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EU Software Patents Delayed Again

Posted by timothy on Mon Jan 24, 2005 05:02 AM
from the it's-like-a-time-loop dept.
Patents Software
Lord An writes "It seems the decision about software patents in Europe has been delayed again for at least a week (link in German). Once again we have to thank Poland that the corresponding item was removed from the A-list of the Council of Agriculture and Fisheries. Hopefully this delay will be enough that the opposition vs. the patents will finally get the upper hand." Non-German speakers might find it useful to plug that URL into the Fish.
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  • What??? no comments yet! (Score:2, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward
    what's with you guys - hurry it up, I can't RTFA !
    • You can read about it in English here [nosoftwarepatents.com].

      But it's good news in whatever language :-)

      • UK Wants EU Directive (Score:4, Informative)

        by LilBlackKittie (179799) on Monday January 24 2005, @05:54AM (#11454067) Homepage
        Here's what the secretary of state for trade and industry wrote to me: [maz.nu]

        We already have patents for computer-implemented inventions in the UK. 20% of patents are for the above. Here's a few sentences on open source, even though your letter doesn't mention it. That's because we're sending you a boilerplate letter. The UK supports the EU Directive on software patents. We think UK innovators and users, especially small firms want software patents. There's no evidence that software patents will harm the industry. Not even in America. The EU Directive will only clarify the current law, not change it. UK Government did a consultation exercise in autumn 2000, which concluded that the status quo of having software patents is the best position. I'd never heard of this consultation. DTI is about the private sector. Nowhere in the letter does it reference my concern: the public sector.

        • I find it highly ammusing that Patricia Hewitt can't spell her name correctly!
        • There was talk in autumn 2000 about a 'consultative process' and the results were published in March 2001 (obviously an in-depth process) which effectively said [patent.gov.uk]: "Some think software patents are good, others think they are bad." (You get what you pay for, eh, what?).

          In my humble and unprejudiced opinion, Patricia Hewitt is a brain-dead industry yes-woman ("...outsourcing is good. We have appointed the CEO of an Indian outsourcing company to determine the effects and will be reporting soon...").

  • What is wrong with software patents (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Sanity (1431) on Monday January 24 2005, @05:07AM (#11453943) Homepage Journal
    Here is an article I wrote a few days ago which is intended to introduce the issue of software patents, and why they are a bad thing:

    The European Union is attempting to pass a Directive that will force many European governments to permit patents on software despite growing protests from software engineers and small European software companies. Opponents fear that software patents will stifle innovation and competition in their industry, increasing their legal costs, while leaving them at the mercy of large companies who have the resources to acquire large numbers of patents. The Directive is supported by trade groups dominated by large multinational software companies, along with national patent offices who generate revenue from patent applications. A patent is a fearsome weapon, not only does it prevent someone from copying an invention, it also prevents them from independently inventing the same thing. This means that you could spend your entire life sitting in a cave, with no contact with the outside world, and anything you invent could still infringe other people's patents. In contrast, a copyright only prevents other people from copying your work. If you copyright a poem and someone else, by chance, happens to write the same poem without copying yours, then they are not infringing your copyright.

    The purpose of patents, indeed all forms of intellectual property, is to promote the arts and sciences. Patents achieve this by granting an inventor exclusive control over their invention for a limited time. In return, the inventor is required to disclose their invention so that after the limited time expires, it is freely available to the rest of society. Society benefits when this provides an incentive for inventors to invent, where otherwise they might not have bothered.

    A patent isn't just granted on an idea for an invention, it can only be granted once you have a prototype, or at least the ability to teach someone how to build a prototype, this is known as a "teachable invention". Patents therefore motivate an inventor to take their idea and invest the time and money to develop it into a teachable invention. In return for this, and a small fee, inventors are granted a 20 year monopoly over their invention.

    This monopoly is not granted without a price. Every invention builds on those that came before, yet for the duration of a patent nobody else can build on a patented invention without the permission of the inventor. This creates a cost for society, and other inventors. Patents work when the benefit to society of having the invention outweighs the cost of the inventor's monopoly over it.

