace in the US, Europe, and others. For an example, take a look at broadband deployment elsewhere in the developed world vs the US, and that's just because of monopoly utilities. Or take a look at the gadgets and stuff in Japan that are unseen in the US. Or the deployment of advanced cell phone technology in the US.
It really has happened, and more will.
For the long-term result, look at the enlightened civilization that dominated the world, the cultural light of math and science, with peace and harmony amoung several major religions. The Islamic Empire around 1000AD.
The living have better things to do than to continue hating the dead.
Details on all the UK's MEP's can be found here.
Will they listen? Will thay take note of you? Who knows.
But the most important thing is they hear your voice.
The political majority in Denmark has switched such that there is no longer a majority in favor of the current proposal.
Denmark is therefore going to vote no at the EC meeting (which will at the very least move the item from being A-list to B-list).
I sent email via faxyourmp to my EU members of parliament, one UK independence party (hates the EU entirely, along with anything foreign), and the Liberal Democrats
I havent heard anything back from UKIP, which surprises me -I thought they'd be "the EU is evil, here is why".
The lib dem MP gave some patronising guff about technical innovation and "balancing the needs of large enterprises and small businesses", nothing about consumers, OSS developers, etc.
But he did say they had voted to send it back, and were miffed at the response. They werent letting it lie, as it was a sign of a broader power struggle between governments (council of ministers) and the EU parliament itself.
Many news and medias outlets are foisting article titles so fast that even if you read them, they go like a blurr...
...
EU Patents Won't Stay Dead
Euro ministers set to OK patent measure
European Parliament votes to scrap software patent text
EC rebuffs Parliament's patent restart request
Reboot ordered for EU patent law
Open source prepares to kiss EU patent ass goodbye
EU patents vote delayed
EU patent law stumbles, fail
European Parliament Throws Out Patent Bill
My head is spinning. Perhaps, I haven't fully absorb the new Euro government structure and its basic triangle relationship between the EC, EuroParliment and Patent. But these medias aren't helping with their front-page titles.
The only one that I understand is this one article:
Linus Torvalds against EU patent directive
--
Sorry for not putting links in the aboves title. I don't believe in karma whoring.
... I'll not give up my Linux distros until they pry them from my cold, dead fingers. Neither will I stop creating software and distributing it under the GPL.
I am creating apps from my own design and it will take my death to stop me from doing so.
So, patent everything under the sun if you want, I am not going to stop doing what I am doing, and there is no one big enough or important enough to make me cease my practices.
Chew on that for a while.
"Less than a thousand bucks" isn't expensive? I'm 27 years old, have been full-time employed for 6 years, and have a family, and there's still no way I could afford a thousand bucks for a patent on any ideas I come up with while programming.
One of the patent defenders in this discussion talked about patents being useful to protect "16 year olds in their basements". How many of those could afford a thousand bucks?
The problem is that by definition the people who need protection don't have a thousand bucks per idea, and the people who can afford to throw a thousand bucks at every trivial idea don't need protection, but ARE more than willing to attack all the people who can't.
One other thing... you wrote: "So, everyone would be willing to program for free, and provide tech support for free?"
Ever heard of open source? I hear it's quite the rage these days...
The cynic in me tells me that the "Software implemented inventions" item will probably be removed from the agenda next monday. It does not matter. It was a big mistake on the part of the pro-patent lobby to push so hard for the adoption of the directive when there was no majority. It put the pro-patent lobby in the position that they had to lobby against democracy. This destroyed any chance of a patent-friendly directive.
Commissioner McGreevy had effectively lost when the EU parliament voted for the restart with a very large majority. Sure, the commission could refuse the restart, and it foolishly did so. The council might even have adapted the directive. But there was no way this would get through a second reading. Denmark saved McGreevy and the rest of the commission from a devastating showdown with the EU parliament. The commission should be grateful.
However, patents on ideas cannot be specific. In fact they will always be abused for precisely this reason by the paper pushing business that is any Patent Office.
Given your example in the thread below, do you imagine if another written medium, like literature for instance, would have progressed with a patent like "A method for building and resoloving the Protagonist's Catharsis." Or in music, the (algorithmic) 'Rondo' phrasal form (musical phrases A - B - A - C - A), prevalent in rock music since the 60's? These examples are analogous with the encouraged trend in what is considered patentable - where software is concerned.
Here are some examples of the current state of software patents today, the kinds of things people want to patent are in fact as loose as possible - eg a net made so large as to increase the likelihood of patent breach. In other words, the bulk of swpats are precisely not about protecting innovation so much as encouraging the possibility of legal action. Hence we increasingly hear about software development houses becoming legal offices; it is simply better and bigger business.
http://webshop.ffii.org/
Secondly a software patent is often used as a pre-emptive strike against a superceding product. Much of the software patents granted today for so-called inventions are registered precisely to protect the patent holders already inferior product - extending it's market cycle while ensuring the 'invention' never makes it to market. How does that encourage innovation, boosting the culture of software as a whole?
