British Government Comes Out Against 'Pure' Software Patents

uglyduckling writes "The British Government has issued a response to a recent petition calling for 'the Prime Minister to make software patents clearly unenforcible'. The answer is reassuring but perhaps doesn't go far enough, and gives no specific promises to bring into line a patent office that grants software patents (according to the petition) 'against the letter and the spirit of the law'. The Gowers Review that it references gives detailed insight into the current British position on this debate, most interestingly recommending a policy of 'not extending patent rights beyond their present limits within the areas of software, business methods and genes.'"

Comments

Fine but useless

[aadvancedGIR]

The way european democracy works is that if the non-elected european commission chooses to have SW patents after some hollidays sponsored by big american SW compagnies, all the european countries will have to implement them fast or be fined.

Re:Fine but useless

[91degrees]

The EU is completely incorruptable. Not because the politicians are honest. Just that there are so many politicians to bribe, and they're all on such huge expense accounts that even Microsoft can't afford to buy enough of them.

Re:Fine but useless

[Stormx2]

Microsoft can't afford

Those three words do not sit well next to eachother.

Re:Fine but useless

[Applekid]

So what we have is a financial arms race for political influence, huh? Good thing companies aren't merging and pooling interests... oh wait.

Re:Fine but useless

[omeomi]

To have that sort of buffer...it would be nice...Here at home the big companies just write the actual legislation...

Re:Fine but useless

[apathy maybe]

And this is different to US democracy where "elected" politicians choose to have SW patents after some holidays sponsored by big US software companies.

Neither is good, neither is better.

Re:Fine but useless

[G Morgan]

A crisis point is coming over the EU soon anyway. It's traditional supporters have turned against further integration recently and while most in Britain still have token support for the EU there is more and more annoyance with the level of infringement things like Maastricht allow.

Fact is most of the British population still think we signed up to a free trade zone rather than what the EU now is.

Re:Fine but useless

[qcomp]

The way european democracy works is that if the non-elected european commission chooses to have SW patents after some hollidays sponsored by big american SW compagnies, all the european countries will have to implement them fast or be fined.

actually, it not that bad: the European Parliament has to agree, and recently it has been possible to stop some very harmful legislation despite a strong push (for it) by the European Commission. The SW-Patent directive has been stopped, IPRED2 has been held up, and EPLA (the last attempt to legalize SW patents and, at the same time, remove them from the reach of national and European legislation) may still be averted. The point is: democracy can work, if citizens are active and alert! even if institutions with very indirect democratic control/legitimation like the commission have too much to say.

Re:Fine but useless

[vrai]

The EU is incredibly corruptible and already incredibly corrupt as the only people who really matter are the EU commissioners. They occupy the same position as medieval lords: appointed by their respective heads of government, unaccountable to the common man and essentially untouchable*. Bribe a couple of influential commissioners (ideally French or German as they are the only ones that true matter) and you're good to go. If the voting masses cause any problems, like not voting for your proposal, you simply keep asking them the same question but in an increasingly loaded manner.

Within a few years we'll have a referendum along the lines of:

Would you like:

EU members to allow the patenting of algorithms used in software products.
OR
EU members to allow the use of EU citizens in invasive medical testing without consent.

* Even when they resign due to massive incompetence they're usually reappointed with a couple of years.

Re:Fine but useless

[SmokedS]

I would really like to be able to tear you a new one for such an absurd mis-characterization of how the EU is governed. Unfortunately, it is not at all far from the truth. The system is rigged so that the council in practice have far more power than the parliament.

It works something like this:
The Council puts together a directive for parliament to vote on.
The Parliament rejects or greatly amends the directive.
The Council resubmits the original directive verbatim or with some cosmetic changes.

And here's where democracy falls down the rabbit hole; The second time around, the parliament needs a majority of all MEPs, present or not, to reject the councils bill or to push through any of their own amendments. Every single abstention or absentee is counted as voting with the council. With the average percentage of MEPs actually present to vote, this means that something along the lines of 75-80% of all the MEPs must oppose the directive, or the council has it's way. That type of near unanimity is rare, so in practice the Council can push through most directives.Not only that, but in this second reading the parliament cannot introduce any new amendments, only reaffirm those from the previous reading.

If you are anything like me, this information will give you a rather uncomfortable feeling about the democratic nature of the EU.

Re:Fine but useless

[Yvanhoe]

The Commission still has a blocking power. Otherwise there would have been a clear law against SW patents a few years ago.

