[Patents] Re: french views

[Rik van Riel riel@conectiva.com.br]

On Mon, 9 Oct 2000, Nicolas MONNET wrote:
> On Sat, 7 Oct 2000, Pierre BREESE wrote:
> 
> |In my concern, I 'm mostly in touch with small companies and start-up. They
> |have a burning need of protecting their innovation, especially software
> |innovations. They can’t abdicate of the possibility of claiming a solid
> |industrial property right, particulary in partnerships with big clients. 
> They
> |must manage the “return of invest".
> 
> As a software engineer who, in his carrier, has never seen a
> software "invention" worth of deserving a patent, I would like
> to see one. If that exists.
> 
> This is a serious request.
> 
> I want to be shown an invention which deserved a patent, because
> it took large amounts of funding to discover it, and would not
> be profitable without a patent.
> 
> I'm thinking, here, of what everybody here will agree on, as the
> perfect example of essential patents: medical drugs. High
> development cost, can only be protected by a patent.

I second this 'challenge'. Can any of the proponents of
software patents show us ANY software patent worthy of
receiving a patent in the spirit of what the patent system
was meant for ?

If not (which is what I suspect), are we left with any other
conclusion than that the whole "software patents" idea is a
big - and illegal - scam by the big companies and patent
lawyers to create an intellectual monopoly where it is very
much inappropriate.

> Another thing, regarding drug patents: when you compare drugs
> (molecules?) to software, does'nt the protection resemble most
> that which copyrights provides for software. I.E. you're not
> allowed "copy" a molecule, but if you find a similar one with
> the same effects, you're not infringing.

This also seems to not be the case with the current
"patents" (never mind their illegality) on software
and business methods.

People are patenting all kinds of trivial and broad
concepts left and right, this doesn't seem to be what
the patent system was ever invented for ...

[note that I have no objection against the use of patents
for eg. the pharmaceutical industry ... the structure and
time length of patents closely matches the structure and
duration of medical research --- but this whole story just
doesn't fit when you replace medical research by software
engineering]

regards,

Rik
--
"What you're running that piece of shit Gnome?!?!"
       -- Miguel de Icaza, UKUUG 2000

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