> Any help with what a Swede, a German, a French, an Italian,
> etc. should be doing today?
Your governments will be represented at the November 10th meeting and at the preparation meeting in 4 days time. Make sure they know what you want them to do.
You should probably join the relevant mailing lists for country-specific information. They're listed here along with a long list of other stuff to do.
I too think that occasionally algorithms are invented that are novel
enough to deserve intellectual property protection.
The problem is, we don't seem to have that choice. The only way I can
see to stop the patent offices from granting patents for every trivial
thing they feel like is to be very firm that no software may be patented
at all.
The patent lawyers are constantly trying to extend their remit.
Already, the European Patent Office has granted
about 30,000 software patents - against the spirit and letter of the
existing law.
I believe that the decision about what software deserves protection
should be under the control of a wide range of computer professionals,
not a narrow group of lawyers. But that would be the best case
scenario. The only way we're ever going to get there is if we
first abolish this worst case scenario of software patent ubiquity.
This may be the best opportunity left for you to prevent software
patents in your own country
The United States Patent Office and the Japanese Patent Office have
already achieved their goal of software patents in their own countries.
The European Patent Office (supported by all the European national
patent offices) is the third partner in the Trilateral
Commission, and if it is able to legalize software patents in
Europe, each partner will have a very strong position of apparent international
legitimacy from which to fight any backlash in their own regions.
And then, rest of the World, watch out.
Between them, these 3
regions have a massive amount of economic power, and they will push the
rest of the World to follow their lead on the software patent issue.
This will be done through the world trade and intellectual property
organizations (WTO and WIPO), where the countries on the
receiving end of this pressure will probably concede the issue, given that they
have more important issues to fight about (such as farming
subsidies). Not that they'd necessarily want to fight it,
since most governments' advisers on the subject (patent lawyers) are
generally strongly in favour of extensions to patentability anyway.
So, the best remaining opportunity for you to remove or
prevent software patenting in your own country may be to help fight it in
Europe. If you are not European, you obviously don't have any direct
say in our democratic processes, but you could still give secondary support.
I guess the best way would be donating your time and money to the
Foundation for a Free Information Infrastructure. Here are the links:
Donate time
to the FFII (long list of things to be done; translations, technical work, mirroring, adopting
patents. Or just sign up to the mailing lists and offer general help)
P.S. I don't speak for the FFII, I just don't want to see software
patents (generally unfair restrictions on people's right to write and
distribute their own software) seriously harm computing all around the
World.
P.P.S If you are an EU citizen, make sure your government knows what you want it to do at that November 10th meeting.
No, it should read... Ross Anderson just released a very interesting paper about the Trusted Computing Platform Alliance (TCPA) - the digital rights reduction technology that Intel, Microsoft and the main PC manufacturers (Compaq, Hewlett-Packard, IBM) want to have built in to every PC in order to keep Disney, RIAA, MPAA, etc. happy.
Seriously. The supposed result about "open vs. closed source software" is almost just an interesting aside. Start at page 6, read about the TCPA, and be afraid. Some quotes:
"For simplicity, I'll... call the chip `Fritz' for brevity, in honour of Senator Hollings, who is working tirelessly in Congress to make TCPA a mandatory part of all consumer electronics.
When you boot up your PC, Fritz takes charge. He checks that the boot ROM is as expected, executes it, measures the state of the machine; then checks the first part of the operating system, loads and executes it, checks the state of the machine; and so on."
"TCPA is not vapourware. The first specification was published in 2000, IBM sells laptops that are claimed to be TCPA compliant, and some of the features in Windows XP and the X-Box are TCPA features."
"Suppose you are developing a new speech recognition product. If you TCPA-enable it, then on suitable platforms you can cause its output to be TCPA-protected, and you can remotely decide what applications will be able to read these files, and under what conditions. Thus if your application becomes popular, you can control the complementary products and either spawn off a series of monopolies for add-ons, or rent out access to the interfaces, as you wish."
"Although TCPA is presented as a means of improving PC security and helping users protect themselves, it is anything but. The open systems community had better start thinking seriously about its implications, and policymakers should too."... which sums it up perfectly IMO.
I understand your scepticism about the paper if all you read was the CNET article - which presents it as open source vs proprietary (and which probably made you think of Apache vs IIS or something). However, while Anderson is dealing with these arguments, he never claims his mathematical model is anything other than first order. So...
... given a program with a certain number of bugs, can we say whether it is best to make it as easy as possible to find bugs or as hard as possible?
The (reasonable) assumption is that having the source makes it easier to find bugs. The answer is no - we cannot say. At this level they are equally good. As Anderson puts it:
... making it either easier, or harder,
to find attacks, will help attackers and defendants equally.
... and...
This does not of course mean that, in a given specific situation, proprietary and open source are evenly matched.