Re:Fine but useless

[geekoid]

You don't stripped away the fundalmental idea of democracy, and then say 'that's where it falls down the rabbit hole.'
Clearly the rule is there to circumnavigate democracy.

Re:Fine but useless

[harryman100]

Microsoft can't afford

Those three words do not sit well next to eachother.

I did it, it just took a bit of re-arrangment:

"Can't afford Microsoft"

Re:Fine but useless

[qcomp]

The Commission still has a blocking power. Otherwise there would have been a clear law against SW patents a few years ago.

True, but thankfully the status quo (in most European countries including my native Germany) is that patents on software/business methods are verboten. So the EPO may grant swpats, but the (national) courts will not enforce them. Of course we need institutional reforms in the EU to give more power to the parliament, but at least the Commission can no longer do as it pleases...

Re:Fine but useless

[gfreeman]

So this would be exactly the same as US democracy, but with an added buffer?

Good for open source

[upside]

It's already virtually impossible to build a product on open source software without infringing on someone's IPR. It's ridiculous. We need a system that protects and promotes innovation.

Re:Good for open source

[Anonymous Coward]

We need a system that protects and promotes innovation.

No. We need a system that promotes innovation. If protecting is part of that, so be it, but the goal should never be protection.

Re:Good for open source

[Applekid]

We need a system that protects and promotes innovation.

That's pretty interesting. Protection and promotion was the idea behind patents in the first place. Protecting innovation from getting swept up into wars of attrition against big entities with deep pockets that will see you go under while stealing your ideas, while promoting innovation by financial gains on that innovation afforded by the protection.

Until leading software geniuses get fame akin to talentless superficial bulimics in celebritydom, I'd think that financial benefits provided by patents are the only way to promote innovation.

Re:Good for open source

[Mateo_LeFou]

"Protecting innovation from getting swept up into wars of attrition against big entities with deep pockets that will see you go under while stealing your ideas..."

See, the thing is that without software patents those big pockets aren't as useful, because said entities can't just sue devs out of existence for daring to compete with them. They have to compete on the merits of their own ideas. Which, I suspect, would not be that strong if their business model consists of harvesting other people's work and putting a coat of paint on it.

Re:Good for open source

[AusIV]

financial benefits provided by patents are the only way to promote innovation.

Except that patents only provide financial benefits to big corporations. If a small company or individual has a patent that a big company wants, the big company will simply use the patent without paying licensing, and if the patent owner challenges them in court, they'll be bankrupted before the case is over.

On the flipside, big companies claim patents on obvious things like double clicks on hand held devices, one click purchases, digitally timeshifting recordings, etc. and can defend these obvious patents in court because they have deep pockets.

If the patent system is going to help spur innovation it needs to prevent deep pockets from being able to abuse the patent system, and right now it's failing at that.

Re:Good for open source

[Andrew Kismet]

Essentially, the patent system fails because the legal system fails.
It's like watching dominoes....

Re:Good for open source

[sconeu]

It's already virtually impossible to build a product on open source software without infringing on someone's IPR

Steve Ballmer, is that you?

Re:Good for open source

[fymidos]

There is still the question though, whether the patent system *can* actually promote innovation when it comes to software. That is, even if the system worked perfectly well.

Re:Good for open source

[geekoid]

"If a small company or individual has a patent that a big company wants, the big company will simply use the patent without paying licensing, and if the patent owner challenges them in court, they'll be bankrupted before the case is over."
If only reality supported that.

Yes, it is failing that only in regards to software patents.

The overall history of the patent system is a pretty good one.

Re:Good for open source

[AusIV]

I think the patent system would be significantly improved if patent cases were handled more like small claims court. Each side has one representative, evidence, and witnesses. Neither side gets a team of lawyers to drag the case out for months. Obvious patents get overturned, legitimate patents are upheld, and deep pockets don't get special treatment.

Nothing reassuring

[Toffins]

The government response is not reassuring. Read the wording of the response again. They are careful not to deny the dangerous distinction that they have been maintaining between "pure" software and software which is implemented to achieve a "technical effect". It is the same sneaky "backdoor" that the UK and EU Patent Offices have been using to allow what most intelligent observers would call "software patents". Even worse, the response makes it clear they are proposing to implement the recommendations on patent law. That will be precisely the occasion for approving the "technical effect" ruse under the guise of an official scheme supposedly merely to "clarify" existing patent law and to "limit" the applicability of patenting.