    In a field such as pharmaceuticals, a vast investment may be required to get from an idea for a new drug, to the drug itself. In this case, it is easy to see how a patent on this drug will benefit society if it provides sufficient motivation to the drug's inventor to make the investment required to invent it. Software, however, is very different. Getting from an idea to a prototype in software requires very little investment and risk. This is the great strength of software. Its why Bill Gates, a college drop-out, could build a multi-billion dollar company out of nothing but the ideas in his head. Its why Linus Torvalds could later sow the seeds of an operating system built by volunteers that would challenge that multi-billion dollar company.

    Patents should not apply to software for the simple reason that they would do far more harm than good, harming creativity rather than promoting it. Software doesn't need patents, copyright is more than adequate to provide the incentive software engineers need to turn their ideas into software. The cost to society of a 20 year monopoly over a software invention will never be justified, because it is inconceivable that any software invention could require such a powerful incentive. The price for this monopoly is paid by other inventors, and so the effect is to stifle innovation, not to promote it.

    Unfortunately software is not the only fie

    • another thing I consider important to remember is that software producers have the option of hiding to an extent how they do something (non-human readable binaries) whereas someone who invents and sells a mousetrap can have their product readily disassembled.
    • Its why Linus Torvalds could later sow the seeds of an operating system built by volunteers that would challenge that multi-billion dollar company.

      It was actually Richard Stallman who did that. Linus only coded a kernel and connected all the pieces together, GNU+Linux. Now I shall wait the /. modbots to mod me -1 troll.

      • Re:What is wrong with software patents (Score:4, Insightful)

        by SnowZero (92219) on Monday January 24 2005, @06:15AM (#11454117)
        Linus only coded a kernel

        Which is incidentally something RMS has so far been unable to do. Linus plugged the gaping hole in GNU that was/is the quagmire of Hurd.

        While I respect the GNU people for GCC and the GPL, I don't consider the rest of the necessary stuff as all that difficult to write: libc and the unix utilities. I call my systems GNU/Linux mainly because of GCC (and in spite of things like "info"). Calling Linux "only" a kernel is a joke; you can't do anything without kernel (or the compiler). So maybe Linus could give more credit to GNU, but then again maybe he would if RMS didn't try to aggrandize himself at every opportunity...
    • While I oppose software patents as they are currently implemented in the US I disagree with some of your statements,

      [QUOTE]Its why Bill Gates, a college drop-out, could build a multi-billion dollar company out of nothing but the ideas in his head.[/QUOTE]

      Mr. Gates first sales were of a compiler and operating system to IBM. The OS he purchased from another programmer, and the compiler followed many of the same ideas and designs of DEC Basic (I've heard unsubstantiated rumors that he had looked at the sour
      • SHA is a security protocol, the value of SHA is proportional to the number of people who looked at the source and tryed to break it. Sure you probably need a security expert, or even several ones to come up with SHA. It is not simple, but the harder work is on the hand of those others who try to break it, and in this process validate it. Shouldn't those be rewarded also?

        DMCA and other laws that protect the "intelectual property" is already harming this. In France, Guillaume Tena, is in jail for the simple reason that he validate a piece of saoftware and found ou that it has bugs. The bad thing is that this not even involve patents, it is copywrite and anti-reverse-engenieer laws.

        I believe that copywrite and patents and almost any form of "intelectual property" is harmfull. science and arts do evolve by copying(*) of good ideas of others. How many movies of great directors you saw that "cite" or makes "homages" to other movies and other directors? This is a kind of copy, rewrite and rehash is part of creating, we as a society must learn to live with it.

        As it stand, sometimes a copy is better then the original.

        (*) Coping here is used refering to rewrites or re-enactments of a piece or many pieces of another work. Not to word-to-word or byte-by-byte xerox copy.

      • Mr. Gates has had superb business sense and has had tremendous success with his leadership of Microsoft, but I'm not sure how much of his success can be attributed to 'nothing but ideas in his head'.