And from the perspective of the small developer (as you claim to be) , here is a testimony that makes the real danger loud and clear. SWPatents discourage innovation , but also creation itself:
Agarwal Associates Ltd
As the owner/manager of a small company employing 10 people I can not afford to do a full patent search every time I have an idea for a software product .
As a small company our strength is in being fast and flexible. We can not be either if every time we need to put together a bespoke solution for a clien t we would need to spend months putting together systems for our clients tha t avoid any software patent issues.
As a small company our strength is in being fast and flexible. We can not be either if every time we need to put together a bespoke solution for a clien t we would need to spend months putting together systems for our clients tha t avoid any software patent issues.
This has a direct impact on our Clients who are also SMEs. They would not be able to afford solutions suitable for them and would have to use a standard solution from the big players whether it was suitable or not.
UKPO claims that the new directive does not change anything but only clarifi es the current law. If that is the case, why oppose the clause inserted by t he European Parliament to explicitly deny patents for software? Make it expl icit and clear for everyone!
Added: 2004-12-07 http://protectinnovation.ffii.org.uk/read_testimo
The more cake you can eat,
the more your asses are belong to us.
"a very large stick to batter upstart developers"
Would that be a stick of butter then?
Contrary to popular belief, coding is not all free blow-jobs and beer. Those things cost MONEY!
It's "Night of the Living Directive!" Starring a bunch of old European guys! And Steve Ballmer!
When you look at the state of the world, how can you not become a radical, liberal anarchist?
Maybe this is it; it surely looks like it. They are certainly preparing the legal grounds to do so. They will get there sooner or later because they just have the power to do so. At some point they will start suing either the developers, the open source software distributing companies or the users; or of course, all of the above.
In our little slashdotian world, behind our glasses and our computer screens, we feel powerful. And we have the naive belief that because we the mosquitoes have been able to cause the giants a little pain or because some of the giants have directed the little power we have against other giants we really have power. Our power is completely overestimated by our community.
This is just the software developers version of the American myth that the little guy has a chance against the big guys. Bullshit. The little guy always looses, except for the one or two cases that the powerful people publicize to their convenience to pacify us with the illusion that we live in a system in which we can get justice if we fight nicely; that is, within the rules of a game where we are at a complete disadvantage.
The exception to this rule comes only when the little guys come together and fight together, like in the fight for civil rights or the huge strikes during the 20's and 30's that forced the ruling class to institute the social security system (no liberals, it was not because Roosevelt was a visionary or a hero or a nice guy, it was because they were forced to do so by the pressure of the masses).
So the bottom line is political power. How are we in that area? not even at zero. We are further behind zero because we have the illusion that we have a voice here in slashdot and in other blogs. Bullshit. Nobody cares about this. Nobody reads this. The larger society looks at us as freaks. Yes, they all believe that hackers are closer to Saddam than to Robin Hood.
We can't gather 20 guys to go out on the street to protest anything. Look at the women's march for the right to choose last year. That's how you demand something. And even that way it is very hard (I am not saying that the demand was right or wrong, I am just talking about the tactics).
Open source is just like PC software piracy during the eighties. Everybody said "it's too extended, they are not going to go after all that people". Blah blah blah. They did start going after everyone. They let that go on as long as it was convenient for them, it continued for a while when it was not a big problem for them and then, when it as not in their interests they started shooting.
In the bigger scheme of things, Open Source does not exist. The only way that something like this counts is if we struggle for this in a wider political perspective. And that ain't gonna happen.
At least not behind our keyboards.
You would think the EU has more important legislation to deal with but this thing somehow keeps popping back up, over and over and over again.
Obviously are friends in Europe are just as controlled my multinational corps as the US is or are the citizens of the EU marching in the streets demanding software patents?
Let the game begin. Jose Manuel Barroso: sg-web-president@cec.eu.int Margot Wallstroem: margot.wallstrom@cec.eu.int Guenter Verheugen: guenter.verheugen@cec.eu.int Jacques Barrot: cab-archive-barrot@cec.eu.int Siim Kallas: CAB-KALLAS-WEB-FEEDBACK@cec.eu.int Franco Frattini: Cabinet-Frattini@cec.eu.int Viviane Reding: Viviane.reding@cec.eu.int Stavros Dimas: stavros.dimas@cec.eu.int Joaquín Almunia: CAB-ALMUNIA-INFO@cec.eu.int Danuta Huebner: Cabinet-Huebner@cec.eu.int Joe Borg: joe.borg@cec.eu.int Dalia Grybauskait: cab-grybauskaite-commissaire@cec.eu.int Janez Potocnik: Janez.Potocnik@cec.eu.int Jan Figel': CAB-FIGEL@cec.eu.int Markos Kyprianou: sanco-mailbox@cec.eu.int Olli Rehn: olli.rehn@cec.eu.int Louis MICHEL: Louis.Michel@cec.eu.int László Kovács: Laszlo.Kovacs@cec.eu.int Neelie Kroes: Neelie.Kroes@cec.eu.int Mariann Fischer Boel: Mariann.Fischer-Boel@cec.eu.int Benita Ferrero Waldner: benita.ferrero-waldner@cec.eu.int Charlie McCreevy: Charlie.Mc-Creevy@cec.eu.int Vladimír Spidla: vladimir.spidla@cec.eu.int Peter Mandelson: Peter.Mandelson@cec.eu.int Andris Piebalgs: cab-archive-piebalgs@cec.eu.int
I find it interesting that there is an ongoing suggestion that only big money firms are innovators and that small companies and open source concerns are just copiers. Such willful ignorance is staggering.
