France To Launch a National Patent Troll

zoobab writes "France is creating a state sponsored patent fund, FranceBrevets, which primary focus will be to sponsor, acquire and license patents in the ICT (read software patents) sector. The patent fund is at the initiative of the minister of Research, Valérie Pécresse, the Ministry of Industry, Energy and digital economy, Eric Besson. The primary target of the fund is to collect licenses on those patents, which is already seen in France as the biggest patent troll of the country. France is also supporting the European Unitary Patent, which is seen by many at the final attempt to validate software patents in Europe."

Comments

Godwin

[Hazel Bergeron]

You remember the Third Reich? Get rid of the racism and the sense of urgency, and you basically have the EU in a couple of decades. If I think of the number of freedoms I've lost both this and that side of the Pond since 1995, I wonder whether it's immoral to carry on being productive.

Re:Godwin

[FatdogHaiku]

Mr. Galt, is that you? I'm not a big "Randophile" but sometimes current events remind me of Atlas Shrugged.

Re:Godwin

[MysteriousPreacher]

I think you meant to post this comment over at www.dailymail.co.uk. They probably have some tips for recognizing Doodlebugs. Hint - listen for a buzzing noise.

Re:Godwin

[MysteriousPreacher]

Whoosh!

Re:Godwin

[Anonymous Coward]

So, you're willing to give up other people's freedoms for $152.80 a month? Thanks asshole, you're part of the problem.

Re:Godwin

[king neckbeard]

There's a certain point where sacrificing freedoms, privacy, and such is no longer worth the benefits sacrificing them makes. Worse yet, these huge losses of freedoms don't seem to work well in practice today. The PATRIOT Act hasn't made Americans safer to any real degree, and the staggering amounts of CCTV haven't been effective in stopping crime in the UK.

Re:Godwin

[ThunderBird89]

So, you're saying, you want people to do illegal things.

Umm, how does what I said lead to people doing illegal things? If anything, a more visible police force and the knowledge that their crimes will be recorded and detected, their moves can be traced to bring them to justice will serve as a deterrent to crime. 1984-ish it may be, but it would at least make for a more peaceful society.
As for crying the moment someone inflicts harm on me, the moment my life is threatened, under Hungarian law, I am allowed to use proportionate force to defend myself, even disproportionate retribution is justifiable by "understandable fright" (whatever that means is up to the judge to decide, though). This even applies if I'm protecting someone else. So no, I wouldn't cry. If at all possible, the assailant would (barring serious disadvantages, for example unilateral possession of a firearm).

On the other hand, I agree with the second half of your comment. Multiple cultures almost inevitably lead to tension, which may or may not be resolved through intercultural dialogue. However, in order for this to happen, both sides must be willing to negotiate and understand the other, which is not always the case (see Angela Merkel's statement about the multicultural society failing in Germany).

Re:Godwin

[pyrosine]

Excluding the booming economy and ensuing economical stability

Re:Godwin

[ThunderBird89]

Other people's? Sure thing, why not. They're not me, and to be honest, I agree with the "If you've done nothing wrong, you've got nothing to hide"-philosophy, to a certain degree. Although if they started wiretapping my cell without a crime being committed, or opening my mail, I'd probably be outraged too. Otherwise, I don't really care about being monitored by CCTV, since I'm not really paranoid about the government being after me.

And before you (or anyone else) start reciting the quote "First the came for the communists...", don't waste your bit-breath: I don't expect anyone to speak out for me anyway, and never really did.

Re:Godwin

[Anonymous Coward]

Hah, I thought I might be the only one..
I remember reading Atlas Shrugged back in the '70s, thought it was right-wing crap (can I add, the next thing I read was the Illuminatus! trilogy)
Re-read it in the early '80s, still thought it was right-wing crap.
Re-read it in the '90s (mostly to give me a set of references to take the piss out of a Randiot I had the misfortune to deal with at the time), it worried me that some of it was starting to make sense. Still regarded is as mostly right-wing crap, but with valid points.

Re-read it a couple of times in the early '00s. Unfortunately, some parts of it almost exactly described my then current situation apropos my employer and my contributions to the 'system'. I'd hate to admit this, but it was a bit of a factor in me getting out of the field of employment I was engaged in.

The more I do look at the world, the more I think she was right, but with the wrong 'enemy' - she had an obvious bee in her bonnet regarding 'commies' which made her a bit blinkered.

Like the characters in the book, I'm currently employed doing something which (just) pays the bills, but it's not in my 'specialist' area of employment - that which I used to get paid silly money for doing (but which others were getting even sillier money for 'exploiting') which is now my 'hobby'. This wasn't a conscious decision, it was a couple of years later that I actually made the connection with the book.

(and no, I've not yet in the 30 odd years I've owned a copy of the book managed to get through Galt's diatribe...it's like all the damn songs in the LOTR trilogy, I promise myself the next time I'll really read through it, but t'other part of the brain which knows better always wins and I skip it/them - and I still maintain Atlas Shrugged is mostly right-wing crap.)

Re:Godwin

[Man On Pink Corner]

You're doing illegal things yourself, dumbass. Most likely before you got out of bed this morning. So did I, and everybody who's reading this thread.

Seriously. Depending on where you live, do you have any idea just how many local, state or province, and Federal or EU laws you're subject to?

Re:Godwin

[phantomfive]

You're confusing things the Nazis did with things people complain about today. The Nazis didn't have cameras on the street, or RFID tags on their ID, and arguably didn't have an effective police force. Having an effective police force is a completely different problem.

Things the Nazis did do: kill their political opponents, destroy their democratic system, try to conquer the world. These are (besides the racism and genocide) the reasons we don't like the Nazis. This is why Godwin's law exists: because comparing RFID tags in your ID to Nazism, or saying you wouldn't mind Nazi rule, just makes you look dumb.

Re:Godwin

[ThunderBird89]

To play the Devil's Advocate again, the PATRIOT act made no real difference due to there being no further real attempts, just some half-assed pokes (Shoe Bomber, Underwear Bomber) to keep the US frightened. It's possible that in case of a real, well-prepared attack, the Act would have had an opportunity to shine, but let's hope we never find that out.

As for British CCTV, it might just be a matter of implementation, though to be honest, I don't know about the system, so I can't judge it either.

Re:Godwin

[cheekyjohnson]

I'd much rather risk a "terrorist" attack than give up any of my privacy or freedoms. Besides, spying on random people suspected of being terrorists is hardly a good method of apprehending so-called terrorists.

Re:Godwin

[turbidostato]

"So, you're saying, you want people to do illegal things"

No, he isn't saying this. I may add that a police state, History shows, only make sense for the one controlling the police, not the citizens.

And then again, if you want surveillance to track criminals after the fact you should think twice about it: by your (probable) argument, death penalty should be the biggest deterrent to criminality (since it's about the worst thing you can do to the criminal after the fact, which is the vector expolited by tracking too) but still criminal rates are higher in USA, where most states hold death penalty, than in Europe where there's no such a thing.

"As long you have a homogeneous group there is no problem. Once you have multiple groups interacting ("multicultural environment"), you get problems."

Quite true. The question is if it's a better weapon against those problems police or education.