Re:Nothing reassuring

[physicsboy500]

The government response is not reassuring. Read the wording of the response again. They are careful not to deny the dangerous distinction that they have been maintaining between "pure" software and software which is implemented to achieve a "technical effect". It is the same sneaky "backdoor" that the UK and EU Patent Offices have been using to allow what most intelligent observers would call "software patents". Even worse, the response makes it clear they are proposing to implement the recommendations on patent law. That will be precisely the occasion for approving the "technical effect" ruse under the guise of an official scheme supposedly merely to "clarify" existing patent law and to "limit" the applicability of patenting.

I think you fail to see the point they are truly making. I am a US patent officer and fortunately the US is doing things a bit differently in this respect. What is meant by pure software is a patent on the physical code itself and not the means that it accomplishes. In this respect code that can undergo a simple or "obvious" change to accomplish an entirely different means can entitle the software company to litigate against a rival over something they were attempting to innovate. If the patent is instead granted on the means the software was accomplishing this eliminates much of the gray area as innovation can be seen from a high level. The point of this response is a push to patent what a piece of software accomplishes and not the code itself and to allow no legal backing to those patents which were wrongly granted under the old system.

Re:Nothing reassuring

[Toffins]

Thank you but I understand precisely what the response is and what the objection to it is. We are criticizing the illegal practice in Europe of granting patents for devices, methods, or apparatus relating to software that achieves a so-called "technical effect" -- what you referred to as "what a piece of software accomplishes" and what I and others refer to, strictly equivalently in our usage of the term, as a "software patent". We reject it absolutely and unequivocally because it is wrong, economically harmful and continuing despite it being illegal according to Article 52 of the European Patent Convention

P.S. Please don't redundantly quote the entire text of comments to which you are replying.

Re:Nothing reassuring

[kanweg]

I'm about to sit the European patent examination (that's next week), and as far as I can see your parent sees things correctly.

Bert

Virgin Patents.

[Anonymous Coward]

So what is a "pure" software patent?

Re:Virgin Patents.

[Anonymous Coward]

Basically, the Patent office does permit some software patents. Say, for example, you managed to find a way to improve the efficiency and power of an engine in a novel way, simply by adjusting the timing in software in a novel way. This would be a software patent, but becazuse the effect is on a physical piece of equipment, it would be patentable.

Of course, this can be extended to much more murky cases. For example, a compression mechanism may effectively increase speed and/or capacity of a hard disk. But it's not possible to extend it into doing exactly the same thing in a different way.

Re:Virgin Patents.

[Intron]

The original US patent (5,440,676) that opened the door to patenting software was for an anti-aliasing feature in an oscilloscope display. Because it was shown that it could have been done in software or hardware, but the result was a physical mechanism, the patent was allowed. Once the foot was in the door, everyone just started adding boilerplate "device is an electronic computer comprising software to do X" and the battle was over.

Anyway, the original was on a device, not pure software. UK believes that they can enforce the same rule that the US PTO failed to enforce.

Re:Virgin Patents.

[sconeu]

I thought it was the Diamond v. Diehr case, where a vulcanizing process for rubber used computer program to control.

Re:Virgin Patents.

[Intron]

Subtle difference, Diamond v. Diehr was the case which allowed processes which include a computer program as a step to be patented. In re Alappat , the case I mentioned, was, AFAIK, the first case to allow a patent on a computer program.

Re:Virgin Patents.

[Animats]

The original US patent (5,440,676) that opened the door to patenting software...

That's bogus information. Software patents go back much further than that. The first software patent was filed in 1965, issued in 1968, and expired in 1981. It's Martin Goetz's U.S. "Sorting System", Patent #3,380,029, the sorting algorithm that broke the O(N log N) barrier. That's the technology behind SyncSort, and it powered mainframe sorting for a generation.

Re:Virgin Patents.

[Intron]

Sorry if I wasn't clear. I was talking about patent law. I don't know of a challenge or court ruling on the SyncSort patent.

Re:Virgin Patents.

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, I wouldn't have a problem with that if the invention was in the timing and software is just a convenient way of achieving good timing. However, the EPO doesn't require the invention to be on the physical side. That's where the mayhem begins (apart from problems like
- it being very hard to search for prior art (ever read a software patent? It is my job to read patents, and the language is tough. The language of software patents borders on the crazy), much of the knowledge isn't described, you just see things on screen and that's sufficient description for the user to work with, but isn't necessarily in manuals (which aren't part of what is searched anyway)
- the hard part about most software is not the ideas, it is the #%@!% coding to implement something that takes the time. Biotechnologists have the same problem, and they have to deposit DNA, micro-organisms or whatever to meet the requirements of sufficient disclosure. Patents on software don't have this requirement.
etc.)

