[patents] Re: World Intellectual Property Day is April 26, 2001

[orre@nada.kth.se (Roland Orre)]

(sorry if some of you got two copies of my reply. Due to a technicality
 I had to resend it and I wanted to preserve the CC-structure)

On Mon, 30 Apr 2001, Jorge Zickermann wrote:
> Shouldn´t these debates be moderated by an administrator in order to keep
> the standard of the newsgroup? I´ve seen that done before and it makes the
> Internet a better place. A bit like police on the streets.

Roland Orre answers:

That what you Mr Zickermann are suggesting is a very dangerous idea,
even though it  may sound harmless at first sight.
What guarantee is there that the moderator works for the public good
and is not biased in any way?

In this case it would have had the effect that Mr Smith's very
provocative statement had never become published, and my strong
reaction towards this, thus had then never occured.

But, imagine the danger if Mr Smith's message had slipped through the
moderator but my response to his message had been judged as
too emotional. That would have been very serious. Consider the
consequences.

So Mr Zickerman, the only thing which is comparable to polices on
the streets considering internet is that people are reading these
messages. That's the only democratic way.

Remember that the police is being watched by the people too. We
don't want dictatorship, do we?

It should be in each person's interest to express himself or herself
in a way which is as good as possible considering all the people
watching.

You can NEVER put this responsibility on one single person. Even
though this person being the moderator has the best intentions,
being the best possible altruist you can find, he or she may have
some sligth bias in opinion, which may affect what is getting
through or not.

        Roland Orre
        Professional software developer
        Fighting for a free world without dangerous
        software patents.

> > From: PILCH Hartmut <phm@a2e.de>
> > Reply-To: PILCH Hartmut <phm@a2e.de>
> > Date: Sun, 29 Apr 2001 20:39:55 +0200 (CEST)
> > To: "webmaster@softwarelaw.com" <softwarelaw@lawyer.com>
> > Cc: <patents@liberte.aful.org>, <epo@mlist.austria.eu.net>
> > Subject: Re: Re: [Patents] Re: World Intellectual Property Day is April 
> > 26,
> > 2001
> >
> > Fred Mobach wrote:
> >
> >> Long time ago I saw such childish behavior on the net. Or maybe an
> >> adolescent who wrote this.
> >
> > Unfortunately Mr. Smith is not an adolescent but a well-known writer of
> > pro software patent articles on renowned patent law magazines.
> >
> > Mr. Smith, I hope to see you putting back his website online without much
> > delay and declaring in public that you are not in physical danger and that
> > you are sorry for having acted in a way suitable to create that
> > impression.
> >
> > Otherwise I may report the case to a criminal prosecutor.
> >
> > Libel itself is the first stage in a development toward nasty warfare
> > which we don't want to see getting started.  I also beg all patent
> > professionals on this list to take appropriate steps to make it clear
> > that, no matter how strongly you may support Mr. Smith's opinion on
> > software patents, you do not approve of his libel tactics or what might
> > look like such tactics. By making that clear, you can counteract the
> > necessity of getting criminal authorities involved in a discourse that
> > should be purely aimed at enhancing mutual understanding.
> >
> > Thank you
> >
> > Hartmut Pilch
> > Federation for a Free Information Infrastructure
> >
> > ----------------------------------------------------------------------
> > This message was distributed by the EPO mailing list.
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> > http://www.european-patent-office.org/mail.htm
> > ----------------------------------------------------------------------
>
>
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