Re:Godwin

[ThunderBird89]

No. I was not comparing the Nazis, I was comparing the whole Reich, economy and all. Politically, the EU is very stable, democratic, so we don't need to examine what would happen if a multiparty coalition decided to remove their opponents, as it won't happen anyway. Even if it did, it would just recreate the problem all over again, due to the mass of freed-up voters being available for the coalition parties to grab, causing it to fracture.
This article is more concerned with economy and sociology: patent suits giving companies trouble (economy), and the pervasive surveillance/spy network of the Nazi party (sociology). I've given my views on both.

The biggest reason beside racism and the Holocaust for not liking the Nazis is that the US/SU alliance won the war, and the western, more developed half of Europe was under US influence. The US is a democratic nation, whose population had every opportunity to command a withdrawal from the war through their elected President or Congress. Why did the US remain in the war 'till the bitter end? Because the propaganda-machine painted the Nazis as horrendous monsters, even the simple soldier who was just following orders (and be honest with yourself, given the order to murder a Jewish woman in cold blood, would you refuse, knowing that court martial and possible execution or at the very least, brig-time awaits?). THIS is why there's Godwin's Law, and this is why Hitler == EVIL.
P.S.: If we're talking about Hitler, for an interesting "explanation" of why he turned out the way he did, read The Primal Solution by Eric Norden!

Re:Godwin

[hoggoth]

That will be great until some scumbag a few rungs up the ladder from you decides he's going to fuck your wife and if you both don't like it he will make your lives a living hell with all the "subversive" things he has on you. You aren't actually subversive at all, but with tens of thousands of items of information about you he will find some angle to paint you as a problem that needs correcting.

Good luck trading freedom for the illusion of security.

Re:Godwin

[the linux geek]

You don't think the EU has serious racism? Look at how well the anti-(Roma,Arab,Turk,Slovak,Russian) parties do in elections. I'm conservative, but the increasing influence of the far right on European politics is a little alarming.

Re:Godwin

[phantomfive]

Here's the other reason for Godwin's law: if you can't possibly think of another historical example that demonstrates your point besides the Third Reich, you don't know enough about history or politics to be worth listening to. And look at your points:

Politically, the EU is very stable, democratic,

No, it's really not. There's a huge dividing rift between the richer and poorer countries. Furthermore, the weakness of its democratic structures (too many powerful people are appointed, not elected) makes it vulnerable to corruption.

The biggest reason beside racism and the Holocaust for not liking the Nazis is that the US/SU alliance won the war

The Nazis didn't treat the countries they conquered well at all. They would have been remembered poorly even if the US had stayed out of it, as happens to oppressive conquerors.

Why did the US remain in the war 'till the bitter end?

Uh, because we wanted to win? What, did you expect us to turn around right after the D-day victories and say, "well that was a waste of time?" Staying in the war to the bitter end was really a more normal thing to do......

and this is why Hitler == EVIL.

Hitler was evil because he was an ambitious, vengeful man, who spread the poisons of hate and anger through Germany until it became a deadly infection.

Unless you can put your ideas into other terms, you truly are not worth listening to.

Re:Godwin

[phantomfive]

Ayn Rand's philosophy is so annoying because it is partly correct, partly idiotic......on the one hand, yes, it's a good idea to take care of yourself and not be a 'leech' on society.......on the other hand, she was so opposed to charity to a ridiculous degree. Really, sometimes people are down, and you don't have to kick them. It won't destroy society if you help them out a bit.

Re:Godwin

[king neckbeard]

I seem to recall reading that we are actually LESS prepared for a real attack. Basically, we've been wiretapping everyone all the time, we don't have the resources to filter through what's important, the signal to noise ratio has gone to hell, and now we're getting less useful information.

Re:Godwin

[ThunderBird89]

I think making the cockpit doors lock in-flight, and having pilots carry sidearms (though are they trained in their use? Probably, but I'm not sure...) makes for rather good defense against most of the damage, even if it's not from the PATRIOT Act. That, and the checkpoints make for too much hassle to blow up a plane, but have shifted the prime target down to the ground, to the checkpoints themselves, where a lot of people queue up.

The SNR could probably be fixed if the "Enhanced Intelligence" really meant enhanced intelligence instead of springing to keywords, disregarding the context. I mean really, how much danger does a 13-year-old kid pose, who's not even making a threat, just posting some thoughts I wouldn't expect from a 13-year-old?

Re:Godwin

[king neckbeard]

I'm not saying there haven't been improvements, but police states generally police hard, not smart (if they did, they'd just be states). IIRC, Israel has far more effective airport security and requires less work than pre-9/11 American airports. They've got it down to a well oiled machine, while the US has pretty much just tried brute force.

Re:Godwin

[Runaway1956]

Those who would give up essential freedoms in exchange for security, deserve neither.

It's only a near-quote, but you get the idea.

Re:Godwin

[Runaway1956]

Implementation, the man says.

Hey, have you noticed that men are never perfect? (Don't get me started on women!) And, lacking perfection, men are corruptible. So - it doesn't matter much how you implement some whacko dystopian surveillance system - it's gonna suck.

Oh, it might make timid old ladies feel good, and collectivists who wouldn't have a mind unless they had freinds around to tell them what to think. But, there are still millions of us individualists who hate you bastards that want to tell us how to act, how to talk, how to think, how to learn.

Surveiliance is the most sought after tool of tyrants. Even if it happens to be the tyranny of the majority.

Re:Godwin

[WidgetGuy]

Those who would give up essential freedoms in exchange for security, deserve neither.

It's only a near-quote, but you get the idea.

And don't for get attribution: Thomas Jefferson.

Re:Godwin

[Anonymous Coward]

Let's not forget that ultimately she availed herself of that same welfare she preached against under an alias.

Re:Godwin

[Anonymous Coward]

So, you are saying "talk the talk and walk the walk" is bunk? Sorry. If people want to tell me how to live MY life, then they need to put their money where their mouth is and show me first. Otherwise it is pretty obvious that they are trying to misdirect people into doing something not in their best interest.

Re:Godwin

[Keen Anthony]

So you're saying, aside from the genocide, the only reason the Nazis were bad was because the Allies won the war; thus, they won the right to tell the history of the war and the history of the Nazis?

The U.S. remained in the war because the U.S.'s war with Germany was a consequence of its war with Japan. You're incorrect about the propaganda machine's depiction of Nazis as monsters. The Nazis were depicted as we depict Star Wars' stormtroopers, yes -- as formidable, highly organized, threatening foes, but not as monsters. The U.S. and U.K. press didn't discuss genocide. In fact, most American soldiers fighting the war had no idea about the genocide of Jews until near the end of the European campaign. Much of the American press seemed to bury the stories as rumors. There's even been some accusations that American finance companies like Citicorp had deliberately worked to bury stories of Nazi atrocities.

In reality, the Nazis got a pretty fair shake for a number of years after the war.

Re:Godwin

[captain_sweatpants]

uh...I'm sorry that you lack an understanding of hypocrisy

Re:Godwin

[captain_sweatpants]

My point (using your rather crass language) was that logical validity has little to do with right or wrong. Pointing out that someone is a hypocrite on the subject at hand is a valid reason to doubt their arguments (premises.) Hypocrites are the worst kinds of people. In this case it was probably due to a gross oversimplification (something very common in US political and economic discussions in my experience) but often it's because the person is a charlatan or a thief.

Re:Godwin

[styrotech]

Why did the US remain in the war 'till the bitter end?

Presumably (with some urging from Churchill) to prevent the Soviets from carrying on across the rest of Europe, which would probably give the Allies an even bigger threat to face in the future.

