Re: [Patents] Pamela Samuelson

[Hartmut Pilch <phm@a2e.de>]

> > They can create that momentum by refusing to do what Samuelson is doing:
> > lending legitimacy to the "realities" created by the patent movement
> > without legislative oversight and without consent from the concerned
> > parties.  Working on "patent reform" and "patent quality" can be one of
> > the ways of lending legitimacy to the movement, and the movement will
> > tolerate such work only to the extent that it does this.  They will not
> > tolerate any reform that leads to a predictable reduction of the number of
> > patents granted.  Such a reform, be it on subject matter or on
> > non-obviousness, can take place only if the patent movement is ousted from
> > its bastions of power.
> >
> Yes de disscusion should proceed beyond bastions of powers of course.
> It would be said if these bastions could not be able to revise their
> position an participate in the concensus instead to fight for a total power.
> The imrovemnet and not reduction of the law is the objective IMHO.

Sometimes less regulation means more order.

Discussions about "patent quality" are fruitless for reasons explained in

        Why software patents are so trivial
        http://swpat.ffii.org/analysis/trivial/

but there is a reason why we are asked to shift the discussion:  it can be
used to imply an endorsement or recognition of software patentability.  If 
you can not get people to explicitely endorse something, the best way is 
to get them to implicitely endorse it by shifting focusses of discussion.

Unfortunately a lot of people in the US who have traditionally been
critical to software patentability, including EFF, Pubpat and Samuelson, 
are now helping to bring about implicit endorsement of swpat by shifting 
the discussion.

-- 
Hartmut Pilch, FFII & Eurolinux Alliance              tel. +49-89-18979927
Protecting Innovation against Patent Inflation       http://swpat.ffii.org/
330,000 votes 3000 firms against software patents    http://noepatents.org/