More petitions..

[Bert64]

There are a number of other petitions on the same site that might be of interest to slashdotters:

http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/OpenDocument/ - petition for opendocument to be used by the british government.

http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/teach-oss - petition for teaching in schools to be vendor neutral, instead of promoting microsoft products

Re:More petitions..

[Anonymous Coward]

It's retarded running a petition to teach non MS stuffs. The IT courses are taught to raise an effective workforce, 90% of the workforce uses Word or such. School level IT is not Comp Sci, it's work and society related.

Re:More petitions..

[Anonymous Coward]

If TB can brush off the complaints of 1.8 million motorists I don't think he will be overly concerned with placating a few hundred OSS advocates do you?

Re:More petitions..

[Bert64]

Well, when i was in school they taught WordPerfect, because that's what the workforce used.
Once i actually grew up and got a job, WordPerfect was nowhere to be seen and everyone was using word.
When the current generation of schoolkids start work, who knows what they will be using?
That's why it's important to teach kids in a vendor neutral function oriented way (that is, teach them how to use a word processor (and other apps) in general, what the common options are and what they do, and how to find them on different programs instead of making them dependant on the exact layout in a single program)...
and refer to spreadsheets as spreadsheets instead of "excel spreadsheets"

Re:More petitions..

[dave420]

Surely schools should teach what kids are most likely to use? Coming out of school knowing all there is to know about Open Office, then being put in front of your first work computer and it's running Microsoft Office, you'd be fucked. Schools shouldn't be about ideology, but preparation. I'd applaud any second school teaching Philosophy instead of home economics, as it's clear which one is the most help to man-kind, but any kid coming out of secondary school unable to boil an egg or make beans-on-toast will be screwed.

Re:More petitions..

[VJ42]

Another you might find interesting: http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/Open-IT-projects/

"We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to require that all publicly funded software projects publish source code under a Free licence."

I've signed it. :-)

Re:More petitions..

[Ash-Fox]

Coming out of school knowing all there is to know about Open Office, then being put in front of your first work computer and it's running Microsoft Office, you'd be fucked.

I can pretty much apply everything I was taught in highschool for Microsoft Office to OpenOffice and vice versa. I don't really agree that you're "fucked". They teach you so little that it applies pretty much to both software suites.

Schools shouldn't be about ideology, but preparation.

No, that sounds more like university to me, high schools seem to be focused on teaching you a lot of irrelevant rubbish. They teach more theory than practical usage (even in computers, you learn about things like binary, rather than how to use a computer effectively).

Re:More petitions..

[BigBadG]

Unfortunately there seems to be a bit of a pattern emerging with the e-petitions site which seems to run much like this -

1. Start petition,
2. Collect signatures,
3. Tony Blair replies to all signatories explaining why they're wrong,
4. Nobody profits.

Re:More petitions..

[dave420]

OO and MS office are interchangeable for the most part. Just don't think Excel is the same as Calc. There really are some differences that make a massive difference. If I learned OpenOffice at school, I wouldn't have learned about Excel's massive function library, and how to use it properly. And now that Office is in its '07 phase and has left OpenOffice behind in the UI front, they're growing more and more apart than together.

I'm really not trying to troll here - I really don't see why kids should be at the short-end of trying to right perceived wrongs that have nothing to do with them. Teaching kids what they "should" know, as opposed to what they need to know is retarded.

Re:More petitions..

[dave420]

hahaha! I'm a web developer. I still have to use office tools, as I work in a fucking OFFICE. I'm not a shill - I have tried to use OO in lieu of MS Office, and each time I try, I've had to stop very quickly. It is fine for opening documents and printing them (but then so is the free Word document viewer), but as soon as you try to save something, it'll fuck up for everyone else. Not to mention the whole Calc debacle. Learning generic tools of the trade, as office suites are, is essential. They're not just for secretaries and assistants. I'm sorry that doesn't fit your "Microsoft = bad" ideology.

Re:More petitions..

[Ash-Fox]

If I learned OpenOffice at school, I wouldn't have learned about Excel's massive function library, and how to use it properly. And now that Office is in its '07 phase and has left OpenOffice behind in the UI front, they're growing more and more apart than together.