The Soviets would then have all Europes resources, industry and Nazi scientists. Stalin was huge supporter of equal rights when it came to sending people off to the gulag. And the Soviets had a preexisting ideological reason to pick a fight with the US/UK that Hitler never had.

Re:Godwin

[KingAlanI]

Yeah, I've sometimes suspected that horrid Nazi regime aspects such as the virulent anti-Semitism make Hitler's better ideas look bad via guilt-by-association

Re:Godwin

[ozmanjusri]

Multiple cultures almost inevitably lead to tension

You mean the multiculturalism in failed states like Australia, New Zealand, Singapore, etc?

Re:Godwin

[Koim-Do]

Well, the Israeli method relies on principles that are impossible or illegal to implement in the US:

1. Racial profiling (non-jews and especially arabs are singled for more thorough examination). This is considered perfectly normal in Israel, but is not legal in US or EU.
2. Way lower volume of traffic: had you implanted the israeli security officers in any large airport, you will get unacceptable delays. scale matters.

Re:Godwin

[ThunderBird89]

There's only a single point in your post that can be reasonably refuted (the rest is a covert ad hominem attack):

Even if it happens to be the tyranny of the majority.

Here in Europe, we call that democracy.

Re:Godwin

[ThunderBird89]

Um, do you know what a failed state is? It's when a state does not have monopoly over the use of force within its borders. Think Somalia, Niger, Mexico is fast approaching with the Drug Wars in the area; according to a broader definition (mostly supported by the US Foreign Office and Fund For Peace), even North Korea and Iran, which have pretty firm grasps on their monopoly of violence...
This latter definition, however, does not reflect the traditional International Relations one, which is strictly the loss of monopoly on violence within its borders. According to this, there are comparatively few failed states. According to the broader one, well, see here. Soooo, what, now Russia is in Warning, almost the whole EU is Moderate, along with the US, and there are a grand total of 14 Sustainable states (including three microstates, the Papal State, and Ireland, which has been making headlines in the EU by having to ask for a bailout package). I think the Fund For Peace has some priorities wrong...

Re:Godwin

[spauldo]

Here in Europe, we call that democracy.

Tyranny of the majority means letting the will of the majority rule even in cases where it causes real harm to the minority. This is usually seen in civil rights situations. Jim Crow type laws tend to pop up in places with a racial imbalance, and similar laws concerning religious practice are seen in places where one religion is dominant.

As an example, lynching was all but legal in the U.S. in some places, and was extensively used in the southern states both before and after the Civil War. The reconstruction-era (late 1800s) Democratic Party at the time was very focused on white supremacy, and since much of the lynching served to keep blacks away from the polls, they resisted any urge to put a stop to it.

Another example is from colonial Massachusetts, where quakers were banned completely and, on a few occasions, executed. That eventually led to Massachusetts losing its charter and having a governor appointed by the crown.

Now, I don't agree that the PATRIOT ACT falls under "tyranny of the majority", but it's obvious that the politicians have taken advantage of the fear generated by 9/11 to pass laws that would otherwise be unpassable. I'm hoping now that the wars are winding down that we'll get some more pressure from the populace to undo some of the damage.

Re:Godwin

[angel'o'sphere]

Would you care to elaborate which singel freedom you lost?

The freedom to settle everywhere in europe?
The freedom to transfer money into every country of europe?
The freedom to own land/houses everywhere in europe?
The freedom to work everywhere in europe?
The freedom to be a private owner (share holder) of a company everywhere in europe?

Comparing the EU with the Third Reich is imho a hugh insult to the survivors of the Third Reich.

Re:Godwin

[Arterion]

You're right, of course. It just makes her a total cunt.

Someone being a total cunt is correlated with whatever that have to say not being worth listening to.

I will concede that Objectivism is wrong in its own right, without needing to look at how big of a hypocrite Ayn Rand actually was.

But seriously, if someone is making an argument from the basis of morality, that they are immoral, by their own code, does make whatever they're preaching suspect. You can argue that anything anyone said should be judged by its own merits, without taking into account the quality of the person saying it, but I disagree this is a case of ad hominem logical fallacy. I mean, if I have a twenty year old rentboy plowing my ass on a vacation while I'm writing a blog about how evil and wrong homosexuality is, then you better believe whatever I have to say isn't worth listening to.

If you read your own link you posted, you'll see ad hominem is only when it "introduces irrelevant personal premisses". That Rand accepted welfare while railing against welfare is very relevant.

It's a bit like the proverbial million monkeys with a million typewriters -- sure, Ayn Rand might wipe her ass and end up with a masterpiece on the tissue, but the odds are so low that I, personally, don't want to start sifting through her refuse, and you can't really call that fallacious logic. If you want to, then more power to you. You may end up a very, very wealthy man for owning the greatest masterpiece of our time.

Re:Godwin

[Linzer]

Politically, the EU is very stable, democratic,

No, it's really not. There's a huge dividing rift between the richer and poorer countries. Furthermore, the weakness of its democratic structures (too many powerful people are appointed, not elected) makes it vulnerable to corruption.

Perhaps the parent meant that individual EU countries are in general stable and democratic.

The biggest reason beside racism and the Holocaust for not liking the Nazis is that the US/SU alliance won the war

The Nazis didn't treat the countries they conquered well at all. They would have been remembered poorly even if the US had stayed out of it, as happens to oppressive conquerors.

True enough, and on the Allies' side, this is largely true of the Soviet Union in the same period. At the end of WWII, the Soviet Union was widely disliked in Central (and parts of Eastern) Europe, but being on the winning side, it still got to bring many of those countries into its sphere of influence. Many residents were *not* happy about that.

Why did the US remain in the war 'till the bitter end?

Uh, because we wanted to win? What, did you expect us to turn around right after the D-day victories and say, "well that was a waste of time?" Staying in the war to the bitter end was really a more normal thing to do......

Unless you can put your ideas into other terms, you truly are not worth listening to.

Er, maybe that last bit was not strictly necessary.

Re:Godwin

[Xest]

Well said, the GP is a fucking idiot blaming Europe for these things, when the problems stem from national governments.

Look at BT's spying on it's customers with Phorm, the British government white-washed it and it had to be the EU that stepped in and told them it wasn't acceptable.

Look at any number of human rights cases where the ECHR has done the right thing where national governments wouldn't.

Look at all the pro-consumer stuff like limiting mobile telco roaming profits which were rediculously high and gross profiteering to the detriment of business and personal users alike.

Sure the British government past and present are too quick to take away our freedoms and too slow to return others, sure Sarkozy is a little Napolean wannabe ruling France like a proper dictator, sure Berlusconi wants to restrict citizens to the nth degree. I agree all these governments are shit.

But the EU/ECHR? No, the EU and ECHR has done more to protect, return, and increase my freedoms than any individual nation state within it has.

The GP is a special kind of 'tard to relate the EU to the Third Reich, an idiot of the highest order no doubt.

Re:Godwin

[ThunderBird89]

Though I'm not a US resident, I too hope the silly "security theater" will drop the curtains soon. Like I've said in so many posts, it just opened up new attack venues for the terrorists to take advantage of, and barely closed the old ones. Now that the al Qaeda is pretty much disorganized after Osama's death, they can really afford easing up a bit. It's not like attacks were frequent enough 2002-2010 to keep all these laws in force, "deterrence-effect" or not...