So, RTFA - or rather... RTFP - before you state that it's "useless". If Anderson's work is accepted we can confidently state that open source starts on a level playing field with closed source, and argue from there that it's more secure wherever specific attributes make it so. (Attributes like quick patching, good architecture design, or simply caring about security rather than just $$$.)
No-one is arguing that IIS is just as secure as Apache.
Sometimes I wish that Google had additional advanced search capabilities such as regular expressions or an Altavista-like NEAR boolean (preferably one that lets me specify my own value for the 'nearness'). In fact I'd be prepared to pay for "advanced googler" status, even just to have those two available (say, $10/year at least).
Do you have any thoughts about the technical feasability of these ideas? And what about the business case; doesn't Google need just such a revenue stream from the people who actually use its service?
Look at the site -- it looks just like the real thing.
Nice try, but it actually looks nothing like the "real thing".I think I could tell the two apart even if I was quite a large distance from my monitor.Perhaps by the "real thing" you meant "a professionally produced website".If so I agree; they've done a good job.
I particularly like Stallman's idea of "shopping for laws", where corporations find countries who will sell anything (cough christmas island, tonga,.cx,.tv) pass laws such as justifiable homicide in response to corporate espionage,...
I think you've partially missed the point. In general, you could think of this proposed law as an extension of extradition. As such, in general, there is no question of an action in country X being illegal in country X just because it's illegal in country Y. (Much less, as in your justifiable homicide suggestion, an action being legal in country X just because it's not illegal in country Y.)
When the first American gets cained in Pancake Ohio in the town square because they were sued in Singapore for spitting gum on the sidewalk, the fit is gonna hit the shan.
(This may be what you were saying, but to clarify anyway...) You would actually have to spit your gum onto the streets of Singapore to have any chance of punishment, and in theory if you did (and returned to the USA), they could (possibly) try to extradite you for it anyway. So in this sense it's not a total paradigm shift.
The exception seems to be where laws restrict the flow or use of information. From what RMS is saying, the treaty's interpretation here is that, as the originator of information, you are legally responsible for its use and distribution in all (signatory) countries, and that your (signatory) country will enforce those countries' judgements on you.
(From the article.)Suppose you publish a statement criticizing a public figure. If copies are read in England, that public figure could sue you under the strict U.K. libel law. The laws of your country may support the right to criticize a public figure, but with the Hague treaty, they won't necessarily protect you any more.
So be careful how you flame me for this. If the treaty goes through, and I become a public figure in the UK, I might just hit you with a retroactive libel suit:-)
(Even better if I could combine it with US style punitive damages...)
Slashdot Mirror
Your governments will be represented at the November 10th meeting and at the preparation meeting in 4 days time. Make sure they know what you want them to do.
You should probably join the relevant mailing lists for country-specific information. They're listed here along with a long list of other stuff to do.
The problem is, we don't seem to have that choice. The only way I can see to stop the patent offices from granting patents for every trivial thing they feel like is to be very firm that no software may be patented at all.
The patent lawyers are constantly trying to extend their remit. Already, the European Patent Office has granted about 30,000 software patents - against the spirit and letter of the existing law.
I believe that the decision about what software deserves protection should be under the control of a wide range of computer professionals, not a narrow group of lawyers. But that would be the best case scenario. The only way we're ever going to get there is if we first abolish this worst case scenario of software patent ubiquity.
This may be the best opportunity left for you to prevent software patents in your own country
The United States Patent Office and the Japanese Patent Office have already achieved their goal of software patents in their own countries. The European Patent Office (supported by all the European national patent offices) is the third partner in the Trilateral Commission, and if it is able to legalize software patents in Europe, each partner will have a very strong position of apparent international legitimacy from which to fight any backlash in their own regions.
And then, rest of the World, watch out.
Between them, these 3 regions have a massive amount of economic power, and they will push the rest of the World to follow their lead on the software patent issue. This will be done through the world trade and intellectual property organizations (WTO and WIPO), where the countries on the receiving end of this pressure will probably concede the issue, given that they have more important issues to fight about (such as farming subsidies). Not that they'd necessarily want to fight it, since most governments' advisers on the subject (patent lawyers) are generally strongly in favour of extensions to patentability anyway.
So, the best remaining opportunity for you to remove or prevent software patenting in your own country may be to help fight it in Europe. If you are not European, you obviously don't have any direct say in our democratic processes, but you could still give secondary support. I guess the best way would be donating your time and money to the Foundation for a Free Information Infrastructure. Here are the links:
But if you don't think it's right for outsiders to interfere in other countries' political processes, tell that to the BSA (which drafted the original directive proposal), and the US Government (which didn't like the proposed amendments). And when they ignore you, come on and help the good guys.
P.S. I don't speak for the FFII, I just don't want to see software patents (generally unfair restrictions on people's right to write and distribute their own software) seriously harm computing all around the World.
P.P.S If you are an EU citizen, make sure your government knows what you want it to do at that November 10th meeting.
