tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5574479.post3475710242652702568..comments2024-03-29T12:23:31.959+00:00Comments on The IPKat: World day against software patentsVerónica Rodríguez Arguijohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05763207846940036921noreply@blogger.comBlogger39125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5574479.post-57627983748145220052008-09-04T21:44:00.000+01:002008-09-04T21:44:00.000+01:00@Rcalvo: “Unfortunately for you, it is also easily...@Rcalvo: <I>“Unfortunately for you, it is also easily dismissed, as I just did above. Software is not special.”</I><BR/><BR/>Hehe... did you indeed? And your easy dismissal is due to appear when and in which economics journal? It seems to me that the 'ease' with which you dismiss the economic arguments (and clearly without having even read them!) is the same 'ease' that e.g. homeopaths employ in their dismissals of the theoretical and empirical evidence confronting their particular brands of absurd belief.<BR/><BR/>The patent system is the province of economics, not quantum theory; from the fact that some subset of persons in some set have claimed 'x' it does not follow that the only claim of all persons in that set was 'x'; that the term “software invention“ is difficult to pin down does not detract from the (empirically justified) fact that the FFII amendments to the law would've been a clarifying step forward... almost every point you have made so far is either simply factually incorrect or fallacious and since posting here is extremely tedious and finnicky (I just lost a long post), if you wish to continue the discussion about patent system economics (or if David would like to help out Martin with his AGW denialism ;-) - come on over to http://badscience.net.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5574479.post-35105073196663964922008-09-04T19:09:00.000+01:002008-09-04T19:09:00.000+01:00@plh: Actually, what you write there is not a defi...@plh: Actually, what you write there is not a definition of "software patent", negative or otherwise, but rather a definition of which software patents should be allowable and which shouldn't, and as such an implicit admission of at least some "software patents". That seems to be in contradiction to FFII's petition (which, moreover, does not point to that or any other definition).<BR/><BR/>Also, having read the various EP amendments incorporating that language, I'm familiar with it (thanks for confirming the source of inspiration of those MEPs). The problem is, it is also self-contradictory and no more clear-cut than any current criteria concerning the patentability of software. In fact, it's far worse, and not just from a "pro-software patents"point of view. Leaving apart the arduous matter of how quantum theory reduces all "controllable forces of nature" to information flows, where does it leave, for instance, image or sound treatment or recognition programs? On one hand, they relate to the use of controllable forces of nature (namely light or sound) under the control of a computer program, beyond the implementation of the data processing procedure itself. On the other hand, they arguably just relate to the processing, handling, presentation, and representation of information. So, are they technical or not?<BR/><BR/>Even mere user interfaces could pass the "controllable forces of nature" test: after all, the cognitive processes in our brain are also a "controllable force of nature", and any improvement in a user interface thus a "new teaching about the use of controllable forces of nature". <BR/><BR/>The same argument could even be made in favour of business method patents, even without computers involved, certainly for those related to the advertising field! Or aren't the various human instincts that advertisers cleverly (and often inventively) exploit also "controllable forces of nature"?<BR/><BR/>What I pointed out as a red herring is definitely not a straw man. Indeed, it has been repeatedly used in this very thread. See what <B>ch. tronche</B> posted:<BR/><BR/><I>I’m personally against software patent on the basis of economic arguments: software is fundamentally different from physical products in term of production (copy) and distribution time and cost: zero in the software world, most of the problem in the physical world. It thus makes no economical sense to grant a twenty years monopoly for software, much less an algorithm.</I><BR/><BR/><B>zoobab</B> has also made the same point, in a more brief, if rather less elegant manner:<BR/><BR/><I>And of course software is special, the economy of immaterial works is different of material works.</I><BR/><BR/>This "economic argument" about the "otherness of software" is frequently repeated indeed (mostly by economists with little direct experience of how either the software industry or patents work), and in fact the only argument of the "anti-software-patent" camp which I regard as somewhat coherent (most other criticism of software patents could just as easily be adressed at patents in any other technology field). Unfortunately for you, it is also easily dismissed, as I just did above. Software is <B>not</B> special.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5574479.post-87210084686128612182008-09-04T18:00:00.000+01:002008-09-04T18:00:00.000+01:00"I see as the most important part (an independent ..."I see as the most important part (an independent judiciary) is well preserved in the EU's institutional arrangements."