Re:Godwin

[TheRaven64]

If someone preaches an ideal and then can't life up to that ideal, then it's a good idea to reevaluate that ideal. In the case of Rand, we're talking about a philosophy that she and her followers want to base an entire society around, yet which even it's founder can't manage to actually live up to. If someone says you can live entirely on water, and you find that they're sneaking regular meals while no one is watching, then it should give you pause for thought.

Re:Godwin

[TheRaven64]

Furthermore, the weakness of its democratic structures (too many powerful people are appointed, not elected) makes it vulnerable to corruption

Since we're already Godwin'd, I'd like to point out that it was the fact that powerful people were elected that made Germany so vulnerable to corruption. This is one of the big problems that I see with a lot of countries now: democracy has become a goal in its own right, rather than a tool for protecting freedom.

Re:Godwin

[KDR_11k]

Happiness is also a reward, after all people spend a lot of money on things to make them happy, if giving money to someone makes them happy that's a worthwhile investment.

Re:Godwin

[KDR_11k]

The problem is that the government is just as self-serving as every other human so a power imbalance like that will get exploited.

Re:Godwin

[KDR_11k]

Is that the same Hungary where violent racism against the Roma is still rampant?

Re:Godwin

[KDR_11k]

Uh, because we wanted to win? What, did you expect us to turn around right after the D-day victories and say, "well that was a waste of time?" Staying in the war to the bitter end was really a more normal thing to do......

Also since the western Allies and the Soviet Union were both part of the Allies that meant the Soviets wouldn't get to conquer the entirety of Europe under the pretext of defeating the Nazis, they stopped where both Allied forces met. Considering how badly they ran the GDR I think western Europe is pretty glad the Soviets didn't advance further.

Re:Godwin

[ThunderBird89]

And confined to a small segment of the population. In much the same way violent racism against the Arabs is rampant in France.
We had a resurgence recently that made the news (Gyöngyöspata, if the place name rings a bell), but even that was just a bunch of extreme right-wingers loudmouthing.

But what does that have to do with self-defense?

Re:Godwin

[makomk]

Racial profiling (non-jews and especially arabs are singled for more thorough examination). This is considered perfectly normal in Israel, but is not legal in US or EU.

Probably not terribly effective either. As far as I can tell the only reason it works at all is not because the Jewish population doesn't contain terrorists but because that they're reasonably sure Israeli Jews will only attack politically acceptable targets. Even that only works due to an atmosphere of imminent danger fed by the media that aims lone-wolf nutters safely at Arabs and Arab-sympathisers.

Re:Godwin

[The AtomicPunk]

Right wing? When has individual liberty been "right wing" ? Seems like a liberal concept to me. John Locke anyone?

Re:Godwin

[The AtomicPunk]

No, she didn't - despite thousands of statists hoping you believe so.

Rand had publicly stated that opponents of statism should collect benefits as restoration of funds taken from them by force, there would be no reason for her to hide it. She would have been more likely to flaunt it.

"It is obvious, in such cases, that a man receives his own money which was taken from him by force, directly and specifically, without his consent, against his own choice. Those who advocated such laws are morally guilty, since they assumed the “right” to force employers and unwilling co-workers. But the victims, who opposed such laws, have a clear right to any refund of their own money—and they would not advance the cause of freedom if they left their money, unclaimed, for the benefit of the welfare-state administration."

Then, there is this interesting piece of evidence against the claim:

Social Security Death Index
Name: Ayn Rand
SSN: 571-32-9405
Last Residence: 10019 New York, New York, New York, United States of America
Born: 2 Feb 1905
Died: Mar 1982
State (Year) SSN issued: California (Before 1951)

Doesn't look like an alias to me.

Re:Godwin

[GauteL]

"Really, sometimes people are down, and you don't have to kick them. It won't destroy society if you help them out a bit."

Indeed. Some people thrive from help when the are down and go on to do good things with their lives. Also some people turn into leeches when they are helped. Most of the arguments regarding welfare states, unemployment benefits and the like comes down to disagreement about what the ratio between the two groups are and what ratio leads to a better society and is morally acceptable (*).

There are plenty of examples of societies both currently and through history where little or no charity is afforded those in need, and they don't appear to be very healthy societies. Certainly far worse societies than what I see around me, despite the rhetoric about a "Broken Society" being created by welfare. If today's society is "broken" then I shudder to think what the society was like a few hundred years ago.

(*) I know people have wildly different opinions about morals. Some would argue that if no charity led to a better society, charity would be morally wrong. But this is besides the point.

Re:Godwin

[GauteL]

"What does hypocrisy have to do with whether someone is right or wrong? Nothing."

What you fail to realise is that there are 6 billion people on this planet with something to say. Nobody has the time to listen to all these voices, and certainly nobody has the time to test whether they are right or wrong. In many cases "being right or wrong" is subjective anyway and certainly most political questions of our time belong to this category, if only due to lack of data.

What all this means is that you HAVE to make decisions about whether to listen to someone based on more than just their argument and thus your argument of pointing out the GP's basic logic flaw is a fatally flawed argument in itself.

In the case of Ayn Rand, nobody knows for sure whether her arguments have merit or not, they have simply never been tested scientifically and testing them scientifically may well be construed as morally wrong. So we look for "supporting evidence", and using hypocrisy as supporting evidence may well be completely logical, because her hypocrisy may well expose a logical fallacy in her argument.

Now I realise that I may be constructing a straw man here, since I simply have not decided that Ayn Rand is someone worth spending much of my time and attention on, but I believe Rand argued that it was wrong of society to impose charity through welfare. If Ayn Rand is correct in her argument, and thus gave a valuable contribution to society despite receiving government assistance, then her argument is flawed. Because at least in her case, government assistance may have been the right thing to do and without government assistance, we may miss out on other such valuable contributions to society.

Re:Godwin

[tomtomtom]

It's not "charity" if it's someone else's money you're giving (through taxes) or if you do it because someone else tells you that if you don't then you're a "bad person" (or going to hell or whatever).

Re:Godwin

[Hazel Bergeron]

You're listing the freedoms that the Reich wanted to grant the ethnically favoured across Europe, yes?

Re:Godwin

[angel'o'sphere]

No, I'm listing the freedoms we have in europe as I don't get why our parent is comparing europe with the third reich.

Re:Godwin

[angel'o'sphere]

Well, to be honest Sarkozy only behaves like any US president does, after all he has similar power and also similar limits. As a person he likes to make grand gestures and to talk big, but I doubt he is truly a danger for anyone.
OTOH Berlusconi is certainly the most corrupt politician in Europe since Giulio Andreotti. Considering that he is a "North Italian" and the Mafia is stemming from the south (well, simplified ;D) it is really astonishing how deep he let Italy sink in the public opinion of the rest of europe. In the late 1980s early 1990s it looked like Italy would rise out of its filth and have a renaissance (after all if you visit Italy the people are brave, smart and it is really a very ice country ... except ...).

Re:Godwin

[Dog-Cow]

It works because, to-date, every terrorist targeting Israel has been of Arab descent. I know it's considered cool to bash Israel on any number of fronts, but you would not find many non-insane Israelis advocating suicide attacks on Arabs, nor hijacking their aircraft for any purpose. There are no politically acceptable targets for Jewish terrorists.

Re:Godwin

[wisty]

Exactly. It's perfectly possible that Ayn Rand was a welfare cheat and a hypocrite, yet her books could still be true.

