Re: [Patents] newsscan: Software patent limits 'go too far'

[Jean-Baptiste Soufron <jbsoufron@free.fr>]

Software is not patentable but there are exceptions. The problem is that
EPO has extended the scope of these exceptions to such a level that they
now appears to cover barely everything. Remember that a patent
registered by EPO is not necessarily valid... it's just registered but
it can be invalidated in court. 

But well... we were with a paradox : software patents are forbidden
except some exceptions but the exceptions became so big that it reversed
the principle. 

Then, the new law was supposed to clear things up... first by allowing
software patents... then, thanks to the free software activits, by
remembering and clarifying the old principle.

But, the exception is still here! So what will the EPO do and how will
courts react?!? We still don't know. 

Voila... :-)

Don't take it wrong but I just want to show that the party is not over
at all. 

On Wed, 22 Oct 2003 17:11:49 -0400
Seth Johnson <seth.johnson@RealMeasures.dyndns.org> wrote:

> 
> 
> Jean-Baptiste Soufron wrote:
> > 
> > What we see now is just the normal process of the birth of
> > legislation. People have opposed views, some are fair and some are
> > unfair but they tend to get closer in the end until everybody find a
> > good in-between solution. It's just not the job of computer
> > scientists to write law and it's not the job of jurists to
> > understand computer science. Both interact on each other and the
> > only thing needed is communication and explanations.
> 
> 
> The Commission's Directive on "computer-implemented inventions" would
> have codified the practice of the EPO into law.  You aren't addressing
> the question:
> 
> 1) Is software patentable in the first place?
> 2) Why is the EPO granting software patents?
> 
> Seth
> 
> 
> -- 
> 
> DRM is Theft!  We are the Stakeholders!
> 
> New Yorkers for Fair Use
> http://www.nyfairuse.org
> 
> [CC] Counter-copyright: http://realmeasures.dyndns.org/cc
> 
> I reserve no rights restricting copying, modification or distribution
> of this incidentally recorded communication.  Original authorship
> should be attributed reasonably, but only so far as such an
> expectation might hold for usual practice in ordinary social discourse
> to which one holds no claim of exclusive rights.
> 
>