[Patents] Patnews on Pierret

[phm@a2e.de (PILCH Hartmut)]

A certain secret newsletter contains a nice comment at the end.  The
assertion that "security issues are a technical effect"  resonates with
nothing in European patent law, and the conclusions drawn therefrom can
probably be understood under Gregorian logics only.

>     --  MARCH: FRENCH MINISTER COMES OUT AGAINST SOFTWARE PATENTS
>
> French industry minister rejects patents, backs Linux
>
>     By: John Lettice
>     http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/4/17960.html
>     Posted: 29/03/2001 at 09:04 GMT
>
> The French government has lined up against software patents. The
> minister in charge of patent policy, industry secretary Christian
> Pierret, last week stated that he opposed them, and that they "would
> kill innovation and promote judicial terrorism" by multinational
> companies against startups.
>
> .................
>
> Pierret, who made the comments in an interview with magazine 01
> Informatique, seems to have made a convincing bid for Open Source
> pin-up status whle he was about it. "I support Linux and free software,"
> he said, "because they allow faster and more robust development to put
> public administration systems online. Commercial software raises security
> issues, because one doesn't know what's inside it. This is why I am
> against software patents in Europe."
>
>                                       ====
>
> Actually his objection helps support software patents.  If his concern is
> security issues, and since security issues are a technical effect, his
> economic (thus making the patents useful) objection, which resonates with
> nothing in patent law, becomes yet another argument for the patentability
> of software in Europe.