<BR/><BR/>I think technical judges (aka Patent Attorneys as judges without a law degree) are part of the EU-EPLA central patent court project.<BR/><BR/>So "independent judiciary" at the EU level is not guaranteed.<BR/><BR/>When the judges are captive of the patent system, it is a recipe for a disaster:<BR/><BR/>http://www.eupaco.org/local--files/eupaco2/John%20Duffy.pdf<BR/><BR/>See slides p12 and p13 about the Pumpkin bag.zoobabhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16896135106354266238noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5574479.post-74473569556003243542008-09-04T17:35:00.000+01:002008-09-04T17:35:00.000+01:00@zoobab: "And whether the Government has been elec...@zoobab: "And whether the Government has been elected by the Parliament does not compromises the fact that the Government is still not allowed to vote on a law."<BR/><BR/>Actually, in many European countries, such as Spain, members of the Government who are also elected to parliament (they do not need to be) are perfectly allowed to vote on laws. And, in other countries, such as Holland, "separation of powers" means that elected members of parliament that enter the government must give up entirely their seats in parliament (paradoxically, Dutch governments then have a power of selective enforcement of laws which would most definitely be seen as an infringement of the principle of separation of powers in any other place).<BR/><BR/>I am no great fan of the Council, but this is just to say that the principle of separation of powers is interpreted in many different ways across Europe and elsewhere, and that what I see as the most important part (an independent judiciary) is well preserved in the EU's institutional arrangements.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5574479.post-2683911122745328512008-09-04T16:10:00.000+01:002008-09-04T16:10:00.000+01:00“The "anti-software-patent" camp claims that softw...“The "anti-software-patent" camp claims that software is special because it is reproductible without hardly any marginal cost, but then this was already true of a great many patented products (never mind processes!) prior to the computer age. This is a clear red herring.”<BR/><BR/>A male red herring made of straw, Rcalvo ;-) While that may well be one claim made by some, it is certainly not the only or most important of a number of characteristics of software which the "anti-software-patent" camp claim combine to make the patent system and software especially unsuited. Have you not read what they (e.g. Kahin, FFII, Bessen...) actually say?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5574479.post-82775513066242133662008-09-04T15:54:00.000+01:002008-09-04T15:54:00.000+01:00“The FFII's campaign is already damaged by the fac...“The FFII's campaign is already damaged by the fact that it fails to provide a definition of "software patent".”<BR/><BR/>That is not true, Rcalvo. On the FFII's “uk-parl” mailing list during the year or so building up to the proposed CII Directive, the vast majority of the discusssion seemed to be about what should and should not be patentable software-wise and how exactly this should be reflected in a modified version of that Directive. A suitable negative 'definition' was found, eventually added to one or more of the EP amendments, and even tested during the UKPO 'workshops' arranged by Lord Sainsbury: <BR/><BR/><I>"Technical contribution" means a contribution made by a claimed invention, considered as a whole, to the state of the art in a field of technology. "Technical" means belonging to a field of technology.<BR/><BR/>New teaching about the use of controllable forces of nature under the control of a computer program, beyond the implementation of the data processing procedure itself, is technical.<BR/><BR/>The processing, handling, presentation, and representation of information by a computer program is not technical, even where technical devices are employed for such purposes.</I>Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5574479.post-74443488306700173342008-09-04T13:38:00.000+01:002008-09-04T13:38:00.000+01:00In a democracy, only the elected people are able t...In a democracy, only the elected people are able to **vote**.<BR/><BR/>As far as I know, Europe and its Council of Ministers as a co-legislator is an example of a system where part of the legislator has not been elected.<BR/><BR/>And whether the Government has been elected by the Parliament does not compromises the fact that the Government is still not allowed to vote on a law.zoobabhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16896135106354266238noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5574479.post-82647686409097138212008-09-04T13:30:00.000+01:002008-09-04T13:30:00.000+01:00I had to look up what it means, after it was menti...I had to <A HREF="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_hominem" REL="nofollow">look up</A> what it means, after it was mentioned earlier.David Pearcehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02336561458060095886noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5574479.post-48014482498986494022008-09-04T13:17:00.000+01:002008-09-04T13:17:00.000+01:00Difficult to discuss when commenters do not appear...Difficult to discuss when commenters do not appear to have sufficient knowledge of the principles of democracy. <BR/>Wikipedia tells us that "Parliamentary democracies do not have distinct separation of powers. The executive (often a prime minister) and the Cabinet ("government") are drawn from the legislature (parliament). This is the principle of responsible government. However, although the legislative and executive branches are connected, in parliamentary systems there is usually a independent judiciary".