You have any doubt? Let us look at Microsoft then as they are the biggest and surely the "most innovative." Which world famous products of theirs have shown them to be the great innovators that all else copy?
MS-DOS? A clone of existing operating systems. They took someone else's idea, made their own implementation, and profited.
Their greatest triumph? Windows OS. So can we assume Microsoft created the first graphical operating system? The first window based operating system? The first point-and-click, mouse navigated operating system? No, no and no. In all three cases they took an existing idea from someone else, extended it and profited.
Which is exactly what small companies and open source projects do. But we're getting ahead of ourselves...
Tell me then, what is the second item Microsoft is famous for? MS Office. So then, did Microsoft invent the word processor? Spreadsheet? Email client? Database? Not one thing that Microsoft is famous for is a software idea of their own invention. In every case they have extended a previous software idea. And have gotten rich doing it.
This is how software has ALWAYS been created... until now.
Software patents are simply a tool for the mighty to beat the young in manners they themselves were NEVER subjected to. If the EU passes this proposal they should be consistent and pass a proposal to allow adults to choke and stifle children, to choke them until they die. Sure, we understand that we became adults because someone else was leanient toward us. Just as the process of creating software was leanient toward today's giants. Should that debt cause us to extend the same courtesy toward those that come after us?
Pass software patents? Let us be consistent then: punish the weak, the poor, the young, the lessers - all they who fall outside the scope of the "master race." Good Nazi's vote in favour of patents.
I just tried to call the number shown for Peter Mandelson (the trade minister) and got a number unobtainable message. Remarkable.
Accordingly to the USPTO only about 2% of all patents have ever yielded moneytary returns to their holders.
So why all this commotion? Again and again you hear that patents serve the "little man", the lone inventor, the one who deserves to profit from his invention.
But if only 2% of all patents serves their master in this respect, and (yes I hold a patent too) given the cost of a patent (20K+) something doesn't hold up.
The reality is that the majority of patents are not used to capitalize on, but to control the general development in an area or as threats to competitors. A patent doesn't need to apply to yield a threat. As it is, a court case doesn't have to be won in order to win the battle. A 24 month delay is all that is needed in many cases. The competitor is dead, so who cares is the court case had merit. From a company standpoint it only counts if it was effective - merit or not.
Lately we have seen SCO versus IBM. Do you really think the truth or merit counts here? SCO believed it had its ducks in a row, but who cares if you like IBM has unlimited funds and lawyer resources.
So who do you think these laws were meant to benefit? One patent with no funds to back up is like owning a spoonful of the ocean. You need a lot to change the game.
Hey, look who is in charge of Fisheries and Maritime Affairs (the department which handles software patents)...
Even if in this struggle I would only be a mosquito that makes the elephant feel itchy, so be it. I'll keep on making him feel itchy for as long as I can.
I like well-mannered elephants, and I'm trying to make the others behave.
If no country implements the SW patent laws that implement the directive, what aer the commission going to do?
Things are different with software. Firstly, you don't need vast resources to mass-produce software. A web site is about all you need; and reasonable servers and bandwidth are within almost everyone's reach these days.
Secondly, there's already something preventing a big company from copying your work and selling it as their own: copyright.
So patents don't work for the little guy in the same way (even when they're working as designed, which they don't seem to be). What do they do for him? Why do you have them? Beats me.
Ceterum censeo subscriptionem esse delendam.
> Why?
>
> Someone else invented it before you, you were
> unfortunate enough to have been the second.
Okay, let me pose the following question,
If I can discover a patent without being aware of the existence of said patent, then isn't that sufficient proof that the patent should not have been granted in the first place?
After all, it wasn't as ingenious as you thought it was.
Im sure this is not intended as such, but a 'community patent / fair use / non-restrictive / anti-anticompetitive' which has a core test of not impeeding innovation, would be a good clause to insert, with 'you cannot patent a standard or prevent interoperability'.
As for the dirty tricks being pulled - unbelievable, this is contempt for due process.
You know Microsoft would never violate any US Law. They are pure and good after all, as are all corporations.
I stumbled accross this. Interesting to say the least and answers a lot of questions. Of particular concern is:
...from their Statement of Principles.
"* we need to accept responsibility for America's unique role in preserving and extending an international order friendly to our security, our prosperity, and our principles."
The worrying thing is, the chairman of this particular gang seems to work for the Weekly Standard, as shown by an entry in the WHOIS of the domain: Registrant Email:wkristol@weeklystandard.com
Scary stuff for us in the rest of the world!
I wrote:
We need to PASS the council's version.
I meant to write:
We need to PASS the Parliment's version.
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- - You can't take something off the Internet! That's like trying to take pee out of a swimming pool.