We pretty much only learned about spreadsheet formulas where I was, and that is very interchangeable between Excel and OO.o.

As for differences, I don't really see the ribbon as such a major design change, although I do find it annoying that Microsoft decided to use a non-standard UI control.

I really don't see why kids should be at the short-end of trying to right perceived wrongs that have nothing to do with them. Teaching kids what they "should" know, as opposed to what they need to know is retarded.

I think children should be taught to learn and use any software they're confronted with rather than learn a specific suite of software. There are those who learned word perfect, but when they got out of school, companies were using Microsoft office.

Re:More petitions..

[CastrTroy]

But I and everybody else in my school learned WP 5.1, with some Dos based spreadsheet (ms works I think). Does this mean that my entire high school put out a bunch of people who couldn't operate MS Office? I don't think so. My school taught us the basic skills, and these are applicable to any word processor. People who learn how to use a tool, rather than follow a set of commands are able to adapt to different types of software. If they didn't teach you to use Pascal in your CompSCI degree, and then your boss comes up to you, and asks you to work on some pascal project, are you unable to cope? No, because hopefully you learned how to program, and the language is secondary. You could probably figure out the syntax and relevant libraries in about a week. I don't know anybody who has trouble using MS Word, just because they learned on some other word processor. They might be a little slow the first week on the job, but if they are smart people they know how to figure it out.

Re:More petitions..

[i.r.id10t]

No they should teach the basic cross application (and version) skills, not a specific application/version. That way, when bold moves from "formatting" to "font" or something, they can still make something bold.

Re:More petitions..

[foolfodder]

I just noticed on the petitions site that the government recently responded to a petition titled "We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to recognise Jedi Knights as a religion on par with Christianity, Islam and other beliefs."

Response is here: http://www.number-10.gov.uk/output/Page11053.asp

Re:More petitions..

[Anonymous Coward]

I've been happily interchanging both a Word document and an Excel spreadsheet (A Business Plan) between three people. Two of us who use OpenOffice.org and one Microsoft Office user. The only problem we've had is when the document accidently became protected. That was done by the Microsoft Office user.

Arn't personal anecdotes wonderful?

As for teaching kids to use Microsoft Office, it's not what schools are there to do, and they're not doing it anyway. Schools are teaching basic skills: how to add up a column of numbers in a spreadsheet, or layout a page correctly with basic formating. They're not teaching l33t h4rdc0re E><c3l h4x0r!ng.

Re:More petitions..

[dave420]

Obviously your spreadsheet needs are different from mine.

Calc's functions are poor in comparison to Excel, for regular users and those leet hackers you talk of. Teaching kids how to use spreadsheets with Calc over Excel will at best offer no benefits, and at worse leave the kids somehow incapable of using the de facto standard.

Re:More petitions..

[dave420]

Of course it didn't render you a computer-illiterate idiot. It just introduced a learning curve without the help of a teacher on hand to give you pointers. It took up your working time, when you could have been working. It would be a shallow victory for OO if it was in schools instead of MS Office.

Re:More petitions..

[Anonymous Coward]

I never even mentioned Calc. My whole point is that schools are there to teach generic skills, not just "the de facto standard" and the level that schools are teaching is way below the point that any differences between different products show up anyway. There are no pivot tables and VBA in a school class on spreadsheets.

Re:More petitions..

[juhaz]

As for differences, I don't really see the ribbon as such a major design change, although I do find it annoying that Microsoft decided to use a non-standard UI control.

Microsoft has used non-standard UI controls in Office (and Visual Studio) pretty much forever. They're their testbeds for them.

Uppity Brits!

[Bullfish]

First reducing forces in Iraq, now this! What the hell is going on? Backstabbing limeys! You'd think they have their own country with their own laws and culture. Put them on the piracy watch list!

Re:Uppity Brits!

[rubycodez]

not to worry, their lead in adopting technology to invade privacy and spy on their citizenry will soon allow those people to be brought to heel

Dont expect too much of the petition system.

[apodyopsis]

Dont expect too much of the petition system.

There was a very well publicised petition on the new proposed road charging system that got 1.7million supporting votes cast, it had little noticible effect on the goverment. Infact all it caused was alot of publicity and condemnation in the Labour ranks that some 'prat' (direct quote) had created this tool that could be used to bash them.

