EU Central Court Could Validate Software Patents

protoshell writes "'Software patents in Europe could be validated with a central patent court,' warns Richard Stallman in an article published in the Guardian. After the rejection of the software patent directive in 2005, large companies have shifted their lobbying towards the validation of software patents in Europe through a central patent court, which is foreseen with the Unitary Patent project. Even if the European Patent Convention literally excludes software from patents, the European Patent Office and the German courts interpret the exclusion narrowly, which makes software patents valid in the end."

Comments

Pathetic

[Anonymous Coward]

the European Patent Office and the German courts interpret the exclusion narrowly, which makes software patents valid in the end.

Pathetic...so it's narrowly interpretable whenever they chose so, but broadly interpretable when they chose so too?

Fuk dis shit.

Re:Pathetic

[Grishnakh]

I really wonder if what we're seeing here is the complete and utter failure of democracy as a viable form of government. You don't see this kind of stuff in China, where the government is more interested in the whole nation actually advancing, instead of particular people or companies who pay off the right people. What we have in Western democracies is a ridiculous amount of blatant corruption from corporations, and there doesn't seem to be any kind of mechanism to deal with this. In theory, the ballot box is supposed to be a check against corruption, but in practice it simply doesn't work as voters are too stupid and easily swayed to vote for the right candidates, instead of corporate-backed corrupt candidates.

Re:Pathetic

[0123456]

As some Scottish guy whose name I forget said a couple of centuries ago, democracy can only last until the voters realise they can vote to steal their neighbours' stuff.

However, dictatorship is hardly an improvement: sometimes you may get lucky and have an effective and relatively non-corrupt leader in charge, but most of the time it's another Stalin or Saddam Hussein.

Re:Pathetic

[GumphMaster]

Graft, corruption, and self-interest exist, even in China.

In theory, the ballot box is supposed to be a check against corruption, but in practice it simply doesn't work as voters are too stupid and easily swayed to vote for the right candidates, instead of corporate-backed corrupt candidates

You are supposing that there is a "right candidate" (and that that candidate is the one you would choose).

It has been said that democracy is the worst form of government except all the others that have been tried.
Sir Winston Churchill
British politician (1874 - 1965)

Re:Pathetic

[Penguinisto]

You don't see this kind of stuff in China

You may not see it, but it is most definitely there. It's just that China's government is a hell of a lot more quiet about it, and the little bit that does see daylight is considered normal, especially when compared to the more outrageous crap (by Western standards) that businesses pull off both with and against each other.

It also helps the facade when you occasionally execute the occasional minor official or two who don't pay enough of a 'vig' to keep the upper echelons' bank accounts properly greased.

Re:Pathetic

[digitig]

As some Scottish guy whose name I forget

Alexander Fraser Tytler, although the quote is also attributed to Alexis de Tocqueville who wasn't very Scottish. "A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the majority discovers it can vote itself largess out of the public treasury. After that, the majority always votes for the candidate promising the most benefits with the result the democracy collapses because of the loose fiscal policy ensuing, always to be followed by a dictatorship, then a monarchy."

And You Could Be The Next Winner!

[F69631]

As a citizen of the EU, I know that EU has a lot of flaws. The economic policies, the subsidies, etc... However, so far both the legislative branches and the courts have been simply awesome when it comes to not giving in to the lobbying of multinational companies. The courts have been handing fines for anti-competitive practices, privacy violations, etc. left and right (and yes, for european companies too) and the legislators have destroyed software patents, 3-strikes copyright laws, etc. at every occasion. When we do get horrible laws, they're generally based on "think of the children" or "terrorism".

So yeah... The software patents could be validated but frankly, I'm rather optimistic about this.

If Richard Stallman says so ...

[Anonymous Coward]

If Richard Stallman says so ...

I mean seriously ...? The line separating this "news" from pure FUD is a very thin one ...

Re:If Richard Stallman says so ...

[Trepidity]

I, too, am glad that we are fortunate enough to live in a world where none of RMS's 1980s predictions about future attempts to increase corporate and governmental control over technology have come to fruition.

Re:Good for me?

[knarf]

So if I am a garage startup in Europe: Is this a good thing?

Of course not. Suppose that you come up with something that piques the interest of one of the big boys. You'll soon be ceasing and desisting whatever it was that they want under the onslaught of a megaton of patents on everything from the way you press the 'Q' key on your keyboard to the best time of day to pick your nose. In the end they will have what they want - namely whatever it was that you did which got them interested - and you'll be left bankrupt.

Patents are not for small inventors. They are there for those with war chests full of them and, of course, lawyers.

They're already valid

[Theaetetus]

... in the same way that software patents are valid in the US. Here, software per se is unpatentable, but if claimed as being performed by a specific computer, then it's patent eligible*. That's essentially what the Bilski decision was. Same thing in Europe: software per se is unpatentable, but a machine performing software is currently patentable.

*note: this does not mean "performed by a specific computer" is not obvious. This is purely about whether a class of subject matter is potentially patentable. Yes, performing software on a computer is obvious, but if the software is new and non-obvious, then the claim as a whole can be patentable.

Disclaimer: I am a US patent attorney. I've gotten many patents issued on software performed by a computing device, as well as software embodied in articles of manufacture, both here and in Europe. That said, I'm not your attorney, and this isn't legal advice, and is purely for the purposes of (my own) amusement.

Re:Good for me?

[AK Marc]

They are good for people who create things that are actually novel (nobody in the computer industry does). When you create a new moustrap that is provably different in every way than all others, then they won't have anything else to get you with. But with computers, almost nothing is close to novel. It's all been done before, it's just being presented/assembled in a different manner. Someone owns a patent on "using a compiler to compile software people want to buy" so there's nothing you could ever make that wouldn't be covered by someone else's broad and silly patents. That's why software patents need to be destroyed. They are patents on math. You can't patent a new formula, no matter how hard it was to prove. But you can patent that formula when you add "on a computer" on the end.