But we can't be bothered getting into a deep philosophical debate with conniving personality cultists. They aren't interested in a logical debat, just justifying their deal leader. It's like trying to explain to Mac fanatics that Windows is more stable these days.

I could point out that all her books were painfully unrealistic. That not all left-wingers are talentless assholes (um, Einstein), and greedy fuckers quite often are.Or that socialist institutions like public health are almost certainly a good idea (after all, almost every first world country manages to have a socialised health system that is better *and* cheaper than the US's privatized health system), but there's no point arguing logically with fundamentalists.

Re:Godwin

[KillAllNazis]

Well no, a person's circumstances which are out of their control can make them do things they don't want to do, even things they think are wrong. I think working in place of a machine is wrong, but I have no choice in this.

Re:Godwin

[KillAllNazis]

The Cancer Stage of Capitalism by John McMurtry.

Re:Godwin

[KillAllNazis]

In a homogeneous group there is no problem that can be recognized, there is only what is and that is what is right and must be. If every citizen of the world had the same value system it would not be subject to analysis, right? Like an asexually reproductive organism it is unable to react to some new disease. If everyone had the same value system there would be no problem even if people were killing each other in the streets as part of that value system.
Correct me if I'm wrong.

Re:Godwin

[phantomfive]

But we can't be bothered getting into a deep philosophical debate with conniving personality cultists.

It's not a personality cult. She had a lousy personality, most people agree with that.

They aren't interested in a logical debate, just justifying their deal leader. It's like trying to explain to Mac fanatics that Windows is more stable these days.

I'm going to say that this is more a reflection on you than on anyone else, an indication that you have poor communication skills. You can work on it, and get good enough to convince crazy Mac fanatics (or idiot Windows fanatics). But it's largely a problem with your own communication skills.

I could point out that all her books were painfully unrealistic. That not all left-wingers are talentless assholes (um, Einstein), and greedy fuckers quite often are.

See, it's stuff like this. I would even add that her stories are kind of boring, but who cares? Many philosophy books are boring (no one reads Francis Bacon for his witty dialog). No one reads Ayn Rand for its realism, there's even a TV Trope about how unrealistic it is (Canon Sue). But so what? If you're going to try to convince someone of something, you're going to at least talk about stuff they care about. It's basically a case of you being 100% right about things that don't matter.

(after all, almost every first world country manages to have a socialised health system that is better *and* cheaper than the US's privatized health system),

This is unrelated, but look, this is the sort of brain-dead ideas pro-single-payers come up with. They have this idea that all we have to do is switch to a single-payer system, and somehow everything will be better. So instead of actually coming up with ideas to make it better, they end up hoping a magical change will fix everything.

Think about it, do you think that perhaps the fact that we pay our doctors more than many socialist-style countries is part of the reason our medical system is more expensive? Have you actually looked at the reasons other countries have 'better' care? This is a complicated but important question if you actually want to improve healthcare in the US.

Re:Godwin

[phantomfive]

You're right, of course. It just makes her a total cunt.

She was that before she accepted welfare.

Someone being a total cunt is correlated with whatever that have to say not being worth listening to.

That's probably true (when we're talking about morality, not other things; some scientists are not much fun to be around), but if that is the only argument you have against someone's philosophy, it's a very weak argument.

but the odds are so low that I, personally, don't want to start sifting through her refuse, and you can't really call that fallacious logic.

OK, but don't get that confused with a logical refutation. I don't particularly like her books either (I started reading Fountainhead but got bored, and my mom didn't want me to read it.....I was a teenager). But her philosophy does have some true points: if there are too many 'leeches' and not enough producers, then society will indeed collapse. That's not a very controversial point.

Re:Godwin

[mckorr]

I'd have to question that definition of a failed state. The United States government has never had a monopoly over the use of force within it's borders. The general populace has always been better armed than the state, and it is a founding principle that this is the correct way to do things, that the people should retain the ability to overthrow the government should it turn tyrannical. While I would find merit in a statement that the US is failing, indeed seems in danger of imminent collapse, it has nothing to do with force, or a monopoly on violence.

Re:Godwin

[sabt-pestnu]

> And confined to a small segment of the population.

Are you talking about the victims or the perpetrators?

Re:Godwin

[ThunderBird89]

Unfortunately, the perpetrators...
The victims form a(n extremely) wide strata by ethnicity, a considerably narrower one by victimization. Those that are victimized, are very vocal about it, though.

Re:Godwin

[phantomfive]

Hypocrites are the worst kinds of people.

Really, of all the character flaws a person can develop, you think hypocrisy is the worst? You need to be a little more creative in imagining evil, my friend.

Re:Godwin

[phantomfive]

because her hypocrisy may well expose a logical fallacy in her argument.

What? No, that's not true.

What you fail to realise is that there are 6 billion people on this planet with something to say.

Somehow, believe it or not, I didn't fail to realize that. I don't care if you read Ayn Rand or not. But if you're not going to read her, don't go around acting like you've refuted her philosophy just because she was a twit. Even twits and hypocrites are right sometimes.

Re:Godwin

[phantomfive]

As other people have said, democracy doesn't guarantee that people get the best government, it guarantees they get the government they deserve. It is up to the people to safeguard their freedoms.

Re:Godwin

[Man On Pink Corner]

Um, do you know what a failed state is? It's when a state does not have monopoly over the use of force within its borders.

Wow. I don't even....

Just, wow.

Re:Godwin

[phantomfive]

Er, maybe that last bit was not strictly necessary.

I would not have said it, had I not full confidence that he can put his ideas into other terms.

Re:Godwin

[phantomfive]

Most of the arguments regarding welfare states, unemployment benefits and the like comes down to disagreement about what the ratio between the two groups are and what ratio leads to a better society and is morally acceptable

Well said, and in reality, it is a pointless argument, because giving money rarely helps very much. We should be debating on how best to help people who need help, instead of doling out a check (or insisting they stand on their own).

If today's society is "broken" then I shudder to think what the society was like a few hundred years ago.

Do you really think the main difference between society now and a hundred years ago was something other than a phenomenal growth in disposable income for the average citizen?

Finality

[Anonymous Coward]

France is also supporting the European Unitary Patent, which is seen by many at the final attempt to validate software patents in Europe.

Correction : this will only be the final attempt if it succeeds. Otherwise, stand by for many more.

Re:Finality

[pieterh]

Ironically, the French patent establishment largely launched the notion of 'intellectual property' in the late 18th century.

This has been a long, long fight between the patent lobby and the rest of society. The sad thing is no-one really represents society, today, except civil society groups. Government has long become a tool for big business to get laws it thinks it needs, and the big software business (often, US firms like MSFT) still believes (wrongly) that it needs software patents.

In Other News

[Anonymous Coward]

Governments continue to back the most restrictive interpretations of intellectual property they can.

Re:In Other News

[Anonymous Coward]

Governments continue to back the most restrictive interpretations of intellectual property they can

interpretations of intellectual property

intellectual property

What?

Re:In Other News

[NFN_NLN]

Governments continue to back the most restrictive interpretations of intellectual property they can.

This is the King's land.
It is illegal to hunt on the King's land.

Hmm... we've just come full circle.

Patents will be the next 'bubble'.

[Anonymous Coward]

Easy to create in the thousands, being nothing more than a sheet of paper and can be sold for billions.
France is getting onboard early to dampen austerity measures from the last bubble.

Shrug?