<BR/>Needless to say that I agree with RCALVO, in particular the last point made (in his earlier comment).Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5574479.post-33320854987534188162008-09-04T12:59:00.000+01:002008-09-04T12:59:00.000+01:00@david, leaving apart the overwhelming scientific ...@david, leaving apart the overwhelming scientific evidence for anthropogenic global warming (and having been to the Arctic, my own lying eyes), the comment was misguided as it opened an easy flank to those who would see you as merely the shills of "Big Business"...Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5574479.post-6412545824239217972008-09-04T12:52:00.000+01:002008-09-04T12:52:00.000+01:00This article seems to have opened up a seething ne...This article seems to have opened up a seething nest of vipers!<BR/><BR/>@zoobab - the fact that software is an immatieral work is, well, immaterial. Patents are also granted for processes and uses - i.e. for actions as well as for products and I don't hear anyone arguing that these should be excluded. You define a software patent as a disclosure of hot air. I am not sure your hard working programmers would appreciate that remark. But hey, in a political debate Hacker's law* determines that "Hot air rises".<BR/><BR/>@Rcalvo - I loved the quote - very appropriate.<BR/><BR/><I> * Jim Hacker, fictional prime minister of the UK </I>Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5574479.post-29035360521501875772008-09-04T12:25:00.000+01:002008-09-04T12:25:00.000+01:00Pointless? Perhaps. Utterly misguided? As another ...Pointless? Perhaps. Utterly misguided? As another commenter observes, time will tell.David Pearcehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02336561458060095886noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5574479.post-4780348953999814622008-09-04T12:11:00.000+01:002008-09-04T12:11:00.000+01:00@rcalvoSeperation of Powers is the base, I cannot ...@rcalvo<BR/><BR/>Seperation of Powers is the base, I cannot agree with you that the Government (Executive) should be part of the Legislative power.<BR/><BR/>For the definition of a software patent, we have a good one here:<BR/><BR/>"A software patent is a right to litigate against authors of software granted to an applicant as a reward for the disclosure of hot air."<BR/><BR/>There is also CAI (computer-aided invention):<BR/><BR/>http://eupat.ffii.org/papiere/europarl0309/juri0504/cxidef.en.html<BR/><BR/>CII is ambiguous, since only software is implemented in a computer.<BR/><BR/>And of course software is special, the economy of immaterial works is different of material works.<BR/><BR/>And I would say the real enemy is not large corporations, but their patent department.zoobabhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16896135106354266238noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5574479.post-31547986676032450852008-09-04T11:29:00.000+01:002008-09-04T11:29:00.000+01:00@zoobabIn the Council sit the ministers of the nat...@zoobab<BR/><BR/>In the Council sit the ministers of the national governments. Of course, they are rarely directly elected, but neither is the President of the US (he's indirectly elected through the electoral college), and not many people claim that the US aren't democratic. So, the Council is arguably a democratic body, even if an indirectly elected one. Indeed there's a good argument that the Council is, if anything, more democratic than the Parliament, considering the ludicrously low voter participation rates at European elections.<BR/><BR/>Also, you appear slightly misguided about the role of advisors. MEPs also have their own unelected advisors, often with far less knowledge of IP or software than any NPO advisor to the Council, and far more open to interested biases.<BR/><BR/>I'd actually welcome a more powerful EP, even if watching its inner workings never fails to remind me of Bismarck's pithy sentence: "Laws are like sausages, it's better not to know how they are made."<BR/><BR/>The FFII's campaign is already damaged by the fact that it fails to provide a definition of "software patent". How can you campaign against something without first setting out what it actually is? I guess that a patent containing a claim over a "computer program" is clearly a software patent, but what if, for example, the patent contains only process claims? The FFII has previously poured a great deal of scorn on the phrase "computer-implemented invention", but it is actually far less ambiguous than "software patent".<BR/><BR/>The "anti-software-patent" camp claims that software is special because it is reproductible without hardly any marginal cost, but then this was already true of a great many patented products (never mind processes!) prior to the computer age. This is a clear red herring.<BR/><BR/>The way in which the FFII presents itself as advocates of the "little man" against "heartless corporations and greedy lawyers" (this last thing regardless of the fact that European patent attorneys are rarely lawyers) is a brilliant PR coup. After all, FFII does also enjoy the financial support of quite a few rather large companies, such as Red Hat, and we also witnessed how a celebrated former head of FFII ("no lobbyist as such") easily went on to lobby on behalf of the richest football clubs in Europe.