        The point I was making is that Bill Gates, who wasn't particularly wealthy, was able to succeed in software because of its low barriers to entry. I wasn't endorsing everything he has ever done.

        With the state of patenting as it currently is I agree, but if changes were made so that patents are 'properly' re

      • Re:What is wrong with software patents (Score:4, Insightful)

        by Znork (31774) on Monday January 24 2005, @07:23AM (#11454274)
        "The real problem is that patents should only be awarded in any field based on innovativeness"

        The trouble is, for anyone skilled in a field there are few things that are truly innovative.

        Encryption algorithms may seem advanced and innovative to you, but to a mathematician they're often old news barely worth a mention in a puzzle book. And to a programmer reasonably skilled in math, it's trivial to implement something like that in code, so no real 'invention' has been made.

        Most new ideas are made up from small steps, and each of those small steps is often natural progression, incremental improvement. Hard work and toil, trying to solve a specific problem.

        But patents are not supposed to be a reward for hard work. They're not a salary. And they definitely were not meant to take away someone elses salary and prevent them from reaping the benefit of their own hard work.

        No, if we still need a state sponsored reward for inventions, let the patent office grant grants instead. If they think an invention is such a great leap that it deserves a reward, let the government pay out a cash prize instead.

        The small inventor would be far more likely to profit from such a scheme, and the patent office could have an interest in not letting someone patent the green, blue, yellow, red and black paperclip because that makes them seem five times as productive and the country five times as innovative.

      • The real problem is that patents should only be awarded in any field based on innovativeness - the likelyhood that it could or would have been invented without a substantial investment of sweat equity.

        How likely something is to have been invented is completely irrelevant to the question of whether it ought to be patentable.

        Patents don't reward inventors, they protect investors. They are an economic device to encourage investment in things that otherwise are considered too risky by those with the money

      • [quote]

        Mr. Gates first sales were of a compiler and operating system to IBM. The OS he purchased from another programmer, and the compiler followed many of the same ideas and designs of DEC Basic (I've heard unsubstantiated rumors that he had looked at the source from the DEC Basic compiler), also he apparently used bios code that he did not have copyright to.

        [/quote]

        "...the best way to prepare [to be a programmer] is to write programs, and to study great programs that other people have written. In my case

    • Those advocating software patents often ask "Why should software creators be denied patent protection, while those in other fields are not?"

      Isn't software the only thing that can be protected by both copyright and patent, making one of them redundant?

  • The of Luxembourg council presidency explained itself after information from diplomat circles ready to shift the planned official verabschiedung of the disputed position of the Minister committee as the guideline over the patenting bar of "computer-implemented inventions" again around one week. Instead of of the agrarian and fishery advice on Monday in May the point of view fastened under troubles is therefore to be abgenickt on 31 January in the advice for general questions and external relations. From the

  • Into the fish? (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 24 2005, @05:08AM (#11453951)
    No no no, that's not how it works. If you want to make a HHGTTG reference you should do it properly: You don't plug anything in the fish. You plug the fish in your ear, that's how it's done!
  • I know that with software patents you have to seed them properly before you can harvest them later, but can somebody explain to me what it is doing on the agenda of the council of agriculture and fisheries?

    • Re:Council of Agriculture and Fisheries ??????? (Score:5, Informative)

      by cheezemonkhai (638797) on Monday January 24 2005, @05:11AM (#11453962) Homepage
      It's the next meeting of enough of the right people, so in theory the meber states could vote on it there.

      Yes I know it has nothing to do with agriculture, and I think it's a stupid idea to.

      The reason it got to this committee was that certain people had pushed and railroaded it through, and they wanted it passed by people who had no concept of it's effect and so wouldn't ask questions.

      So good on Poland :D
    • It's because in May, the responsible ministers reached a political agreement on this text (sort of, anyway). Such a political agreement has no legal value however, and must still be turned into a "common position".

      Normally, turning a political agreement in a common position is just a formality. That's the reason why it can be done by any kind of Council formation.

