On 11/04/05 10:46, Malcolm Tyrrell wrote:
Someone on the campaignforcreativity list sent me this announcement e-mail. Looks like things are hotting up again.
(I thought there used to be a wiki page refuting some of their arguments, but I can't find it now, so I've had my rant here... if someone wants to start a wiki page for this stuff I'll gladly add to it)
: The objective of our campaign is to ensure that the legal protections : we enjoy, such as copyright, trademarks, patents and design rights are : not diluted. These protections are a right, they are not a privilege. : We must not allow them to be trampled on. We must fight back."
Whee! This pseudo-rebellious bullshit really annoys me... Fight the power, man!
: Is the Campaign opposed to open source software? : : No, not at all. In fact we are supportive. The directive will have no : effect on the development of open source software.
Except to massively increase the risks of doing so and the costs if patent searches, cross-licensing and litigation become necessary
: Patents have to be applied for.
Not sure if this is intented to mean "There is an imperative to apply for patents" or "Patents are not granted automatically".
: If open source developers want to create and publish : their own work they will continue to be free to do so.
How magnanimous! Except now they will face greater artificially-created costs and risks, for the benefit of a few megacorporations and parasitic patent farms.
: Once an invention has been made public it cannot be patented by : another, so it would be impossible for a company to 'steal' open : source material.
I think this is intended to mean that it is "impossible" for a company to patent an idea that has been published as open source software. Except I can think of at least one case where this has happened: Network Associates' broad anti-spam patent which was applied for in December 2002 and comes way after SpamAssassin and also after Paul Graham's article on Bayesian Spam filtering from August 2002 (http://paulgraham.com/spam.html).
: On the other hand, without patents commercial companies, or indeed : anyone who creates software or any other invention, would find it : impossible to make a return on their work.
Nonsense! "Impossible" is a pretty strong word. There are plenty of commercial software companies making a return on their work without patents. MySQL AB is probably a good example, but there must be many small companies who make a profit on the software they develop without patents.
: So whilst we support giving inventors a choice, those who oppose : patents would create a world in which only non-commercial software : would exist."
Further nonsense! Personally, I'd like more software to be Free Software, but this is orthoganal to the patents issue, and indeed to the commercial/non-commercial issue.
Kind regards,
David