Re: [Patents] Linux FR latest news article

[PILCH Hartmut <phm@a2e.de>]

> Weren't the French parties both against software patents?
> Have you all (French people) been fooled?

The article is not by politicians, and it states matters rather
objectively, almost directly admitting that the law is being broken.

On the other hand, there has been a lot of fooling.  The French government
issued a clear statement against the directive proposal

        http://swpat.ffii.org/papers/eubsa-swpat0202/france020301/

at first but then, when there was the opportunity to get other governments
behind its position in the council, it did nothing whatsoever in support
of its position.  France was, like the other countries, represented by
someone from its patent office.  The change of government probably had
little impact on this.  The matter has been firmly in the hands of the
patent movement all along, and politicians gave only a few public
statements to the contrary without doing much to assure that their
instructions be followed by the civil servants.  Which is already more
than most other governments did.

-- 
Hartmut Pilch, FFII & Eurolinux Alliance              tel. +49-89-12789608
Protecting Innovation against Patent Inflation       http://swpat.ffii.org/
135,000 signatures against software patents      http://www.noepatents.org/