      Of course, in this case we have the fact that Poland really abstained [ffii.org] in May (although they were recorded as voting in favour) and that since November change of voting weights there no longer is a qualified majority because of this, the fact that the Dutch parliament asked its government to change the pro-vote into an abstention, a similar motion by the German Bundestag etc.

      Diplomatic inertia is a powerful force to fight, however: political agreements are "always" turned into a common position, so they want to do it this time as well, even though it's completely against democratic principles [lenz.name].

        • Actually, the dutch parliament told the dutch minister of economic affairs to vote against software patents. Brinkhorst, the dutch minister of economic affairs, then voted for software patents, because he doesn't give a shit about the democratic process. Dutch parliament then told him to change his vote in "against," he didn' t want to because that would mean losing face so instead he abstained.

          No. Before the Council meeting in May, Brinkhorst told the Dutch Parliament that there was no problem with su

    • That's the point. The unelected €C want to pass this directive (despite the member states' governments, the EU Parliament, the public and the European software industry being against it) as a certain large US software company is bribing their commissioners.

      The €C were hoping that the farmers and fishing folk wouldn't notice that this fishy directive was being shoved through their council. NB: the €C only added it to the list of directives to pass at the council one working day before the council met (even though they are supposed to give at least six weeks notice) and were hoping no one would notice so it would have got passed by default.

      Thankfully, both times they've tried this trick the Polish minister has been awake. Clearly they intend to keep on trying in the hope that eventually they'll get away with it. It seems that if everyone in the room snores through the entire meeting, it gets accepted by default.

  • ...poland [youforgotpoland.com].
  • This was also reported on Friday in eWeek here [eweek.com].
  • from nosoftwarepatents.com

    WITH YET ANOTHER COUNCIL DELAY, JURI IS STILL OUT ON SOFTWARE PATENTS

    Poland requests another delay of the adoption of the EU Council's common position on a software patent directive -- JURI (legal affairs committee of the European Parliament) may ask for restart of entire legislative process next week

    Brussels (24 January 2005). At the request of Poland, the EU Council once again postponed the adoption of a so-called common position on a software patent directive, which had be

  • Corruption (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Skiron (735617) on Monday January 24 2005, @05:21AM (#11453991) Homepage
    The biggest story here is the way the European Parliament and associated croonies keep on trying to get this directive through the backdoor without no reference to the rules, law or democratic society.

    Fisheries and Agriculture? The people behind this must be offering big backhanders to all involved to push this through at all costs, that's all I can say.

    • Re:Corruption (Score:5, Insightful)

      by BeeRockxs (782462) on Monday January 24 2005, @05:32AM (#11454022)
      The biggest story here is the way the European Parliament and associated croonies keep on trying to get this directive through the backdoor without no reference to the rules, law or democratic society.

      The European parliament is trying to get this directive axed, it's the European Council that's trying to get it through.

      • Re:Corruption (Score:5, Informative)

        by sepluv (641107) <blakesley.gmail@com> on Monday January 24 2005, @07:26AM (#11454279) Homepage
        Actually its the EPO (who have been unlawfully breaking the current laws to create more work for themselves and want to have their unlawful action legitimised) and the European Commision (who are being bribed by a certain large US software company) who are pushing this through.

        The majority of the council of ministers are against and nearly all of the parliament are (in fact I think every single MEP is against the proposal as it currently stands including McCarthy).

    • Re:Corruption (Score:5, Informative)

      by Halo1 (136547) <jonas.maebe@NoSpAm.elis.ugent.be> on Monday January 24 2005, @05:38AM (#11454035) Homepage
      The biggest story here is the way the European Parliament and associated croonies keep on trying to get this directive through the backdoor without no reference to the rules, law or democratic society.
      It's the European Commission and Council of Ministers that keep trying to push it through. The European Parliament is the one that tried to stop it in September 2003.
      Fisheries and Agriculture? The people behind this must be offering big backhanders to all involved to push this through at all costs, that's all I can say.
      In principle, the fact that it's handled by agriculture and fisheries is not special [slashdot.org].
  • Once again it's the poorer member states in the EU who have to stand in the way of globalisation and giant companies trying to punish the smaller companies.

