[Patents] EPO Paper on patenting business methods

[Prashant Uchil prashantu@hotmail.com]

does any one know how voice files /voice streaming can be done over existing 
wap specifications (one solution is to make a com object -use corba- which 
will convert voice files in to another format which can be transferred over 
wap)can anyone tell me about such things patented  etc.

prashant uchil
>From: PILCH Hartmut <phm@a2e.de>
>To: patents@aful.org
>Subject: [Patents] EPO Paper on patenting business methods
>Date: Mon, 28 Aug 2000 21:56:55 +0200 (CEST)
>
>Greg Aharonian reports
>
>   A press-release about "Patentability of methods of doing business"
>   of the EPO can be found at
>
>     http://www.european-patent-office.org/news/pressrel/2000_08_18_e.htm
>
>and  comments very nicely:
>
>  If you are not a patent lawyer, don't read the press release, it will
>  cause temporary brain meltdown.  I quote an excerpt (is [and whatever
>  "is" means] President Clinton moonlighting by writing stuff for EPO?):
>
>     The EPC does not give a definition of the term "invention".
>     It does, however, include a list of subject-matter and activities
>     which are deemed not to be inventions. According to Article 52(2) EPC,
>     methods for doing business, mathematical methods, presentations of
>     information and programs for computers shall not be regarded as
>     inventions.  However, Article 52(3) EPC stipulates that this provision
>     shall exclude patentability of the subject-matter or activities
>     referred to only to the extent to which a European patent application
>     relates to such subject-matter or activities AS SUCH.
>
>  In short, these things aren't patentable except where they are.
>
>     It follows that, although methods for doing business, programs for
>     computers, etc., are AS SUCH explicitly excluded from patentability,
>     a product or a method which is of a technical character may be
>     patentable, even if the claimed subject-matter defines or at least
>     involves a business method, a computer program, etc.
>
>  EPO officials probably wrote this at a retreat in Nicaea.
>
>In fact, the EPO has ever since 1986 been distinguishing between a
>"computer program as such" and a "computer program with a technical
>effect".  According to EPC Art 52, however, computer programs are not
>patentable.  The EPC implies no distinction between "program as such" and
>"program" or "business method as such" and "business method".  Patents may
>simply not be granted on programs or business methods.
>
>If Art 52 is to be modified, (3) should be deleted, because it has only
>served for the EPO to engage in brainmelting activities.
>
>Currently, the German Federal Patent Court also interprets the EPC in this
>way.  It does not accept the "computer program as such" sophistry and has
>rejected a software patent this month.  But the Federal High Court
>has been melted down last year and now engages in the same kind of
>sophistry.  It also has a reputation of overturning the verdicts of the
>Federal Patent Court and promoting patent inflation.
>
>-phm
>
>
>
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