Absolutely right.
If anyone would care to read the text of the proposal, (and maybe then you'll stop paniccing about it) A link for the latest version available dated 17-03-2004 Software directive [register.consileum.eu]
There is a working document dated last week but not available.
Nope, they are not doing it for commercial usage so they don't infringe. Not to mention the US government do not have to recognise patents held by their citizens (this mainly gets used so the military can rip off ideas..)
Ah I see your point, that could lead to some fun. At the moment however the closest thing to an EU patent is an EP patent designating lots of countries in the EU (countries covered are not strictly the EU countries). If you apply for a EP patent covering a country and there is conflict with another right this will usually count as prior art and no patent will get granted (remember it's first to file in european systems, not first to invent). It is hard to think of a situation where two rights in different countries could be covering the same stuff but not citable against each other. I think in the past when this has happened in the EP system, the country with conflicting rights has been removed from the scope of the granted EP patent.
More pertinent perhaps is the question of whether or not we moving towards a federal united europe? We've been trying to implement the EC patent (ComPat) for years and not getting very far so I'm not convinced that a federal super state is going to be on the horizon anytime soon..
Hang on, I'm getting sucked in to answering the EPOs questions for them...dangerously close to giving away what I do for a living.:)
In the UK or EU your device would not be patentable. It amounts to a business method which are prohibited unless they show some technical contribution to the prior art. You may overcome the objection by showing that your electronic voting box gizmo is new and technical/inventive.
In the US of course you can patent sticks and methods of playing with cats if you want to......
Actually in the UK people like business link and similar initiatives try to help the little guys and the Engineering and Science research council (whatever acronym they're using these days)and others can be useful to academics struggling in the big bad world of intellectual property. As for pro bono patent lawyers though, never heard of one.
..but unlike in the US, if you reckon you can write up the spec yourself then in the UK you can prosecute the application yourself as a private applicant. This does lead to some 'interesting' patent applications but is also a much cheaper way of applying for those with enough know-how...
Dude a national patent is just that, a national patent. If some guy in Romania has a national patent for 5 years and then Romania joins the EU, he still only has a patent valid in Romania, there is no conflict. And if someone else in the EU already has an EP patent (covering a choice of several countries in the EU) then there is no way it can have previously designated Romania as Romania wasn't part of the EU when the patent was granted....
On the same subject people in Sweden and the UK can happily both have patents on the same thing as long as niehter were published before the other was applied for.. As the patents cover activity (copying etc) in different countries there is unlikely to be any conflict.
How about shutting your eyes during the commercials.. Grand thievery! If I'd known it was this easy I would have taken up a life of crime a long time ago....oh hang on, I did.
There was a great documentary about a device using the water hammer phonomenom to generate steam/power. The slightly crazed looking American guy who'd invented it had just installed one in a fire station and predicted that it would revolutionise the world in a few months.....now lets see that would have been around 5 years ago?
Anybody heard anything since?
"If I had a hammer...I'd hammer some water.."
I'm not a 100 percent sure on US law, but in the UK you can't infringe a patent by doing something on a personal basis, (ie. non-commercially) So companies spamming might infringe but private users should be exempt.
Slashdot Mirror
Just so's you know..
Absolutely right. If anyone would care to read the text of the proposal, (and maybe then you'll stop paniccing about it) A link for the latest version available dated 17-03-2004 Software directive [register.consileum.eu] There is a working document dated last week but not available.
Nope, they are not doing it for commercial usage so they don't infringe. Not to mention the US government do not have to recognise patents held by their citizens (this mainly gets used so the military can rip off ideas..)
More pertinent perhaps is the question of whether or not we moving towards a federal united europe? We've been trying to implement the EC patent (ComPat) for years and not getting very far so I'm not convinced that a federal super state is going to be on the horizon anytime soon..
Hang on, I'm getting sucked in to answering the EPOs questions for them...dangerously close to giving away what I do for a living. :)
In the US of course you can patent sticks and methods of playing with cats if you want to......
Actually in the UK people like business link and similar initiatives try to help the little guys and the Engineering and Science research council (whatever acronym they're using these days)and others can be useful to academics struggling in the big bad world of intellectual property. As for pro bono patent lawyers though, never heard of one.
..but unlike in the US, if you reckon you can write up the spec yourself then in the UK you can prosecute the application yourself as a private applicant. This does lead to some 'interesting' patent applications but is also a much cheaper way of applying for those with enough know-how...
On the same subject people in Sweden and the UK can happily both have patents on the same thing as long as niehter were published before the other was applied for.. As the patents cover activity (copying etc) in different countries there is unlikely to be any conflict.
How about shutting your eyes during the commercials.. Grand thievery! If I'd known it was this easy I would have taken up a life of crime a long time ago.. ..oh hang on, I did.
There was a great documentary about a device using the water hammer phonomenom to generate steam/power. The slightly crazed looking American guy who'd invented it had just installed one in a fire station and predicted that it would revolutionise the world in a few months.....now lets see that would have been around 5 years ago? Anybody heard anything since? "If I had a hammer...I'd hammer some water.."
I'm not a 100 percent sure on US law, but in the UK you can't infringe a patent by doing something on a personal basis, (ie. non-commercially) So companies spamming might infringe but private users should be exempt.