[Patents] Re: [Patents] Un négatif de www.freepatents.org

[PILCH Hartmut phm@a2e.de]

> Have you seen this web site : http://www.freepatent.org ;(without the
> final s) it's really a negative of http://www.freepatents.org ;?

This must be written by people who want to ridicule the concept of
intellectual property.  It starts from their naming:  taking a free ride
on the trademarks that other peolpe have worked hard to establish is a
blatant violation of "intellectual property" in its best sense.

The authors of "freepatent.org" are pretending that we oppose IP or want
to deprive people of the fruits of their work.  In reality the opposite is
the case.  We all hate free-riders.  We want the original people to reap
the fruit of their work.  But sometimes this just can't be enforced in a
beneficial way.  Enforcing software patents in practise means fostering an
unjustified rent-seeking activity and creating barriers to prevent people
from implementing their own ideas.  Moreover it means strengthening an
informatic monopolism, which has already created such barriers.

Trademarks can be enforced in a beneficial way.  Thus the freepatent.org
people discredit their own pro-IP moralism by violating IP principles.  
And apart from naive moralism they have nothing to offer anyway.

So let them continue to make fools of themselves.  We are actively
advertising their site at http://swpat.ffii.org.

-phm