    I really do wonder about the EU commission, undemocratically elected and accusations of corruption are nothing new (the whole commission resigned a few years back).
      • Not for making law it isn't (or it shouldn't be)...

        • Re:Capitalism (Score:5, Informative)

          by vidarh (309115) <vidar@hokstad.com> on Monday January 24 2005, @06:57AM (#11454211) Homepage Journal
          Ignoring the fact that the patent issue is currently going through the Council of Ministers and not the Comission, neither of them can make law on their own.

          The EU process for creating and ratifying a law is long winded - a simplified version (likely to contain errors - there is a proper long winded description at the official EU website but I can't be bothered looking it up) is that the comission will usually suggest a law, whereupon the parliament will discuss it and suggest changes and vote on it, after which the council will debate it and vote upon it, at which point it will go back to the parliament, giving parliament a second chance to reject it and force a reconsideration or restart the process.

          The reason the council has the power it has is that the council represents the national parliaments, and because the EU is not a state/country or a federation it does not have real law making power itself. The EU can NOT create binding laws for the member states. It can issue directives requiring the member states to create laws or face sanctions.

          The council members can be directed by national parliaments using whatever processes the member states prefer, while the national parliaments have no such authority over the EU parliament, and hence the EU parliament CAN'T be given control over the law making process without a dramatic shift in the power balance towards the EU.

          Allowing the EU parliament to effectively make law (as opposed to now, when it can prevent a directive from being passed, which doesn't prevent the member states from unilaterally creating a law) would likely require ammendments to the custitutions of most EU member states since it would involve giving up sovereignty. Under the current process, on the other hand, the governments are only bound to treaties which, though costly to do, they can pull out of, and which retain the national parliaments sovereign rights to pass laws on behalf of their citizens.

          In essence, the council is a result of the process by which the EU has been created as a loose confederation where the EU government is subordinate to the member states' governments. If the EU at some point becomes a federation, it would be logical to remove the council, or transfer large parts of the power to the parliament, but that's not a very likely prospect for many years.

      • The lack of accountability, if they misuse their power then the voting public doesn't have the power to oust them at the next round of elections.
        • It's a lot more than that now.

          The EU member states are subject to EU laws, there's economic union thanks to the Euro. This also dictates taxes and monetary policy.

  • Patents in the EU and USA (Score:5, Insightful)

    by tres3 (594716) on Monday January 24 2005, @06:05AM (#11454095) Homepage
    I think that delaying and then defeating patents in Europe is the best opportunity that we have in the USA to get the subject revisited. There is a need to have some uniformity in patent laws throughout the world, or at least with our major trading partners; if we (or more accurately, Europeans) can get Europe to defeat software patents or at least demand that they truly be inventive and not the next logical step in programming (a la one click) then there will be a need to have the two systems brought closer together. If Europe stands opposed to them, and America (Adobe/Micro$oft) stands for them then hopefully they will be forced to compromise. Not that a compromise is a good solution for us but I believe a negotiation like this is the best hope/chance that we have at bringing our patent system in line with what our Founding Fathers had in mind: "To Promote the Useful Arts and Sciences". As long as US politicians are bought and paid for by the big corporations there is no other way that this issue will come up for discussion in either the House or the Senate.

  • Software patents delayed yet again again (Score:4, Informative)

    by erik_norgaard (692400) on Monday January 24 2005, @06:26AM (#11454138) Homepage
    Due to the general election in Denmark the socialist party has withdrawn it's support for the software patent directive and demanded that the current government blocks the decision at least untill after the election on february 8.

    Effectively, this means that if the minister of economy votes in favor of the directive on january 31, he will be forced to withdraw his vote when he returns.

