Folks,
KDE (Ireland) and the committees of the Irish Linux Users' Group and the
Irish Free Software Organisation on behalf of their members sent a
briefing document (authored by myself, Colm Buckley, Ciaran O'Riordan
and with many contributions from others) to all Irish MEPs to explain
the issues surrounding Software Patentability & EU Directive
COD/2002/0047 as we see them and to impress upon them the importance of
voting against this directive in its current form.
It was printed, binded and posted in this morning's post (Tuesday). Full
details and copies can be found at:
http://www.kde.ie/patents/
I would like to thank all ILUG members that e-mailed their MEP(s) over
the last week. Those e-mails made a _hugh_ difference and the briefing
document was a direct result from requests for more information that we
received from a number of MEPs on foot of these e-mails.
I would also like to thank Malcolm Tyrrell, Noirin Plunkett, Niall O
Broin and Glenn Strong for their time and efforts in proof reading,
contributions and interest. And I hope I didn't leave anyone out.
Kind regards,
Barry
--
Regards,
Barry O'Donovan
http://www.barryodonovan.com/http://www.ihl.ucd.ie/
Public key: http://www.barryodonovan.com/gpg.asc
Hi,
I've just stumbled across this letter from Charlie McCreevy to the Chair
of Committee on Legal Affairs [1] and wonder as to its meaning.
It seems to be saying that the Parliament can decide to *reject* the
proposal, and that if this should happen then he would 'not propose to
submit a new directive'. I'm not sure what to make of it.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Letter from:
Charlie McCreevy
Member of the European Commission
Letter to:
Mr Giuseppe Gargami
Member of the European Parliament
Chairman
Committee on Legal Affairs
European Parliament
Rue Wiertz
1047 Brussels
Dated 9th March 2005
Dear Chairman,
Following the formal adoption by the Council of its common position on
the proposal for the directive on the patentability of computer
implemented inventions on Monday 7 March, the Commission has today
forwarded to the European Parliament its communication on the Council's
common position in accordance with normal procedures.
You will recall that I attended the Committee on Legal Affairs on 2
February to debate this proposal with the Committee. I also attended the
meeting of the Conference of Presidents on 3 March and made a statement
in the plenary session of the European Parliament on 8 March. I have
listened carefully to the views expressed in the European Parliament
during the past month. I understand that a *new wind* is blowing.
The matter is now in your hands, The Parliament can *reject* or
*substantially amend* the proposal. As I said in the plenary on 8 March,
if the Parliament decides to reject the common position, the Commission
will respect your wishes. I will not propose to the Commission to submit
a new directive.
I should like to underline, in accordance with what President Barroso
indicated in his letter to President Borrell of 25 February, that the
Commission stands ready to review all the arguments and positions
expressed and to work constructively with the Parliament and the Council
to find a solution in the interests of all. Should you decide to propose
commitments under the framework agreement. Any modifications will need
to be careful evaluated given the complexity of the subject matter. You
will understand, of course, that the Commission cannot speak on behalf
of the Council and I would urge the Parliament to engage constructively
with the Council in the future on this dossier. I am ready to help in
any way.
Yours Sincerely
Charlie Mc
------------------------------------------------------------------------
--
Adam M
[1] http://wiki.ffii.org/Com050311En
It's patently absurd to let the bureaucrats take over
John Naughton
Sunday March 13, 2005
The Observer
Do you know who your MEP is? If not, can I respectfully suggest that you
click on www.europarl.org.uk and find out, pronto? There are 12 European
constituencies in the UK, and each has between three and 10 MEPs. They
need to hear from you, because they hold your future in their hands. And
the irony is that many of them probably don't know that yet.
At stake is a simple but overarching question: who runs Europe: the
elected European Parliament or the unelected European Commission? This
may seem a rather grand question for a technology column, but bear with me.