<BR/><BR/>I must agree on almost every point with the IPKat, even if I deeply regret that he had to include also that utterly misguided and pointless comment about anthropogenic global warming.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5574479.post-25432443230496874942008-09-04T10:15:00.000+01:002008-09-04T10:15:00.000+01:00"That the law can be changed by a democratic proce..."That the law can be changed by a democratic process is a totally different matter. Since in such process the FFII has not been successful the question appears justified whether the FFII is indeed interested in a democratic decision making process because in such a process all arguments are scrutinised for their relevance."<BR/><BR/>@IPMouse<BR/><BR/>Can you precise if you consider the Council and their NPO advisors as part of the democracy?zoobabhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16896135106354266238noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5574479.post-12991360137639391802008-09-04T08:55:00.000+01:002008-09-04T08:55:00.000+01:00Disappointing to read that there is so little know...Disappointing to read that there is so little knowledge about the function, organisational position and competence of the Boards of Appeal in the EPO. What is even worse is AR's ignorance of the necessity of a court's independence. How lucky we are that in most democratic countries the courts are shielded against outside influences and in particular against "influences from the democratically elected decision makers" (have look at Italy....). Please let the courts decide on the basis of the law only, because that is their task. That the law can be changed by a democratic process is a totally different matter. Since in such process the FFII has not been successful the question appears justified whether the FFII is indeed interested in a democratic decision making process because in such a process all arguments are scrutinised for their relevance. <BR/>Furthermore, anybody with some knowledge in the matter of software implemented inventions is very well able to distinguish between the American and European patenting approach and mentioning them in one breath can only serve an obvious goal....Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5574479.post-18671146574021086632008-09-03T20:57:00.000+01:002008-09-03T20:57:00.000+01:00@Anonymous: Indeed, the EPC is international law. ...@Anonymous: Indeed, the EPC is international law. But a BoA is no court but an administrative appeal chamber (imho it should not even be considered to constitute "case law") and members of the chambers are not qualified as judges. In fact some real judges in national courts dissented with the BoA interpretation which gave grounds to the CII-Directive to enforce the EPO opinion.<BR/><BR/>You further know that the EPO is de facto governed by the national patent offices and shielded against influences from the democratically elected decision makers. MPs have hardly any influence on the EPO. Their parliament resolutions are ignored. Even worse, the EPO lobbies parliament and writes industry reports and argues on normative grounds.<BR/><BR/>The scope of the petition campaign is international. It is not even relevant here if patent offices do grant patents and under which legal base (positive question). The purpose of the campaign is directed towards a normative decision. Normative is the political matter and here positive considerations are more or less irrelevant.<BR/><BR/>Generals should not lobby politicians whether to go to war or not. Patent Offices with a public mission and persons who earn their money with patents have to be neutral observers regarding the question what should be patentable. Currently they go beyond, lobby and propagate expansive patent regimes and ignore the software market opinion. The goal of the petition is to organise the stakeholders and keep them insisting on meaningful reforms. And here the answer "why?" can be easily explained: We believe soft patents are dangerous and want to overcome the software patent regime. In the US the software market lacks a movement as was incubated by the FFII and lobby attempts for patent reform fail because the US patent system casts its well-known Red herrings such as non-obviousness and other players such as Pharma don't support it.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5574479.post-30234887580799905712008-09-03T18:38:00.000+01:002008-09-03T18:38:00.000+01:00“They are the real target of most anti-software-pa...<I>“They are the real target of most anti-software-patent campaigners who mistakingly see them as synonymous with software patents because of the common link in the origin of business method patents.”</I><BR/><BR/>Nonsense. (As can be easily seen from the FFII website(s) or earlier campaign sites such as that of the LPF: http://progfree.org/Patents/patents.html)<BR/><BR/><I>“Business method patents are also usually the target when people say a software patent is obvious. I've never seen anyone suggest that LZW (as claimed in the "GIF" patent) was obvious and other software patents that have been called obvious are usually done so in retrospect, 5 or 10 years down the line when they only look obvious because...”</I><BR/><BR/>Nonsense.<BR/><BR/>Castigation of the latest obvious software patent is a popular Internet sport and only some of them can be described as business methods. The most recent one to hit the blogs was “Method and system for navigating paginated content in page-based increments”.