[medcalf]

Well, given that we (in the US) currently have a government that thinks "Atlas Shrugged" is a great story about how to run a railroad, I suppose it will be a while before stuff like this gets sorted out. And it probably won't be pleasant.

Re:Shrug?

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, given that we (in the US) currently have a government that thinks "Atlas Shrugged" is a great story about how to run a railroad

We should make it a test for anyone standing for office - if you think that Atlas Shrugged is great then you're banned.

Re:Shrug?

[lennier]

Well, given that we (in the US) currently have a government that thinks "Atlas Shrugged" is a great story about how to run a railroad, I suppose it will be a while before stuff like this gets sorted out. And it probably won't be pleasant.

Ah yes, that train story about how running a red signal light is perfectly safe.

This is even worse than Intellectual Ventures

[MikeRT]

At least IV has two things going for it:

1. It's a private company, so if it fails it fails on its own dime (rather than getting millions of tax dollars infused into it)
2. It actually sponsors some new research.

This just sounds like a real, outright troll. It doesn't even convert the revenues into more research money.

Re:This is even worse than Intellectual Ventures

[rmstar]

At least IV has two things going for it:

1. It's a private company, so if it fails it fails on its own dime (rather than getting millions of tax dollars infused into it)
2. It actually sponsors some new research.

As to 1: it is raising a tax on you by patent licensing. Moneywise it is the same thing, the difference is that since it is a private company, you have no vote on the matter.

As to 2: the French gov. sponsors a shitload of research, orders of magnitude beyond what IV will ever be able to do.

Also, if the patents are in the hands of the government, odds are you will be able to do bulk licensing for a pittance.

Welcome to 1984

[Midnight Thunder]

Animal farm wants their president back. As a French national this makes me question my nationality. Between three strikes patents and this I wonder whether France truly got rid of the Nazis? Sad thing is there are so many other 'first world' nations that are also following this trend of returning to medevial times.

Re:Welcome to 1984

[Rising Ape]

Between three strikes patents and this I wonder whether France truly got rid of the Nazis?

Holy sense of proportion... I don't think anyone's biggest complaint about the Nazis was their attitude towards intellectual property.

Re:Welcome to 1984

[medcalf]

Of course not, but tyranny is tyranny, and tyrants act like tyrants. When you give them control, they grab for more. Europe and the US are both heading down this slope, which will have a bad end if not reversed.

Re:Welcome to 1984

[KiloByte]

The attitude towards imaginary property isn't the biggest complaint about the French government either.

Re:Welcome to 1984

[JSG]

For goodness sake, you have a seven digit ID here - stop being so insightful.

You should be writing up bollocks under the subject line of "Welcome to 1984" or something.

Re:Welcome to 1984

[Keen Anthony]

I would argue that not all tyrants are the same, and some forms of tyranny are perhaps better than others.

Re:Welcome to 1984

[KDR_11k]

The Nazis were a mixture of tyrants and the mob, their approach to intellectual property was to subject your company to Gleichschaltung (intimidate, arrest or assassinate its leaders and replace them with peons of the party).

Re:Welcome to 1984

[KDR_11k]

Religion is irrational. There's a reason we are all afraid of stupid govt monkeys enforcing teaching of creationism in school.

Besides, the law against hiding faces wasn't based on the Bible, it was based on the fact that they're impossible to identify when hidden. France is pretty secular and we atheists don't consider Religion a valid reason for concealing yourself. Concealing your face also helps with crime as nobody can tell who you are, that's a good enough reason to ban it.

Re:Welcome to 1984

[The AtomicPunk]

You're not alone. Over here, we have SWAT team raids against people for selling raw milk.

If you ever felt you 'missed out' not living in the dark ages, I think you'll be getting your opportunity real soon now.

Re:Welcome to 1984

[drinkypoo]

Nazism was a bus that some people got on and rode for all it was worth. Several interests in this country including William Davis (who was nailed to the wall for it) and Prescott Bush (who was permitted to keep a million dollars and use it to found an empire that culminated in the placement of a total idiot in the white house... so far) and let us not forget IBM made awfully big piles of money off ol' Adolf's attempt to exterminate every Jew but himself. Hell, a relative of mine watched a shot-down Zero sink into the ocean, and he could clearly see where the material was still stamped ALCOA.

The Third Reich's aspirations were aided by greedy men who knew precisely what they were doing (in the case of all of these examples.) I'd say there is a direct parallel to be drawn here, because at the ultimate extreme, strong IP law kills people when they are denied access to medication due to profit-related monopoly. You could argue that only patent law does this, but champions of IP law wish us to conflate the various pieces, and so I shall.

Re:Does anybody like France?

[Midnight Thunder]

That just sounds narrow minded. There are many countries doing crazy bullshit.
This bullshit is limited to their own borders and they haven't yet created a report on how badly Canada is doing ;)

The problem in France is they still believe what your parents did matters when you are trying to position yourself in society. The revolution only got rid of the king, since the rest essentially stayed the same.

Don't politicians learn?

[Teun]

It really makes you wonder under what stone these politicians live.

The whole world witnesses the stagnation to software development caused by the incessant court battles about software patents in the USofA and then they want a similar system!

But then most of them are probably lawyers by trade so they see opportunities...

Lets hope other nations like the Germans can stop this nonsense taking hold in EU legislation.

Re:Don't politicians learn?

[El_Muerte_TDS]

I think it's more an issue of the deepness of pockets than the size of stones.

Re:Don't politicians learn?

[JAlexoi]

It's an issue of lining one's pockets at the expense of ordinary people. France laws are crazy, Loire valley castles are copyrighted. (See http://www.istockphoto.com/tutorial_copyright_list.php)

Re:Don't politicians learn?

[Asic Eng]

That might work - the Green party in Germany is on the rise in a major way. They poll at around 20% of the votes and have picked up their first governorship in the state of Baden-Wuerttemberg. They are opposed to software patents and patents on genes and their positions have become a lot more influential in Germany, now.

Re:Don't politicians learn?

[Billly Gates]

"The whole world witnesses the stagnation to software development caused by the incessant court battles about software patents in the USofA and then they want a similar system!"

Not if you can outsource to a more business friendly country like India where you do not have to worry about patent lawsuits and you get really cheap labor too on top of that!

Part of me feels a consipiracy going on with outsourcing companies favoring software patents to they can turn around and sell more overseas contracts to clients. Meanwhile the developers in western countries like US, Canada, and now France will need to learn different professions like manufactoring ... oh oops. Seriously, the lawyers and simple greed are ruining everything and causing the world to head into a depression ... with the exception of China and India of course. We are heading into the dark days in the western world. ... besides bickering, the real problem is campaign contributions from corporations NEED TO STOP. We will never have politicans no matter which country you live in vote in our interests if this bribery continues. Long term economic losses will add up and civil strife and disobedience after that.

Re:Don't politicians learn?

[gmhowell]

That may be one of the more depressing things I've read on the internet.

Re:Don't politicians learn?

[KDR_11k]

Also the German economy is heavily based around small and medium sized businesses, software patents would be able to cripple that and wreck the country's economy.

Re:Don't politicians learn?

[scamper_22]

You have to ask if you have learned?

Why should the primary goal of a society be innovation?
I don't ask that sarcastically. Seriously... you speak of stagnation in software development as though that is the end of the argument.

For politicians and arguably for most of the population... things like jobs, security, power, wages... matter a whole lot more.

Looking at society, lawyers provide much more job security and long term employment than software developers. Expect more strangling pieces of legislation that benefit lawyers and paper pushers and regulatory compliance people in the field of technology.

