[Fsfe-ie] McCreevy sees anti-s/w-pat-movement as anti-globalisation/anti-American

Glenn Strong Glenn.Strong at cs.tcd.ie
Wed Jul 6 11:22:53 CEST 2005


On Wednesday, July 6, 2005 at 09:48 +0100, Malcolm Tyrrell wrote:
> 
> --- Alex Macfie <alex at cgce.net> wrote:
> > > It also looks like the pro-patent lobby may push for a rejection of
> > > the draft (which is bad):
> > 
> > No, it's good [...] we can claim victory.
> 
> It is better than a bad directive. However, assuming it is voted down,
> then we're back with "software as such" (aren't we?) and I expect
> patent litigation to be fought and sometimes won because of the
> ambiguity of that phrase.

The serious danger, as I see it, is that they will have failed to
comprehensively forbid pure software patents. This means that the
supporters of software patents will still be able to push individual
governments to pass laws favourable to them, and the EPO will
presumably be able to continue their practice of issuing software
patents of dubious legality.

So this is better than having the so-called "common position" passed,
but not as good as having the Buzek-Rocard-Duff amendments passed.
 
> I wouldn't be too keen on claiming a victory. 

I would. Admittedly, a qualified victory, but we would have managed to
avoid the horrors of unrestricted software patents.

> I won't be suprised if a media campaign attempts to blame our side
> for *obstructing patent harmonisation in Europe*.

Bah, we'd get that in some form if the Buzek-Rocard-Duff amendments
passed as well. The only way to avoid having the pro-swpat lobby
criticise us would be to roll over!

-- 
Glenn Strong



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