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EU Software Patent Directive Adopted

Posted by Hemos on from the big-bad-news dept.

sebFlyte writes "FTA: "An EU Council spokeswoman said on Monday morning that the Computer Implemented Inventions Directive had been adopted." Apparently it's due to 'institutional reasons' that they're ignoring the outcry from developers and several nation states ..."

5 of 455 comments (clear)

  1. Note that this means it goes back to Parliament by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    Note that this means it goes back to parliament for a second reading (where an _absolute_ majority of 376 votes in the Parliament or something like that is needed to do *anything* about it (i.e. abstentions, absences, etc. count as votes _for_ the directive) - seems to be corruption is build into system, but there you go).

    Time for a straightforward declaration of our own, I think:

    "We, the undersigned, will not honour or respect european patent law any more. There are millions of us. You'll have to kill us all before you ever get your patent monopolies, you corrupt corporatist fuckers. Good day."

  2. It's Not Oer Yet... by PipianJ · · Score: 5, Informative

    RTFA. The European Parliament still has to vote on it, and have rejected it before.

  3. Always go to ffii.org by Baron+Eekman · · Score: 5, Informative

    Best information source for the EU patent-problem.

    Here's the press release

  4. Re:It still has to go for a 2nd reading... by elgaard · · Score: 5, Informative

    You better start explaining to your MEP why this is so important.

    The second reading will be much more difficult than the first reading because this time they need a majority of all MEP's (not just MEP's present) to change the directive.

  5. FFII Press Release by Halo1 · · Score: 5, Informative
    Available here.

    And as someone else already said: the Council has adopted its "common position" (although it was far from common in this case). It still has to get into the European Parliament, through its second reading (where it can be amended or even rejected, after which the whole game is immediately over).

    Anyway, as far as I am concerned, the big news is not what they adopted (a directive text which codifies the European Patent Office's US practice), but how they adopted it. Three countries with the support of several others asked to reopen discussions, and the Luxembourg presidency simply denied that even though they have to let the Council as a whole decide about that according to their own rules of procedure (point 3.8).

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