Better return on investment?

[AnyPerson]

There are approximately 16 patents per $100 million spent in Australian publicly funded Research Institutions http://bit.ly/jROW2M. Other nations are not radically different. Therefore, France's concept may give a better return on investment whilst stimulating innovation. The danger is if they act as a Troll to intimidate other nations?

Re:Better return on investment?

[Registered Coward v2]

There are approximately 16 patents per $100 million spent in Australian publicly funded Research Institutions http://bit.ly/jROW2M. Other nations are not radically different. Therefore, France's concept may give a better return on investment whilst stimulating innovation. The danger is if they act as a Troll to intimidate other nations?

Actually, they can use this as a competitive advantage by favoring French or favored companies in licensing terms. They could give them generous (read cheap) licenses while charging others higher fees; thereby giving some companies an economic advantage.

Software patents ?

[Cochonou]

As far as I know, software patents are not recognized in France.
See for instance here.

Re:someone should patent 'surrendering'

[SuricouRaven]

Us English are still taunting them about Agincourt. They outnumbered us five-to-one, and they still lost dismally.

Hah, at the Battle of the Herrings we managed to beat them using a defensive structure made from fish wagons.

Re:"Endlösung" without "h"

[ThunderBird89]

Noted. Thanks for the correction, German is not my strong point...

Innovation Expropriation

[kawabago]

It is totally unethical for a government to enact legislation to create a tax on innovation in the form of patents and then turn around and gather all the patents for itself. This is a guarantee that poor quality patents will be issued and subsequently bought by the French government who will no doubt make it a criminal act to not pay them the innovation tax. If France adopts this it will destroy that sector of the French economy. But what else would you expect of the French, experts at shooting themselves in the foot.

The west has run out ideas...

[Yaa 101]

This whole Patent and Intellectual Property craziness is because the politicians run out of ideas how to increase employment and Gross National Product.
They see that they lost the battle of keeping manufacturing and other jobs into their countries, slowly all the money creeps toward the BRIC countries.
What the politicians will be left with is the doom scenario that is unfolding in the Arabic countries round the Mediterranean and the creep of that scenario to the weak European economies round that same Mediterranean, 25% or more unemployment by young people who are at the prime age of being able to push revolutions.

Basically the Patent and Intellectual Property craziness is a lost gamble that will only bring a little time for the ruling classes, but they won't come with new ideas and in the end we will enter an era of poverty in the west, and we will see some Hitlers come and go.

Defining "intellectual" and "property"

[tepples]

intellectual property

What?

"Intellectual" refers to works of authorship or inventions; "property" means exclusive rights. Or are you referring to the "Seductive Mirage" article?

Re:It's not possible to patent software in France

[Wolfbone]

it's not possible to patent software (except software related to industrial processes, like computer-assisted production).

The EPO and some of the national POs have a long and dirty history of pretending - for political reasons - that that is the case. I'm horrified if the lie is being repeated in an educational setting. I suggest you contact the French branch of the FFII for clarification, but with a little patience you can quite easily check for yourself just how brazen a lie it is: http://worldwide.espacenet.com/

Re:Stop Using that Term

[Mindcontrolled]

The whole summary is epic trolling by the usual anti-IP zealots. Someone please explain to me how the Unitary patent is a push towards software patents? It's basically meant to fix that fact that today, after applying for an European patent, you end up having a bundle of national patents for each member state, which all have to be litigated separately if it comes to that. Oh, and while you are at it, explain to me why software patents are a bad thing. Or IP in general. Bring rational facts, would be a change to the last 10 years of discussion here.

Re:It's not possible to patent software in France

[Cederic]

I'd suggest you avoid giving the FFII your email address though, as the one I gave to them sadly became a spam magnet shortly afterwards.

This is one reason I fund ORG and not FFII.

Not as bad as it sounds

[HuguesT]

Of course on Slashdot patents=bad ; and of course as well no one is going to read the Fine Article, particularly if it is in french. The google "translation" and the various interpretations in english people have put out are not helping. Nowhere in the article is it written that this institution will massively collect stupid patents for little money and sue companies like Microsoft.

First you have to admit that patents have at least on principle some validity. Someone has an idea for a commercial new product, describes it in a patent and get some limited protection. It is totally unfair of large company to read such patents and implement the idea at a lower cost without paying licenses.

The idea here is to allow small-to-medium companies to benefit from patents as well. While a small company can certainly file for patent, they do not have the resources to defend them in court or otherwise, so basically they are more or less moot, except as bargaining chips for acquisition. The French government puts out a lot of money (think NSF-like grants but also industrialization grants) and they are not seeing as many industrial success as hoped. One reason, they reason, is that small companies cannot defend their ideas against larger companies, both in Europe and overseas. Other nations have government-based patent protection. Do you think the CSIRO patents for 802.11a/g were trolling?

So this institution will help small-to-medium French companies defend their portfolio. The initial idea is no to collect patents but to propose services. Indeed they will put together defensible cases by polling patents in some cases, but the stated aim is to get licenses income for the companies, not for this new institution by itself. This is not the same as trolling I think.

Essentially the French government doesn't want to see its industrialization monies get wasted too much. What's bad about this ?

Re:Not as bad as it sounds

[devent]

"First you have to admit that patents have at least on principle some validity. Someone has an idea for a commercial new product, describes it in a patent and get some limited protection. It is totally unfair of large company to read such patents and implement the idea at a lower cost without paying licenses."

No that is not how patents are working. With patents (not the BS business or software patents) you have a working machine, not just an idea. I can come up with thousands of ideas every day, should I be able to patent them all? No, only if I build a machine I can patent it.

And that is the one big problem with software patents, it's a patent on an idea, that can be implemented in multiple ways. I can implement a otto-motor* in just one way and if I do it in any other way it's not a otto-motor anymore and I can apply a new patent. Did you ever saw any source code with a software patent? No, because it claims the idea of an algorithm that can be implemented in anything.

"So this institution will help small-to-medium French companies defend their portfolio. The initial idea is no to collect patents but to propose services. Indeed they will put together defensible cases by polling patents in some cases, but the stated aim is to get licenses income for the companies, not for this new institution by itself. This is not the same as trolling I think."

So first the government is creating a system in which the small business owner cannot defend their ideas and now they creating a government institution to protect the small business owner against that system (that they created)? Why they just don't admit that the current patent system is broken and fix it? What they are planning to do now is spending millions of tax money to protect small business owner from a broken system instead to fix the system.

"Essentially the French government doesn't want to see its industrialization monies get wasted too much. What's bad about this ?"

Just fix the broken patent system. Is is really so hard to see where the idiocy lies? This institution is just admitting that the current government have no power against the big cooperations and the word trade agreements.

* http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Petrol_engine

Re:Not as bad as it sounds

[Anonymous Coward]

The current state of affairs in patents is that every little idea can and will be patented, at least in the US. There's so many patents out there that you can't build anything of value without stepping into the patent minefield.

So even though it sounds nice in theory - that the little guy gets a way of defending his patents - what's more likely to happen is that the big company will license the patent for free in exchange for not suing over one of the many patents that the little guy has stepped on. Unless of course the little guy is not really building anything, but just pushing patents out there - in which case he's a troll.

The really bad thing about this is that by making this move the French government is basically acknowledging the validity of software patents and as such have moved Europe closer to accepting patents on software.

