Richard Stallman on EU Software Patents

schreibmaschine writes "Richard Stallman writes in The Guardian that the defeat of the EU directive has bought time, but that the pro-patent forces will regroup and try again."

Comments

The world did just fine before their invention

[Anonymous Coward]

I think it's time we kiss software patents goodbye. How can we pretend to have a true capitalist market when you can somehow monopolize ideas like this? If someone can produce it cheaper (or produce an even better product), why should you have exclusivity?

Software patents make no sense.

Re:The world did just fine before their invention

[ProfaneBaby]

True capitalism always tends towards monopoly for some finite period of time.

The problem we have is that we (1) understand the downsides of monopoly, (2) have a pro-capitalist nature, and (3) have those who would love to control monopolies lobbying stronly on their own behalf.

The true answer is somewhere in the middle: software patents have their purpose (to protect the true innovator from a mass produced knock-off created by a huge company), but they're abused by the huge companies of the world. The problem, though, isn't with software patents in general - it's with the implementation of the patent system as a whole. True innovation is lost in the midst of mass-filed patents on every possible silly concepts as the patent-land-grab has become the new speculative market. By reforming the way that patents are issued, we can both protect the true purpose of the patent, and prevent the widespread abuse that makes them dangerous to most people.

Re:The world did just fine before their invention

[ZephyrXero]

Agreed, patents aren't really a bad idea in theory... it's in practice that they've become a problem.

Quick and easy ways to solve current patent issues:
1. Make patents only last for around 10 years. This gives the inventor more than enough time to establish themselves as the original.
2. Make corporations have to pay much more than an actual person would be charged to file.
3. Any person or business that files over 5 patents in one year has their filing fees raised expotentially with each subsequent submission.
4. Don't allow patents on concepts and ideas, only something that's actually been produced already.

These won't fix everything, but it's a good start and woulnd't be hard at all to implement. Getting the guys in charge to listen however, is a very different story...

I think that software patents are a good idea

[Laurance]

I think that software patents are a good idea, but I understand that having them can limit what software developers can do. So feel that software patents should exist but only last for a short period of time ( 6 months to a year). This will allow for the original developer to make money but then after while the patent can fall in to public domain. Allowing others to implement it into there software.

Re:I think that software patents are a good idea

[cpt kangarooski]

Well, the problem I have with them is this: Patents exist only to provide an additional encouragement to inventors to do certain things that they would not have done otherwise (i.e. invent, disclose, and market their novel and nonobvious useful inventions).

In many fields, the encouragement of merely being a competitor with others is insufficient, though it is worth noting that inventions don't stop being useful when their patents expire, and that the lack of a monopoly on an invention doesn't mean that you can't still make a handsome profit. Thus, the additional encouragement of a patent is of use to the public, which is who wants to see more useful, novel, and nonobvious inventions come about, who wants to see them disclosed so that anyone can reproduce them later, and who wants to see articles embodying the invention in the marketplace.

The software field is special, however. At least for right now, I think that there is so much inventive activity going on that patents simply could not stimulate more of it. Likewise, software embodying these inventions often hit the market. Disclosure is at times an issue -- though for some inventions, the specific details of their implementation are not of huge importance. However, I think that it's best addressed with additional copyright formalities, rather than granting patents.

In fact, not only do I believe that patents will offer no additional encouragement to software inventors, I think that the monopolies they embody, and the high costs of complying with them or licensing them, will in fact reduce the amount of inventive activity going on in this field.

The only reason software patents exist is that there is a belief amongst many in the patent field that patents should be granted for any sort of thing under the sun, made by man, if it satisfies the various requirements for a patent. This is ideological, basically. I OTOH think we should remember why we have patents at all, and thus should grant them, or not grant them, for particular fields according to pragmatic values. In some sectors of industry, patents are beneficial; in a few, such as software, they're not.