Thankyou very much for anything you can do.
No, it should read ... Ross Anderson just released a very interesting paper about the Trusted Computing Platform Alliance (TCPA) - the digital rights reduction technology that Intel, Microsoft and the main PC manufacturers (Compaq, Hewlett-Packard, IBM) want to have built in to every PC in order to keep Disney, RIAA, MPAA, etc. happy.
Seriously. The supposed result about "open vs. closed source software" is almost just an interesting aside. Start at page 6, read about the TCPA, and be afraid. Some quotes:
"For simplicity, I'll ... call the chip `Fritz' for brevity, in honour of Senator Hollings, who is working tirelessly in Congress to make TCPA a mandatory part of all consumer electronics.
When you boot up your PC, Fritz takes charge. He checks that the boot ROM is as expected, executes it, measures the state of the machine; then checks the first part of the operating system, loads and executes it, checks the state of the machine; and so on."
"TCPA is not vapourware. The first specification was published in 2000, IBM sells laptops that are claimed to be TCPA compliant, and some of the features in Windows XP and the X-Box are TCPA features."
"Suppose you are developing a new speech recognition product. If you TCPA-enable it, then on suitable platforms you can cause its output to be TCPA-protected, and you can remotely decide what applications will be able to read these files, and under what conditions. Thus if your application becomes popular, you can control the complementary products and either spawn off a series of monopolies for add-ons, or rent out access to the interfaces, as you wish."
"Although TCPA is presented as a means of improving PC security and helping users protect themselves, it is anything but. The open systems community had better start thinking seriously about its implications, and policymakers should too." ... which sums it up perfectly IMO.
I understand your scepticism about the paper if all you read was the CNET article - which presents it as open source vs proprietary (and which probably made you think of Apache vs IIS or something). However, while Anderson is dealing with these arguments, he never claims his mathematical model is anything other than first order. So ...
... given a program with a certain number of bugs, can we say whether it is best to make it as easy as possible to find bugs or as hard as possible?
The (reasonable) assumption is that having the source makes it easier to find bugs. The answer is no - we cannot say. At this level they are equally good. As Anderson puts it:
This does not of course mean that, in a given specific situation, proprietary and open source are evenly matched.
So, RTFA - or rather ... RTFP - before you state that it's "useless". If Anderson's work is accepted we can confidently state that open source starts on a level playing field with closed source, and argue from there that it's more secure wherever specific attributes make it so. (Attributes like quick patching, good architecture design, or simply caring about security rather than just $$$.)
No-one is arguing that IIS is just as secure as Apache.
Sometimes I wish that Google had additional advanced search capabilities such as regular expressions or an Altavista-like NEAR boolean (preferably one that lets me specify my own value for the 'nearness'). In fact I'd be prepared to pay for "advanced googler" status, even just to have those two available (say, $10/year at least).
Do you have any thoughts about the technical feasability of these ideas? And what about the business case; doesn't Google need just such a revenue stream from the people who actually use its service?
Nice try, but it actually looks nothing like the "real thing".I think I could tell the two apart even if I was quite a large distance from my monitor.Perhaps by the "real thing" you meant "a professionally produced website".If so I agree; they've done a good job.
I think you've partially missed the point. In general, you could think of this proposed law as an extension of extradition. As such, in general, there is no question of an action in country X being illegal in country X just because it's illegal in country Y. (Much less, as in your justifiable homicide suggestion, an action being legal in country X just because it's not illegal in country Y.)
(This may be what you were saying, but to clarify anyway ...) You would actually have to spit your gum onto the streets of Singapore to have any chance of punishment, and in theory if you did (and returned to the USA), they could (possibly) try to extradite you for it anyway. So in this sense it's not a total paradigm shift.
The exception seems to be where laws restrict the flow or use of information. From what RMS is saying, the treaty's interpretation here is that, as the originator of information, you are legally responsible for its use and distribution in all (signatory) countries, and that your (signatory) country will enforce those countries' judgements on you.
(From the article.)Suppose you publish a statement criticizing a public figure. If copies are read in England, that public figure could sue you under the strict U.K. libel law. The laws of your country may support the right to criticize a public figure, but with the Hague treaty, they won't necessarily protect you any more.
So be careful how you flame me for this. If the treaty goes through, and I become a public figure in the UK, I might just hit you with a retroactive libel suit :-) ...)
(Even better if I could combine it with US style punitive damages
> So the conclusion is that there are no numbers that cannot be described in a hundred words.
> Counterexample
<BR><Pedantry></BR>
<BR>Of course, what you actually gave was an <EM>example</EM>.</BR>
<BR></Pedantry></BR>
I am English and live in England, and was not aware of that, however FWIW my dictionary of British English lists both forms equally.
I therefore choose the shorter of the two (after all, how could I disagree with a writer-of-big-textbooks?)