It just so happens that the issue which has brought the power struggle
between the parliament and the commission to a head concerns the future
of software, and especially the future of open source software, the
stuff that makes the internet (and a great deal more besides, including
your broadband modem) work. What's happening is that the commission has
been nobbled by a small number of large software companies (among them a
noted US monopolist), and is trying to railroad through a directive that
would enable them to control the evolution of software.
Here's the story so far. In 2002, the commission proposed that
'computer-implemented inventions' should be patentable in Europe. In
2003, the European Parliament amended the proposal to exclude computer
programs and 'business methods'. Last May, these amendments were
discarded by the commission and the original draft directive was
resurrected.
In December, the commission tried to push the directive through by
making it an 'A-list' item at the (wait for it) European Fisheries
meeting. (An A-list item is one that is approved without either a
discussion or a vote.) This wheeze was initially foiled by Poland. The
parliament then considered the whole affair and demanded that the
commission think again about software patents.
The commission refused and tabled the directive as an A-list item at
last Monday's council of ministers meeting. This time, Denmark requested
a postponement but Luxembourg (currently holding the presidency) refused
the request - on 'institutional' grounds. The directive now goes back to
the parliament, where it can be stopped - but only by a majority vote of
MEPs.
Why are software patents bad news? Simply because patents (unlike
copyright) allow someone to control access to an idea. Ideas are not
copyrightable - only tangible expressions of them are. Thus James
Joyce's idea of stream-of-consciousness narrative could not be
copyrighted, but the text of Ulysses (in which the idea was given
expression) could be. And that's fine.
But a patent gives the patentee monopoly control of an idea - not of a
tangible implementation of it - for 20 years. There is a valid US patent
for a method of exercising one's cat by using a laser pointer to create
a moving spot of light. (I'm not making this up - it's US patent no.
5,443,036). So if you decide to exercise your moggie by using a small
mirror to deflect sunlight onto the floor you may be infringing
someone's intellectual property.
In most areas of life, we can live with that. But the trouble with
software is that it is pure 'thought-stuff'. A computer program is a set
of ideas turned into instructions that a computer can execute. Software
is thus the expression of an idea, and is rightly covered by copyright.
And again, that's fine. If I have the talent and dedication to write a
great program, it's reasonable that my creation should be protected.
But extending patent law to cover software would have a chilling effect
on creativity and competition. Take for example the idea of using a
computer to organise the composition of documents - ie what we now call
word-processing. There are innumerable programs on the market that do
this - all protected by copyright. But imagine if someone had been able
to patent the original idea. That would have meant that nobody could
have developed a word-processing program without the permission of the
patentee and paying a royalty for the privilege.
The fact that software hasn't been patentable has led to an explosion in
creativity because the barriers to entry to the market are very low. To
create a great program, all you need is an idea, programming talent,
dedication and a computer. But in the world desired by the European
Commission, the first thing you will need is a patent lawyer - to check
that the ideas embodied in your embryonic program are not owned by
someone else.
And if your program turns out to be popular, it will only be a matter of
time before a patent lawyer acting for a big company claims that you may
have infringed one of his client's patents. So you stop selling and
spend months checking whether this is true. Even if you're sure you're
not infringing, there is the risk that he will raise the ante by
threatening to take you to court anyway. And he's got a colossal budget
for litigation, whereas you don't. So perhaps the best thing is to cave
into the blackmail and pay the royalty. After all, you're a programmer,
not a poker player.
The only people who can play this kind of poker are big companies with
huge patent portfolios which they trade with one another - thereby
keeping troublesome outsiders out. These are precisely the outfits that
have nobbled the commission and led it to cock a snook at the
parliament. They must not be allowed to get away with it.
Which brings us back to your MEPs. They may not be aware of the
technical issues involved, but they will understand that there is a big
political issue here. The European Parliament is the only democratically
accountable institution in the EU. So far it has displayed a good
understanding of the patent issue.
It is being treated with contempt by the commission's unelected
bureaucrats. Sanity can be restored - but only if politicians turn up
and vote on the issue. So email your MEPs now. And if you need a basic
text to work from, follow the Footnotes link below.