I don't think that merely varying the term length is a good solution. Better to just ban them for the software field (and business method field) for now, and only reinstitute them if those fields slow down and finally actually require the additional encouragement.

interesting

[roman_mir]

Europeans are fortunate that French and Dutch voters conclusively rejected the proposed EU constitution. The document explicitly prioritised the interests of business over the public. It slightly increased the power of the parliament while greatly increasing the power of the council of ministers: in other words, it would have made the union less democratic. The rejection provides an opportunity to consider something better. I have a proposal. - RMS is bringing up an interesting point here. Had the EU constitution passed, the resulting government body would have been able to impose regulations on formerly sovereign contries and the process would have been far less democratic than it is now. The United Europe government would probably be even worse than the US government in such issues. Viva la France?

Keep it up RMS!

[LibrePensador]

Stallman exemplifies that old adage that the price of freedom is eternal vigilance or something to that effect.

For all the BS he often gets from the newly-lobotomized Microsoft "ain't that bad" and "Apple's so cool that we must lick its DRM" crowd, he has much respect for consistently fighting the good fight, which is something that is rare to find in these funny times when people gloat about not believing or standing up for anything.

Re:Interesting article from RMS

[Scarblac]

Could one of our EU slashdotters enlighten?

Speaking for most of us, no we can't :-(.

Re:Interesting article from RMS

[Eldav]

Since they had been so dispised by the council, they voted NO in force.

Unfortunately, this is wrong : just look at the figures : 684 votes against, only 14 votes for the directive. Anti-patent MEPs alone wouldn't have been enough to reach the 2/3 quota required for rejection. TFA clearly explains what happened :

Lobbying and protests continued in Strasbourg until the last day, but on July 5 things took a strange turn. The pro-patent forces decided to kill their own directive and began forming a coalition to push for its outright rejection. On July 6, nearly the whole parliament voted for such an outcome.

In other words, the pro-patent lobby preferred to scuttle their own directive, rather than risk to get an amended directive which would not have suited them (around 150 amendments had be prepared by anty-patent MEPs).

The same kind of behaviour could be seen regarding the (temporary) rejection of the infamous Bolkestein directive : the directive was scuttled in order to try and salvage the equally infamous European "Constitution". To no avail, fortunately !

patents are anti-business

[blitz487]

Stallman seems to think that patents favor business interests as opposed to the public interest. What he doesn't realize is that patents are anti-business as well. All you have to do is look at how businesses can be threatened, cowed, and destroyed by patent litigation. The public isn't going to be sued out of existence by patent lawyers.

The interests served by patents are not the public or business in general, but a handful of giant corporations who wish to use armadas of patents to cover for their inefficiency and sloth and prevent other, more nimble businesses from competing with them.

Re:patents are anti-business

[SirSlud]

Well said. Patents (and copyrights) were originally inteded to provide protection to small businesses or artists. Now those very same laws have simply been extended and convoluted enough to favour large corperations (friends of the king, in feudal-speak) with mountains of lawyers.

It breaks my heart when I hear somebody quote strong copyright or patent laws as a means of protecting Joe Average and his American Dream. The current state of these laws makes such a claim nearly indistinguishable from a romantic fantasy.

Re:EU constitution would have been an improvement

[o'reor]

Indeed, the EU law is already binding on member states, but I have to disagree with you and share the views of RMS on that point : the new constitutional project would have made the EU less democratic and (even) more corporate-driven than it currently is.

With this text, although the EU parliament would have had the power to oppose decisions taken by the EU Council of ministers, the decisions would have been as messy to take or to oppose as with the current EU software, since this directive project was already being discussed in co-decision -- the way nearly every directive would have been, had the text been approved. As we have all seen with the software patents directive, there was still plenty of room for sneaky things to be done by the Council and the Commission to push the agenda of the European Patents Office against the will of the Parliament, and as RMS says, even though the Parliament rubbed their noses this time, they will surely be back with a revenge.

However, if the constitutional treaty had been voted in, the Commission and the Council would have had even more powers; the Commission could have taken "european decisions" (the equivalent of directives, that have force of law) on its own, without any possible democratic check and balance over these : not even the EU Council would have a say on that.

Finally, let us not forget that the inherent flaw of the current EU institutions is that the Council of Ministers has the legislative power at the european scale, and the same ministers apply these european laws using their executive power at the national scale. This is already in contradiction with the principles of separation of powers.

So sure, it will be a while until the EU gathers again around a constitution project. But I think that voting against this one was the right thing to do -- and I for one did it.