To put it in perspective the whole population in the UK is 60million in total, so 1.7million is ALOT of the driving adults.

see

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/6354735.stm

I think Labour saw it as a exercise in good relations and checking the boxes. Certainly there is no sign of them doing anything about the petitions that people actually support.

Re:Dont expect too much of the petition system.

[aitio]

I'm not commenting on the afore mentioned petition, but in general they are a poor way of getting changes done. Especially it is about a very technical or otherwise difficult subject. One can never be sure how well the petitioners understand the subject in question.

I seldom favor decision making by popular vote. Decisions should be made by those who have the understanding about not just the immediate effects but secondary and tertiary also. Hence the representative democracy and specialization withing the parlamentary system.

The problem arises when the size of the governed entity grows too large and only the truly wealthy can afford, or have the possivility for a professional representation in influencing the decision making. For example, there are only few qualified experts in the whole of EU to guide the processes of chemical legislation and they all work for the industry. Or how the WIPO treaty was mostly drafted by the owners of intellectual property - the foundations of a monopoly created by the monopolist!

Re:Dont expect too much of the petition system.

[jez9999]

it had little noticible effect on the goverment.

Au contraire; we now have some more ammunition with which to slaughter them at the next election.

Re:Dont expect too much of the petition system.

[Anonymous Coward]

So far, I've had responses from Number 10 to about four of the petitions I've signed at the site. All the responses can be summarised as "We understand your concerns, we're not going to change our policy, you are quite clearly wrong in your views."

Masters of Understatement

[hey!]

You and a friend are driving along a scenic dirt road, when all of a sudden the shoulder gives way, and you are tumbling over and over, until you are on the edge of a precipice, roaring white water gapes below.

Your friend is shaking with terror. "We're going to die!" he says.

"Well, then," you say, putting on the parking brake,"I don't think we should go any farther in that direction."

----

Almost every practicioner I know thinks that software practices are a nuisance and a hindrance. Certainly they are useful in startups when you are considering your exit strategy options, but I have personally never seen a technology that was developed because it would be sold as IP, that would not have been developed otherwise.

Overall, the best word I can think of to describe software and business method patents is "fiasco".

The government response made me think, with affection, of ironic humor of the late, great Douglas Adams. He loved characters to say sensible sounding, politic things that were nonetheless patently insane. Adams humor was not surrealistic, it was hyperrealistic. One thing he comes back to again and again: if anything is really large, really important, and really obvious, people will find a way to ignore it completely.

What about ...

[Mathness]

What about software patents that are not pure. Say, if you add this* to the code and patent?

* Probably not work safe.

Note that software is defined as...

[gedhrel]

... a "nontechnical field", which is the basis for its exemption.

Once again my government shows itself to be in touch with the IT world :-(

Re:Note that software is defined as...

[LingNoi]

No it is not. Read the damn thing.

Under this test, the true nature of the advance being claimed in a patent application must be determined, and if this advance lies solely in the field of software, or another non-technical field such as methods of doing business, the patent will not be granted.

You see that "or"?

Re:Note that software is defined as...

[gedhrel]

you mean the one right next to "another"?

Re:Note that software is defined as...

[LingNoi]

... I'm an idiot ...

What isn't clear here?

[LingNoi]

"The Government remains committed to its policy that no patents should exist for inventions which make advances lying solely in the field of software."

That seems pretty clear to me. Why is everyone moaning about this being vague?

"Although certain jurisdictions, such as the US, allow more liberal patenting of software-based inventions, these patents cannot be enforced in the UK."

If anyone was thinking about starting a GNU/GPL project on something patented then find someone British to be your front man. Open Source patents problem solved.... for now.

Someone loaded the question back-to-front

[itsdapead]

From TFA:

Software patents are used by convicted monopolists to threaten customers who consider using rival software.

Who wrote this? Kudos for starting the petition, but folks! Its hard enough to get a relevant response out of a politician at the best of times, without asking them if they have stopped beating their wives.

No political advisor worth their salt is going to let their charge tacitly support that unneccesary little swipe at... who could it be?... tacked on to a not-directly-related issue. Any slim chance of getting a politician to respond directly to the issues raised (instead of the sort of bland re-statement of policy seen here) goes straight out of the window.