<BR/> <BR/>I wouldn't presume to call it obvious but LZW was obvious enough to get patented twice and R.L.E. should be obvious even to the most mathematically inept:<BR/><BR/>http://www.patentstorm.us/patents/4586027/claims.html<BR/>http://www.ross.net/compression/patents_notes_from_ccfaq.html<BR/><BR/>More to the point: there are oodles of obvious software patents that are not business method patents - easily enough to keep the naïve anti-obvious-software-patent crowd exercised - but no-one has ever seriously campaigned or is now seriously campaigning against software patents solely on the grounds that there are a lot of obvious ones.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5574479.post-39488108774593457382008-09-03T17:48:00.000+01:002008-09-03T17:48:00.000+01:00@Merpel"IPKat comment: so we should put reform in ...@Merpel<BR/><BR/>"IPKat comment: so we should put reform in the hands of people who know nothing about patent law instead?"<BR/><BR/>I would ask another question:<BR/><BR/>"So we should put reform in the hands of people who know nothing about software programming instead?"zoobabhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16896135106354266238noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5574479.post-11671868222608000282008-09-03T17:36:00.000+01:002008-09-03T17:36:00.000+01:00AR: I think my feathers were ruffled by statements...AR: I think my feathers were ruffled by statements in the article such as: <BR/><BR/>"Markets learn the hard way that you may not leave reform to patent professionals [<I>IPKat comment: so we should put reform in the hands of people who know nothing about patent law instead?</I>]."<BR/><BR/>The IPKat comment patently is misreading the comment, misinterpreting it as an either/or statement and seemingly condescending of the opinions of those actually affected by patents. I of course agree with you that reform should be driven through democratic processes, though I took note of the extra-ordinary lengths the only democratically elected body in the EU had to go to to prevent the commision from putting through the CII (the commision having ignored a previous motion of the EP).<BR/><BR/>Gerontius: LZW was special, but it is pure math. Why should it then be patentable just because the information you applied it to was a GIF format image, or because that math is implemented on a computer (no longer software, "as such", some argue)?<BR/><BR/>You're essentially arguing that applied math should be patentable, right?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5574479.post-39168517593984448072008-09-03T16:09:00.000+01:002008-09-03T16:09:00.000+01:00@ipkat, I missed this one: Any reform of the syste...@ipkat, I missed this one: <I>Any reform of the system to address the real underlying problem of how to improve patent quality to minimise the number of 'bad' patents that get granted (and most of them are undoubtedly in the US, which has its own particular examination issues) will, the IPKat suspects, never be enough for the FFII.</I><BR/><BR/>The FFII position is well known and we don't see such a quality reform happening: FFII aims for substantive clarification. The FFII is also not behind the campaign but backs it.<BR/><BR/><I>Merpel would like to controversially point out that the ideological basis of the anti-patent lobbyists seem to have a lot in common with other single issue pressure groups like anti-globalisationists and man-made global warming alarmists; nothing the rest of us can do will ever be enough for them.</I><BR/><BR/>Nice try, but Merpel knows he is wrong. Patent law is just a tool for the economy. If no one can prove that patent law suits the needs of the software market I don't see any reason to apply it. The commercial and institutional interests of patent offices and patent lawyers are clearly irrelevant.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5574479.post-48951397435649336142008-09-03T16:02:00.000+01:002008-09-03T16:02:00.000+01:00"There clearly is room for different intrepretatio..."There clearly is room for different intrepretations of the existing legislation. To turn your argument on its head - if we are to ignore the "as such" qualification in Art. 52 EPC, then any and all technical inventions which require implementation by a computer program are excluded from patentability - this is no more what was intended by the legislator than the patenting of computer programs in their own right (i.e. "as such")."<BR/><BR/>That is something different and has nothing to do with the as such provision. In fact it is safe to delete the phrase "as such" from EPC 52.3 without any change of meaning. Some national implementations don't carry it as you know.<BR/><BR/>You reverse the economic burden of proof. You don't need to prove that you don't need a patent system for a certain field but you need to prove that it is justified in a certain field.<BR/><BR/>We can argue a lot over positive law but the fact is that the EPO BoA changed the interpretation and thus the normative scope of patent law. <BR/><BR/>Normative questions are political ones and we can even totally abstract from the EPC as the EPC is an expression of normative will.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5574479.post-73009922493332493432008-09-03T15:57:00.000+01:002008-09-03T15:57:00.000+01:00"Furthermore, In Europe the legislative process m..."Furthermore, In Europe the legislative process must be a democratic process (not "ideally a democratic process"). Otherwise, why would we bother vote for our legislative bodies?"