    Article (in danish):

    http://www.computerworld.dk/default.asp?Mode=2&A rt icleID=26766
  • There should be more people active in this discussion.
    I think it dimishes our democracys (in europe) if we allow for the Europe Council circunvent the vote and opinio of the democratically elected European Parlament.
    There should be enough geeks * near the strings of power to make those in power aware of their needs.
    If that is not the case, we have to make enough noise until we are heard and the European Parlament Directives get aproved

    * I use geek in the thecnological savvy meaning.
    • There should be enough geeks (I use geek in the thecnological savvy meaning) near the strings of power to make those in power aware of their needs.

      Yes, but unfortunately, as you probably well know, those in power are never geeks, don't understand geeks, and are not much interested in geeks. They are interested in money and power. They studied law, economics, or politics. They spent their life rubbing elbows. They are in a totally different class then geeks.

      I know, this sounds cynical, but it the truth.

  • "Thank you for your letter, which I read with interest, and the points
    you made. The Labour MEPs' position on software patents is reflected in
    the amendments we tabled and voted for in the Parliament's report on the
    Commission proposal on the patentability of computer-implemented
    inventions. In short, the position remains:

    * No US-style patenting of software.

    * Software as such, must not be patented. No patenting of
    business methods or "general ideas"

    * Opensource software must be allowed to flourish and the
    Commission must ensure that this Directive does not have any adverse
    effect on opensource software and small software developers.

    * Patents and the threat of litigation must not be used as an
    anti-competitive weapon to squeeze out small companies.

    The Member States and European Commission will negotiate with Parliament
    on our amendments and we hope we can achieve an outcome which will limit
    and restrict the patentability of computer-implemented inventions.

    As you are aware the European Patent Office has already handed down some
    40,000 software patents and without an EU directive we could end up
    drifting towards extending patentability to business methods, algorithms
    or mathematical methods, as is the case in the US.

    Labour MEPs are not voting to introduce software patents but to limit
    patents."

    • Pedantic, but pertinent: UK Labour Party line

      I'd argue that the line being followed is that of the European Parliamentary Labour Party, not the UK Labour Party per se. The EPLP's line may very well differ from UKLP, just as the Welsh and Scottish Labour Parties differ in policies while remaining close (politically) to John Smith House.

      I suspect the EPLP is towing the GPES (European Socialists) line, while the UK Labour Party is doing whatever the Civil Service and Big Business tell it to.

    • The Labour MEPs' position...is reflected in the
      amendments we tabled and voted for in the Parliament's report
      That's total and utter bullshit: the exact opposite to the truth.

      They did not table the amendments (which I think were mostly tabled by UK Green and SNP MEPs) but they (specifically UK Labour MEP, Arlene McCarthy) did table the proposed directive they claim they called to be amended.

      No Labour MEPs voted for it to be amended.

      The UK Labour MEPs consistently used threats and underhand tatics to try and stop those amnedments being passed by other MEPs.

      The UK MEPs originally wrote and proposed this directive.

      Check the record on the European Parliament WWW site.

    • Apple was in no position to patent the windowing interface. It was Xerox PARC (Palo Alto Research Center) that developed the mouse, windows, ethernet, and many other things that we take for granted in modern desktop computers. It is said that the greatest business faux pas was the person who chose not to go into business with Alexander Grahm Bell because he thought that few people would want a novelty like a telephone in their home. If that is true then the second biggest faux pas has to be the Xerox Boa
    • The Dane Valdemar Poulsen (who also invented the telephone answering machine) came up with a "Method of, and apparatus for, effecting the storing up of speech or signals by magnetically influencing magnetisable bodies".

      Also, a German engineer named Fritz Pfleumer in 1928 demonstrated a magnetic recorder of his own design which used paper tape coated with steel dust.

      (ref: http://www.amps.net/newsletters/issue27/27_poulse n .htm [amps.net])
    • It seems that the right time has come to deliver the Thank Poland letter [thankpoland.info] with all the signatures which have been confirmed so far; right now the most likely date appears to be Thursday this week (January 27). I plan to fly to Warsaw for this, and we'll try to get some significant media coverage. If you think you might be able to help with this, please drop me an email at nb@norbert.ch

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