The patent issue is a lot wider and deeper than our favorite convicted monopolists... who risk Mutually Assured Destruction by last-century's favorite convicted monopolist (and others) if they finally stop the FUD bombardment and launch their missiles at Linux. Darn, that's another metaphor not to try on a politician at the moment :-)

Re:Someone loaded the question back-to-front

[jez9999]

Nonsense. That sentence is perfectly reasonable; it doesn't state that every software patent is used in that regard, just that some (many) are - which is perfectly true. Frankly, I don't acknowledge a single legitimate use for software patents. Every last one reduces freedom to innovate, because software is low-cost enough to develop that plenty of innovation happens without them. Statements strongly critical of the whole idea are just fine in my book. Politicians should definitely associate themselves with this 'swipe'.

Re:Someone loaded the question back-to-front

[itsdapead]

Nonsense. That sentence is perfectly reasonable; it doesn't state that every software patent is used in that regard,

Not the point - it unnecessarily convolutes the software patent argument with the allegation that you-know-who is continuing to abuse their monopoly. However much the /. community might agree with that allegation it is still a sensitive issue that a politician would have to keep at arms length. As you say, there are plenty of other good arguments against SW patents.

Useless?

[Anonymous Coward]

If all the governments went the same way would it still be useless? If they all decided software patents were stupid they would never get implemented so having *any* opposition is not useless and may, in fact, be very useful.

You also seem to forget that with the many layers of EU BS every decision ends up going through some elected officials. How do you think the last pure software patents proposal got shot down?

I'm curious...

[Beached]

I know this may not be popular but...
Are software patents really the problem or is the process that grants lousy patents the problem. It seems like that if you are against software patents you must be against patents in order for it to make sense and I understand that. However, if you are not against patents in general, why are software patents any different from mechanical ones.

Now, the process that have been granting stupid patents (One click anyone) is broken. But how is One click even in the same league as say RSA was way back.

Re:I'm curious...

[jZnat]

You can't patent math equations. All software is just a huge math equation. Therefore, software should not be patentable.

Re:I'm curious...

[muuh-gnu]

Or you should ask yourself if anything like 1-Click (or anything else in the software world for which a patent was granted) was _SO UNBELIEVABLY GENIUS_ that really nobody else would come up with it in the next 20 years, as long as it would be "protected"?

The US are actually the best example that software patents are superfluous. If they werent, the number of software innovations coming out of the US would outnumber the rest of the world by hundreds or thousands each year. And all of these would happen to be patented innovations, since even in the US nobody would innovate without the possibility to patent it. So do you actually remember when you last time used an application a part of which was innovated only because it could be patented later and wouldnt exist without the patent system? And.... do you remember when you last used a innovative application where there were no patents to back it up?

Re:I'm curious...

[geekoid]

"_SO UNBELIEVABLY GENIUS_ that really nobody else would come up with it in the next 20 years, as long as it would be "protected"?"

that has nothing to do with it, and it shouldn't.

Re:I'm curious...

[geekoid]

"It seems like that if you are against software patents you must be against patents in order for it to make sense and I understand that"

incorrect.

A) You and I can write software that does the same thing, but looks completly different.

B) Do to the very nature of software, PAtenting it will stiffle innovation.

C) It's just math, and you can't patent that.

It's like patenting a plot to a book, or patenting a sentence structure.

Copyright is the protection for software, not patent.

Re:I'm curious...

[Wolfbone]

"It seems like that if you are against software patents you must be against patents in order for it to make sense..."

It may seem like that but only if you have little if any knowledge of the patent system - its history, economics and law - and an extremely distorted view of what the opposition to software patents is all about.

http://eupat.ffii.org/vreji/cusku/index.en.html#iu ris http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWHC/Patents/2005/1 589.html http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id =959931 http://www.firstmonday.org/issues/issue8_3/kahin/i ndex.html#k7 http://www.researchineurope.org/policy/patentdirlt r.htm

It is also important to realise that the Patent Offices are not and never can be the arbiters of what constitute the great inventions of the day. The patent system is not some prize-giving system, only granting patents to the truly worthy inventors, and in order to be fair and objective, the P.Os can only - at best - reject the truly meritless or clearly unpatentable applications. It may be possible to raise the "inventive step" a little and improve patent quality a little but only in hindsight and in the subjective opinion of some is the 1-click patent a "stupid" patent. In fact a case can easily be made that it was more desirable from the point of view of the economic rationale of the patent system to grant the 1-click patent than it was to grant the RSA patent. The salient point though is that it was neither necessary nor efficient to grant either patent in order that society, the economy and the progress of the sciences and useful arts would benefit from those inventions.

