From Bernard.Lang@inria.fr  Thu Nov 16 11:55:51 2000
Date: Thu, 16 Nov 2000 12:55:51 +0100
From: Bernard Lang Bernard.Lang@inria.fr
Subject: [Patents] re. consultation and conference


I think the comments of Steve Probert would be well founded in a
normal situation, i.e. if the process had been sufficiently open,
public, and if the issues had been properly analyzed from all angles
by the people in charge.

  None of this has been done. It has been a closed process, by IP
specialists who seems to have fully ignored economic and societal
issues, and who do not even seem to master the technical implication
of what they are doing.  No impact study was conducted, and only
ideology and corporate lobbying has been at work.

   Furthermore, there is a clear intent to force the issue by
piggybacking major changes like modification of 33 and 52.2 onto other
issues.

   In these conditions, the work of the EPO council is a sham, and it
is only adequate that now that it is openly known as such, they be
forced to reconsider... by the political authorities they betrayed
(whether by intention or not).

   I understand that reconsidering each and every article is
difficult, since they are often interdependant. This is usually the
reason to introduce higher viscosity in the procedure by requiring 2/3
majority to reconsider a point.
  However, that is not the case for the modifications or articles 52.2
and 33.

   The modification to the procedure could also be to decide to vote
on them separately, since they can stand on their own (the
piggybacking is not needed).


So: direct question to Steve Probert

  Could the vote on the procedure decide to separate modifications to
articles 52.2 and 33 from the rest of the proposed change.


Cordialement

   Bernard Lang


PS   DO NOT FORGET TO WARN YOUR POLITICIANS ABOUT ARTICLE 33


On Thu, Nov 16, 2000 at 04:45:09AM +0100, Nicolas Pettiaux wrote:
> 
> What about the following case: the Belgian minister of economy, Charles 
> Picque, has publically said that Belgium would NOT take a position on the 
> question of software patent at least BEFORE the end of the European 
> consultation that is December 15. And still Belgium has to vote on Nov 27 ?
> A vote that CANNOT be interpreted as a vote FOR the software patents.
> 
> How can this point be taken out of the discussion in a "nice" way ?
> 
> Best regards
> 
> Nicolas
> 
> -- 
> Nicolas Pettiaux
> Avenue du Prou 29 - B-1000 Bruxelles
> Email: nicolas.pettiaux@linuxbe.org
> 
> _______________________________________________
> Patents maillist  -  Patents@liberte.aful.org
> http://liberte.aful.org/mailman/listinfo/patents

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