<BR/><BR/>Do you vote to elect the Council members?<BR/><BR/>Especially the ones that participate in the Council Working Group on Patents:<BR/><BR/>http://press.ffii.org/Press_releases/Patent_administrators_preempting_parliaments_in_Councilzoobabhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16896135106354266238noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5574479.post-82268167250326096952008-09-03T15:48:00.000+01:002008-09-03T15:48:00.000+01:00Considering the FFII's arguments, the IPKat appear...Considering the FFII's arguments, the IPKat appears to be right in that there is only an ideological basis for their general rejection of software patents, including the so-called software implemented inventions. However, western history shows that the "Time is on our side" argument relied upon by the FFII will go exactly in the opposite direction when there is no proper legal or scientific basis supporting the ideology. <BR/>An example of this development appears to be the IPKat itself, because not long ago it still rejected the idea of patenting software implemented inventions ....Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5574479.post-8095539478091665492008-09-03T14:52:00.000+01:002008-09-03T14:52:00.000+01:00@Euro-pedant Actually, you're wrong since the deci...@Euro-pedant <BR/>Actually, you're wrong since the decision to grant does not take effect until it is mentioned in the Bulletin, which only happens once a week. <BR/><BR/>@AR<BR/>I did not intend to imply that the statement was deliberately misleading, but it is misleading and I have explained that it important to get it right since misunderstanding how patents are granted can and does lead to inflation in the figures of the number of patents being granted.<BR/><BR/>@Francis Davey<BR/>You're absoutely correct that the problem is unhappiness in the field. Unfortunately, this unhappiness is self-perpetuating due to the unrealistic expectations of those in the field caused by the misleading statements by the anti-software-patent campaigners.<BR/><BR/>There's an implication running through much of this discussion that software patents are a new thing that are being forced on an unsuspecting world. However, it's important to realise that software patents are not something that are being newly introduced. There have been patents on software for as long as there has been software that was used for more than adding up accounts more quickly than could be done on paper. The EPO Vicom decision, although from 1985, was based on an application filed in 1978. You can also easily find things that would be called software patents going back to the early 70s in the US and, since 1972, the US Supreme Court has hinted that a computer program would be patentable if the process being performed by the programmed computer (eg curing rubber) were patentable. True, there was a boom in software patents, but that boom tied in with the dot.com bubble (unsurprisingly). <BR/><BR/>The nature of software patents has changed over time and they are now more likely to be infringed by an individual programmer sitting at his desk rather than a huge corporation. But that ties in with the development of the computer industry putting the power to write and publish computer programs in the hands of the individual programmer.<BR/><BR/>The problem is not one of extending scope of software protection, but of the ever-burgeoning reach of software itself and the ease with which a software patent can be infringed. As the FFII themselves point out, you don't need a factory to sell millions of copies of a piece of software (any more).<BR/><BR/>The new player on the field is actually the business method patent. Business methods have been around since the dawn of time, but patents on them have not. Business method patents started by jumping on the back of software patents (in the US, JP and AU) but are now gaining a life of their own separate from their software implementation (in the US). They are the real target of most anti-software-patent campaigners who mistakingly see them as synonymous with software patents because of the common link in the origin of business method patents. <BR/><BR/>Business method patents are also usually the target when people say a software patent is obvious. I've never seen anyone suggest that LZW (as claimed in the "GIF" patent) was obvious and other software patents that have been called obvious are usually done so in retrospect, 5 or 10 years down the line when they only look obvious because they have been succesfully incorporated into a wide range of technologies despite the patent protection which, we're told, would hold the computer industry back. It's also scary how often people claim a patent is obvious having read only the abstract or by saying that a feature in claim 2 in obvious. Claim 1 is where it's at, people!<BR/><BR/>So, it's often said that software patents are a new bane on society. It's often said that software patents are all obvious. But it's also often said that if the wind changes direction, your face will stay like that. Just because lots of people say something it true, doesn't make it true, but it can make people afraid of the repercussions if it is. Fear is the enemy, not software patents, and the trolls (and there are trolls even if we don't quite know who they are) prey on that fear. FFII, you have a duty to stop putting fear in the hearts of programmers as you're only feeding the trolls by doing so.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com