I got a copy via e-mail

[Random BedHead Ed]

I got a copy of this via e-mail this morning. I must say, it was nice to hear back from Number 10. I know they've had problems with the online petitions and I had worried that a potentially useful system like this might be abused, and/or ignored by Blair - particularly since some of the online petitions asked for silly (but funny) things like having the prime minister make the petitioner a cup of tea (that one was rejected because it was 'outside the remit or powers of the Prime Minister and Government', but not before it gathered a lot of signatures). Getting an e-mail acknowledging the patent issue and explaining Labour's policy was reassuring. From a democratic standpoint, and because it shows corruption of the patent process in Europe hasn't hit to the depths of the US.

Re:I got a copy via e-mail

[Anonymous Coward]

Silly things like an end to sky-high road tax or mandatory ID cards were ignored completely. Im guessing they will only answer the ones they can weasel out of ("pure" software???).

Agree

[cortana]

I am very much opposed to the patenting of software, business methods, mathematics and so on, but I could not bring myself to sign this petition. It sounds like it was created by a 13 year old Slashdot user!

Re:Agree

[x2A]

"Please sign your name here to state that you do not understand the issue" I think is how most of those petitions go. "Here is a flawed and heavily one-sided argument, please sign your name to it, and get hundreds of others to do so too, so prove how clueless the public really are and shouldn't be listened to"... this is truely a win for democracy.

"The best argument against democracy is a five-minute conversation with the average voter."
    -- Winston Churchill

Some things never change.

Burn

[Anonymous Coward]

That's a painful example of someone on Slashdot actually knowing about law. Good work.

Merely obstructive

[2901]

There is a problem of traffic congestion. Call it market failure because the price you pay in taxes is the same whether you drive in busy places at peak times and get in each others way or not. Some kind of road pricing might help. Or the politicians could knock down houses to widen roads. Or they could limit the total number of cars allowed in Britain. When the limit is reached, join the queue or buy second hand.

Given that there is a real problem how do you expect politicians to respond to the rejection of what they have already guessed is the least bad option. Shrug and sigh? Pick a worse option? Fail to act?

Signing a petition against software patents was much more promising. We already have copyright for software. There is not really a problem for software patents to solve, so asking politicians to reject them is worth the effort.

Re:Merely obstructive

[James McGuigan]

Beyond the additional taxation (they may reduce some other taxes, but like most things it will be an overall tax increase), the scary part is that such a scheme would require a GPS tracker in each car linked to a national database. The UK already has more CCTV cameras per person than any other country in the world, and its only a matter of time before this system will start being used to track people beyond simple road taxation, first speeding tickets and parking fines, and its only a matter of time before the police start getting to use in for their investigations to see where you have been and who you have been associating with.

I for one welcome our Big Brother overlords.

Re:Merely obstructive

[2901]

If the petition had asked the prime minister to confine himself to city centre entry tolls with limited geographical scope, and to forget about GPS, the petition would have exerted much more political pressure. Voters in big cities who are sick of being stuck in traffic jams and want something done could have got behind the petition with enthusiasm because it would be saying "Don't waste public money on ambitious hi-tech, use that money on something small and practical".

Another better petition would have said "We ask the prime minister to realise that the hitech scheme will be very expensive and he would reduce traffic congestion for half the price by subsidising public transport".

You cannot oppose bad solutions to real problems just by saying "No" because you are not reaching out to those who want something done.

There are things even Microsoft can't afford.

[tepples]

Microsoft can't afford Those three words do not sit well next to eachother. How about "At this time, Microsoft cannot afford to acquire 20th Century Fox Films, Paramount Pictures, Universal City Studios, or Warner Bros. Pictures, to more effectively compete with Sony's Columbia Pictures and Steve Jobs' Walt Disney Pictures"?

except that

[alext]

Fine, but where we are now is that if the influence of the EU wanes we will be even further under the control of the British Patent Office.

Remember that it was the UK PO who were the prime movers in the attempt to railroad the EU parliament into accepting the most egregious form software patent legislation. Resisting this is probably among the most useful things Europarl has ever done.

Software is *not* "a huge math equation"

[Randym]

You can't patent math equations. All software is just a huge math equation. Therefore, software should not be patentable.

I beg to differ with the poster:

I=I+1

Software. Uses math symbology. This statement is *not* an equation. Therefore: "All software is just a huge math equation." is a false statement. Therefore, the conclusion: "software should not be patentable" is also incorrect, as it is based on a false assumption.