Demonstration Against Software Patents

seanos

The Council of European Minister is pushing Software Patents, and this against
the democratically voted decision of the European Parliament of last
september.


In accordance with : http://demo.ffii.org/
The NetSoc website shall be down for 10 days ...
Just giving you all warning ;

I would ask that any of you reading this will do the same with your respective websites.


Current list of participating websites :
http://www.eurielec.etsit.upm.es/OnlineDemo.php
[We the 13th to Participate]

Ruaidhri

a) that was a very democratic decision on your behalf
b) you real;ly dont like the idea of making money, do you
c) i'm not taking down www.boy-bussy.tk

Stephen

I'm not going to try to open boy-pussy.tk here in work, I really don't think that would look well in the logs.

So, pray tell, what is it?

Ivan

What gets to me is how nobody seems to be able to tell me exactly what is changed by this law. Or how it negatively affects software programmers.

leeroybrown

http://www.ifso.info/projects/swpats.html
http://swpat.ffii.org/

It's most damaging impact will be on free software.

To my mind, apart from the disasterous consequence this could have for free software the real issue centres around the ease at which you can actually get a patent for something where there is clearly prior art. Unfortunately once a patent is wrongly granted anyone who infringes it can be litigated against and their only recourse is to challange the it, which will always prove incredibly expensive.

BT patented the hyperlink years ago (I'm not sure of the current status of the patent):
http://swpat.ffii.org/patents/effects/hyperlink/index.en.html

The Eolas patent (very topical at the moment) describes in broad terms the concept of a browser plugin. Many millions of dollars have gotten this thrown out (the downside of which is that this saves Microsoft €500M+ in damages). Strictly speaking this patent if it remained in force would have required every web page containing APPLET, EMBED or OBJECT tags to be modified.

Amazon filed a patent for 'one click commerce' which essentially meant that any web purchase made in association with a cookie was infringing. More law suits.

All the above involve prior art, lots of money and a hell of a lot of unnecessary problems. There are thousands more where they came from.

The EU patenting office is slightly better at checking than it's (abysmal) US counterpart but not much.

Ivan

Now hold on a second. It seems to me that the problem should be with the patent system in general, as its crazy handing out unwarranted patents to whomever decides to apply for them.

Extending the patent laws to cover software should not be a problem, it should be welcomed.

Originally posted by leeroybrown

It's most damaging impact will be on free software.

How does a software patent negatively affect free software.

Surely you can apply for an open source licence which allows anyone to edit it but prevents them from selling it for profit and hence prevents someone from patenting your work?

Taken from http://www.ifso.info/projects/swpats.html
It's crazy that the EP is even considering extending the patent system to cover software, but the monopolies have vast resources for lobbying the MEPs, and the monopolies stand to gain a lot from the impending stagnation of the market.

This seems to be just blatant scare mongering. What about the countless programmers who design complex software architecture only for some big corporation to come along and steal it simply because software cannot be patented.

See, it works both ways.

To be honest, its the type of thing that should be debated, analysed and set up properly, not a blanket 'NO' across the board. Software patents have the potential to help as well as to hinder.

seanos

One can patent an idea, something which isn't solid.
By being able to patent an idea, a thought, a process, you are in fact, as leeroy put it, infringing on the idea behind programming....the suitation we're in currently is bad enough, without it getting worse.

Btw leeroy; loved the point on BT.
I remember that about 3 years back I think at this point [maybe 4], where BT sent lots big companies [HUGE companies] legal letters saying they owed them X Million due to using Hyperlinks on their websites.
What insued was general hysterical laughter

/me goes off to patent while loops.

Ivan

Originally posted by Sinnocence
One can patent an idea, something which isn't solid.
By being able to patent an idea, a thought, a process, you are in fact, as leeroy put it, infringing on the idea behind programming....

That makes absolutely no sense whatsoever. Are you saying that by creating a patenting law for software then companies can patent the idea behind software. My understanding of patenting law implies that you produce a particular piece of software such as a database engine/game engine/etc. etc. and you patent it. Now, if anyone uses this particular engine/code they have to pay you royalties. It doesnt mean that whenever someone creates their own game engine etc. that they have to pay you royalties then.

In theory, sure, it seems like a bad idea, but in practice... wasnt the telephone patented, the t.v. and the P.c. But there is no market stagnation or monopolies taking over. Seriously guys, show me some proof.

Originally posted by Sinnocence

Btw leeroy; loved the point on BT.
I remember that about 3 years back I think at this point [maybe 4], where BT sent lots big companies [HUGE companies] legal letters saying they owed them X Million due to using Hyperlinks on their websites.
What insued was general hysterical laughter

This only goes to show that big, ridiculous blanket patents just wont work.

If anything it proves my point :dunno:

Patents have to be very specific or they are just unenforcable and hence arent.

seanos

It's black...

Ivan

Originally posted by Sinnocence
It's black...

Ok, that makes even less sense...

leeroybrown

That makes absolutely no sense whatsoever. Are you saying that by creating a patenting law for software then companies can patent the idea behind software.

Yes. A patent is a mechanism to protect an innovation. To patent something you need to have a new idea or novel/innovative way of approaching an existing problem.

In the area of software the current protection mechanism is Copyright (or CopyLeft in a lot of open source cases).

Ivan

A patent doesnt protect an idea or govern the use of an idea. It protects a specific application of an idea.

When Alexander graham bell developed the phone, he couldnt patent the physics behind it. He couldnt say "Well I discovered that sound can travel through a cable, now I'm going to patent it and prevent others from using this INNOVATION or else force them to pay me money".

You can only patent the application of the knowledge, which seems perfectly reasonable to me.

And with "copyleft", open source people are covered as well.

I really cannot see the problem with all this :eek:

i_am_dogboy

Originally posted by Sinnocence
It's black...

no it's white

Redrocket

i say pink

i_am_dogboy

vas deferens