[Patents] Re: DeCSS, source code and software patents

[Jesus M. Gonzalez-Barahona jgb@gsyc.escet.urjc.es]

PILCH Hartmut writes:
 > >        What does all of this have to do with swpatents? Well my
 > > impression is that patents are precisely a way of letting the
 > > knowledge being disseminated, while a monopoly on *devices* is
 > > allowed. 
 > 
 > This is precisely where written European patent law (EPC 52) places the
 > boundary:  patent rights can not be claimed against informational objects
 > but only for inventions that imply more than an informational object in
 > order to be realised.
 > 
 > This distinction is also formulated in our petition text.  By speaking
 > about the "dissemination of computer programs", we imply that computer
 > programs are information that is "disseminated" and not devices that are
 > "distributed".
 > 
 > The border is not source code and object code, but between information
 > and matter, soft and hard, logics and physics.
 > 
 > Unfortunately, this distinction isn't self-evident at the level of basic
 > instinct, thus allowing patent lawyers to successfully feign
 > dumbness.  But at least the distinction between information and
 > non-information is clearer and more intuitive than that between source and
 > object code.  Another reason to leave it there.

       I understand your (mine) position about the difference being
"information" and "matter". But in any case, I wonder whether there
are other lines of attack. And confronting legislation on industrial
propriety directly with legislation on free speech could be one of
those lines (at least WRT libre software, which is what interest me
the most). Of course this also highlights that source code and
compiled code are all the same thing, with straightforward
transformation from one to the other.
                                   
       Saludos,

              Jesus.

-- 
Jesus M. Gonzalez Barahona                | Grupo de Sistemas y Comunicaciones
jgb@gsyc.escet.urjc.es / jgb@computer.org | ESCET, Universidad Rey Juan 
Carlos 
tel: +34 91 664 74 72                     | c/ Tulipan s/n
fax: +34 91 664 74 90                     | 28933 Mostoles, Spain