From phm@a2e.de  Mon Sep  3 15:48:26 2001
From: phm@a2e.de (PILCH Hartmut)
Date: Mon, 3 Sep 2001 16:48:26 +0200 (CEST)
Subject: [Patents] Re: swpat with free niche ?
In-Reply-To: <005301c13477$81738a30$bb01a8c0@uprp.pl>
Message-ID: <Pine.LNX.4.31.0109031609070.1706-100000@querty.oas.a2e.de>

> Battle over logic patents is far from over. But the failure to
> legitimize them in 2000, the result of consultation exercise of the
> DGIM make Europe different place to live. One can now observe efforts
> to keep status quo, and create for open sosoftware a special niche
> where attorneys are not intervening.

This seems too optimistic.  So far I have not seen any serious proposals
for keeping open/free software free from patents.  If you look closer at
the proposals, you find that they are merely proposing that publication or
distribution of source code should not be considered an infringement.
Nobody has a clear proposal on the free use of such software.  This is
indeed difficult, because you cannot allow people to use a chemical
process just because the software for controlling it is free.  If you want
to solve this problem, you can no longer avoid the fundamental issue of
"technical invention" (logical functionality vs physical causality).

Of course some dirty compromises solutions could also be thinkable, but I
am afraid both sides have their reasons for shying away from proposing
anything of the sort.  There is currently no context in which it could be
proposed, because the established powers don't want a discussion, and it
makes no sense to discuss among us something we don't believe in.

> The task before us is reject this kind of proposals and left no doubts
> that we can agree only on a law that treats closed/proprietary and
> open/free software at equal footing.

I would not reject them outright but rather use the opportunity for
getting the discussion moving, such as done recently with JP Smets in

  Software Patentability with Compensatory Regulation: a Cost Analysis
  http://swpat.ffii.org/stidi/pleji/

This article mentions a lot of possible compromise packages, but we can of
course not really propose or endorse any of them.  That is something for
politicians to think of.  When a normal citizen mistakes himself for a
politician or diplomat, he will commit the kind of errors that Lutterbeck
et al committed in

	http://swpat.ffii.org/vreji/papri/bmwi-luhoge00/
	http://swpat.ffii.org/vreji/papri/bmwi-luhoge00/indexen.html

They were charged with clarifying the issues and they played politics
instead, producing a set of unworkable compromises based on half-truths
bent to accomodate the prejudices of the perceived two lobbies, quite an
unpalpable mixture that could be pardonable and honorable, if it came from
real politicians, whose job it is to create such beasts.

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

