Recent columns
05.10.2003: Microsoft's might makes us insecure
14.09.2003: Breaking through with the Baghdad blogger
07.09.2003: Hutton website shows where the betrayal lay
08.06.2003: Web's lack of bell curve is alarming
01.06.2003: If you really want to know, ask a blogger
18.05.2003: How will Gates fight Linux? It's a dead giveaway
25.05.2003: 3G fiasco - only the porn barons win
27.01.2002: Why Google just leaves everybody goggling
06.01.2002: Spam, spam, spam, spam, spam, horrible spam, disastrous spam...
30.09.2001: Jack Straw blames me for bin Laden
Hi there.
Tomorrow (Tueday 15th) is the third Tuesday of the month, so there will be an
IFSO meeting. All are welcome. 2000h in Mahaffey's pub:
http://www.compsoc.com/~coriordan/images/mahaffeys.png
Hope to see you there,
Malcohol.
_________________________________________________________________
Sign up for eircom broadband now and get a free two month trial.*
Phone 1850 73 00 73 or visit http://home.eircom.net/broadbandoffer
Thanks to Seth.
---------
http://www.guardian.co.uk/online/story/0,,1433686,00.html
Second sight
Glynn Moody
Thursday March 10, 2005
The Guardian
If you think computer patent law is boring, think again. Over the
past year, factions for and against the patenting of programs
have fought a battle for the soul of European software, and the
ramifications of a recent EU decision on the subject are likely
to be huge - and not just for anoraks.
Things began quietly in 2002, when the European Commission's
Directorate for the Internal Market submitted a proposal
regarding the patentability of "computer-implemented inventions".
In September 2003, the European Parliament added amendments that
made clear that programming code and business methods could not
be patented - a view widely held in Europe, if not in
patent-happy America where they can be given for quite mundane or
obvious concepts - as if you could patent the idea of a verb of
motion in an English sentence. It would turn the life of a
programmer into a nightmare.
But last May, for no apparent reason, the clarifications were
discarded, and a text close to the original draft that did allow
US-style software and business method patents was pushed through
by Ireland, which held the presidency of the European Council.
The software patent proposal finally turned up on a Fishery
Meeting agenda in December as what is known as an "A" item:
something that would be adopted without a discussion or a vote.
Poland's science minister raced to the meeting to request that
the item be removed from the agenda. Poland did this twice, but
these were simply postponements of the vote, not a restart to the
whole patent legislation process.
Meanwhile, the backlash against the European Commission's
attempts to steamroller this legislation through had been
growing. At the beginning of the year, German, Spanish and Dutch
politicians formally called on their respective governments not
to support the proposed text. The Legal Affairs Committee of the
European Parliament asked for a restart of the legislative
process, as did the European Parliament itself.
Against this background, Monday's meeting of the EU Council,
where the software patent directive was again an "A" item, was a
critical one. Denmark requested that the matter become a "B"
item, which would allow more discussions, a move supported by
several others. But the country currently holding the presidency,
Luxembourg, flatly refused - "for institutional reasons"; the
item remained on the "A" list, and the "common position" was
adopted, despite the manifest lack of unanimity.
This is a major victory for the pro-software patent lobby, but it
is by no means the end of the story. The directive now goes back
to the European parliament, which has the option of modifying it
- theoretically, at least, since an absolute majority is required
to do so, irrespective of abstentions and absences, and MEPs are
not known for their rigorous attendance levels.
But this time, things may be different. The European Commission
has gone out of its way to thwart the European parliament,
disregarding the wishes of various elected bodies by its
insistence that bureaucracy trumps democracy, and that fiats beat
votes. A time was bound to come when there would be a power
struggle over who really runs Europe: the commission or
parliament.
Maybe an apparently obscure battle over software patents will not
only go down in computing history, but also be counted as a
decisive moment in shaping the 21st century's political
landscape, too.
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