From phm@a2e.de  Thu Aug 16 17:09:47 2001
From: phm@a2e.de (PILCH Hartmut)
Date: Thu, 16 Aug 2001 18:09:47 +0200 (CEST)
Subject: [Meta] Re: [Patents] <no object>
In-Reply-To: <20010816102702.B20910@john-edwin-tobey.org>
Message-ID: <Pine.LNX.4.33.0108161755510.4669-100000@mulix.oas.a2e.de>

> Read Howard Zinn.  Read Noam Chomsky.  Cancel your NY Times
> subscription, turn off your TV, and look elsewhere if you want the
> facts.

While this may be so, it has relatively little to do with our discussion.
In the case of the patent mess, the responsible people are sitting in
Brussels and Munich.

> Greg made an argument about the effects of patentability based on some
> incorrect, or at best debatable, assumptions about how the world
> works.  Bernard's reply sought to poke a pin in Greg's balloon.

Compared to Greg's empty rhetoric, even Radio Bagdad is an extremely
informative source of information.

We don't need a debate about the problems of the world in order to pin
that balloon.

Software patents are a question of idiocy vs common sense.  Even if the US
was an evil empire with the worst intentions, software patents would be
quite counterproductive for its policy.  Idiocy is never productive for
any policy.

--
Hartmut Pilch                                           http://phm.ffii.org/
Protecting Innovation against Patent Inflation	      http://swpat.ffii.org/
85000 signatures against software patents         http://www.noepatents.org/