As a European software developer there's nothing more frightening to me than having to live in a world where everything I create can be taken from me by the means of patents.

Re:Not as bad as it sounds

[iive]

The road to hell is paved with good intentions.
&
The devil is in the details.

From your description I understand that the new institution would sue "larger companies" on behalf of small patent holders. Now if these small patent holders are patent trolls, this institution service would be like a pipe dream for them. Patent trolls could sue everybody everywhere and expenses would be covered by taxpayers.

I'm not saying that protecting small manufactures is bad thing, but fundamental principles should be established so that this "great power" won't be abused in just one or two decades.

If this institution works like MPEG-LA, then maybe it could do more good than harm.
It's all in the details.

Re:Stop Using that Term

[zoobab]

"Someone please explain to me how the Unitary patent is a push towards software patents"

Thats very simple, take the German case law and make it the default for the whole of Europe.

"why software patents are a bad thing"

Because it is insane to ask authors to check zillion of claims before being able to write a piece of code.

Re:Stop Using that Term

[spauldo]

I don't know anything about the Unitary patent, so I won't comment on that.

Software patents are bad because they make it all but impossible for small companies or individuals to legally make software. IBM has the legal resources to research what patents a particular product may violate, but a guy who writes a script to create M3U playlists doesn't. Look at all the patent cases the smartphone companies are dealing with - they have a team of lawyers and can't avoid violating patents.

Bear in mind that patents are supposed to enhance innovation, not stifle it. They work well for actual physical inventions, and 20 years (in the U.S. anyway) seems to be a decent time to develop your product and bring it to market. 20 years in the software world is the difference between Windows for Workgroups and Windows 7. By the time a patent expires in the software world, there's a good chance it'll be irrelevant.

There is also a problem with the type of patents awarded. I can understand the LZW compression patent (think .GIF files), since it's non-obvious and required a good amount of work, but what about the 1-click shopping patent awarded to Amazon? How about the plethora of UI-related patents?

Right now, the system basically works because the patent trolls ignore the small fish and go after the big guys first. It's not a stable situation, and it basically means that millions of developers are unknowingly breaking the law every day. That's a good sign that the system is broken - after all, there's nothing to stop IBM from starting RIAA-type lawsuits against individual open source developers.

Don't confuse software patents with other types of IP, like copyright. Copyright laws don't hamper the creation of new IP* in the same way software patents do. It's a completely different issue.

*Actually, they do make it harder to create derivative works. The original U.S. copyright was for 14 years, and many (such as myself) view the extended copyrights as theft of the public domain, but like I said, that's a different issue.

./, I'm disappointed

[Trigger31415]

If you knew a bit more the French, you'ld know this isn't so bad:

-It's not linked to software patents. As it was linked, software in Frace is something that cannot be patented. And externalizing the ownership/defense of patent to a state organism won't create this possibility.
Instead, it's aimed to small entreprises (PME = less than 50 ppl) that wouldn't patent otherwise. Ofc, some abuses are possible, but it won't work because:

-Instead of US, where you can claim huge amount of money in court, France is not doing the same: the sum you can ask for = the (equivalent) amount of money you've lost/couldn't earn. Nothing else.We have really less, and maybe no patent troll cases.

-Stuff about tyranny, nazi, etc. in France about this affair is just plain bullshit (really, wtf? Did I missed the 2nd degree?). Main problem is rather normal racism agaisnt homosexual ppl and muslims/arabs.

-There may be a untold reason: France is just jealous of US superiority in technology (some govt official said 'where are our Google, our Amazon?', or something like that; sry I can"t find the exact quote). And that's likely aimed to change that situation.

Re:./, I'm disappointed

[zoobab]

"It's not linked to software patents"

Of course it is linked, do you really believe that they wont file any software patent in the field of "Information and Communication Technologies":

http://www.agglotv.com/?p=15499

"Le domaine d’intervention prioritaire du fonds sera dans un premier temps les nouvelles technologies de l’information et de la communication"

Maybe they will stick themselves to resistors and hardware, but it is obvious that 95% of patents in "ICT" are now software.

Re:./, I'm disappointed

[Trigger31415]

Given that the law doesn't allow that in France, they don't really have a choice. Filing a software patent will be either refused, or considered as being null later.
But they may field patents in US, ofc.

Re:Stop Using that Term

[Mindcontrolled]

If you can understand the technical merits of the LZW compression patent, you are obviously not against software patents per se, but rather against the granting practice of the patent offices. There you have a point, in particular when looking at the US. I completely agree that stuff along the lines of 1-click should be not patentable. Not because it is basically software, but because it is trivial. However, an algorithm of sufficient complexity is completely patent-worthy in my opinion.

Re:Stop Using that Term

[Mindcontrolled]

How exactly is German case law relevant here? It's not even highly relevant for Germany, not being a common law system. You are aware that patents are already granted on a European scope by the European Patent Office under the articles of the European Patent Agreement? The relevant case law is the case law of the boards of appeal of the EPO. All the Unitary patent would change is that litigation gets moved from the national courts to additional boards of the EPO or a similar, yet to be created organization. As to your last point, why should a software engineer be privileged over an electrical engineer, who indeed has to check the patented state of the art before developing anything?

...into Space?

[RivenAleem]

My excitement dwindled after the title.

It's not a "Patent Troll"

[kikito]

It's a "Patent Tgoll"

Re:Stop Using that Term

[zoobab]

"How exactly is German case law relevant here?"

German judges are the number one candidates to populate such european courts. There is now a series of decisions in Germany, notably the Siemens document generation patent, which has abolished the exclusion of software patents in DE:

http://translate.google.be/translate?u=http://www.heise.de/newsticker/meldung/Bundesgerichtshof-ebnet-Weg-fuer-Softwarepatente-1003190.html&sl=de&tl=en&hl=&ie=UTF-8

"The relevant case law is the case law of the boards of appeal of the EPO"

Administrative tribunals run by patent examiners without a law degree do not produce case law.

"why should a software engineer be privileged over an electrical engineer"

Because software authors write code, and deserve freedom of expression.

The EPO invented the term "computer implemented invention" in the late nineties because they knew that the Berne Convention was already protecting "computer programs" as literary works.

Authors are spoiled from the right to benefit of the fruits of their work.

As far as I know, electrical engineers have to deal with physical forces and all that, not with a text editor.

Ayn Rand on medicare.

[sabt-pestnu]

> on the other hand, she was so opposed to charity to a ridiculous degree. .. but only philosophically. She was entirely 'rational' about exploiting the weakness of others who created that social safety net that is Medicare and Social Security.

That is, she was against GIVING charity, but not about to pass up TAKING charity.

Re:Stop Using that Term

[spauldo]

Actually, no, I am against software patents altogether. I was merely pointing out a major flaw in how they are assigned. When software patents are legal, there is going to be people who abuse the system to the detriment of all, and judges are not knowledgeable enough to decide what is obvious. Even if they were, small-time coders can't afford to defend themselves against patent trolls.

Software patents are unnecessary anyway - you don't have an algorithmic research industry that needs that sort of protection. The companies acquiring these patents derive their primary income from products, not patent licenses.

Software patents serve two uses:
They raise the barrier of entry into the software market
They allow litigation-based companies to profit via lawsuits.

The big dogs like the first use, which is why they lobby for software patents. No one likes the second use. Small developers don't like either. If you're trying to incentivize innovation, the small developers are who you need to be looking at.