[Fsfe-ie] Any company owners: can you sign this statement against software patents, from Irish industry?

Ciaran O'Riordan ciaran at fsfe.org
Sun Jul 3 05:42:19 CEST 2005


[feel free to pass this on to other people or lists]

Monday will be the last day to influence the MEPs before the software
patents vote.  I would like to hand a short note to the Irish MEPs, asking
them to vote to exclude software functionality from patentability, and I
would like it to come from a list of Irish companies.

I will print this note+list on Sunday night, and _if_it_is_possible_ (which
is unlikely in Strasbourg) I will print it again on Monday mid-day or early
evening if more signatures have come in.

So, if you run a company in Ireland that *uses* software (not just those
that develop software), even a 1-person company, send me your name, company
name, and one (or more) contact detail (phone/fax/website/email) today
(Sunday) if I can add them to this statement:

   "Statement from Irish Industry Against Patents Restricting Software
                            Development And Use

    We urge the representatives of Ireland in the European Parliament to
    support the Buzek-Rocard compromise amendments to the
    Computer-Implemented Inventions directive for the following reasons:

    * We need to know that we, and our suppliers, will not be prohibited by
      patents, from developing the software we need for our businesses.

    * we need to have certainty that we wholly own our work and can
      distribute under the terms we choose.

    This statement is not in opposition to patents on high-tech products,
    only to patents on software functionality such as standards, user
    interfaces, ways of representing data, and ways of using computers for
    business."

The parliament will debate the issue on Tuesaday and vote on Wednesday.

"Buzek-Rocard" are the two prominent MEPs that have tabled the amendments we
want.

If you know somone that should sign this, but probably won't read email on a
Sunday, if you can phone them to pass on the message, that could be useful.


thanks.
-- 
Ciarán O'Riordan,                              |   Support FSFE's work against
http://www.compsoc.com/~coriordan/             | software patents by becomming
                                               |     a Fellow: http://fsfe.org



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