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EuroLinux Alliance For immediate Release Paris, Munich, Amsterdam - 2002-02-19 - The European Commission is likely to approve this wednesday a proposal of directive on software patents. EuroLinux has managed to obtain a draft version of the proposed directive. The same document was sent to a few official representatives in European national governments. Incidentally, the author of this document, according to the Microsoft Word file, is Francisco Mingorance (franciscom@bsa.org), patent expert and director of public policy at BSA (Business Software Alliance), an association which represents the interests of large US software publishers in Europe. Software patents are a major legal issue in the information society. Copyright is currently the right way to protect software publishers against piracy. "Copyright provides a simple and very efficient protection to the software economy" says Matthias Schlegel, CEO of Phaidros. "Copyright is the prefered protection of SMEs and independent software developers [1]. EuroLinux strongly supports copyright." adds Harmut Pilch, speaking for the EuroLinux Alliance. On the other hand, software patents allow one company to monopolize an idea of software (ex. patent EP0800142 on the conversion of file names between DOS and Windows) or an idea of business on the Internet (ex. EP0756731 on generating buying incentives from the distribution of cooking recipes), thus prohibiting other companies to use the same idea, even when implemented differently. Because software is always based on a creative arrangement of a few innovative ideas and many common ideas, all European software publishers are infringing on hundred patents among the 50.000 software patents owned by IBM, Microsoft, Sun or Sony, etc. "Thus, instead of protecting software publishers, software patents create a tremendous juridical uncertainty and allow large IT companies to completely control the software economy, block innovation and block competition by prohibiting one software to be compatible with another" says Stéfane Fermigier, CEO of Nuxeo. "Software patents allow large IT companies to steal the intellectual property of smaller players, both by taking control of their copyrighted creations and by forcing them to disclose and trade their most competitive ideas in return for being allowed to live." adds Jean-Paul Smets, CEO of Nexedi. The content of the proposed directive draft legalises the illegal practice [5] of the European Patent Office of granting patents on software and on business methods [2]. The proposed directive draft requires inventions to be "technical" but fails to define what is technical, thus creating an undefined limit to patentability in Europe. The proposed directive draft does not contain any provisions to prohibit patents on Internet standards, to garantee interoperability and fair competition, to protect SMEs against juridical terrorism or to to ensure that shareware and open source / free software are not put at a disadvantage. It paves the way to a global control of the information society by multinational - mostly US - IT corporations. Patents are supposed to promote innovation. However, all economic studies show that the introduction of patents in the software economy stiffles innovation. [3,4,6,7,8] Patents are supposed to protect independent innovators. However, all official studies show that most if not all european software creators will just face more juridical risk without better protection. According to the Rome Treaty, EC directives are supposed to raise the level of protection for consumers and to promote the development of technologies. However, this directive discourages competition and innovation, and by allowing large corporations to tax - through the use of IT - all economic activities, this directive goes against the Rome Treaty. It is thus constitutionaly illegal. Eurolinux hopes that, by making public this draft document, the European Commission will be encouraged to publish without delay the final version of the proposed directive, at the same time as the expected press release and to provide the same level of information to European Citizens as to the BSA. Draft DirectivePlease download the draft directive at http://petition.eurolinux.org/pr/proposal.doc In order to understand the technical language of the directive and its juridical implications, EuroLinux has prepared a commented version at http://swpat.ffii.org/vreji/papri/eubsa-swpat0202/. Please do not hesitate to call for more explanations on this technical material. References[1] Acceptable protection of software intellectual property: a survey of software developers and lawyers. Effy Oz. Information & Management 34. Elsevier 1998. [2] European Software Patent Horror Gallery - http://swpat.ffii.org/vreji/pikta/mupli/index.en.html [3] What is behind the recent surge in patenting? Samuel Kortum, Josh Lerner. Research Policy 28. 1999. Elesevier [4] Abstraction oriented property of software and its relation to patentability. Tetsuo Tamai. Information and Software Technology. 1998. Elsevier. [5] Juridical Coup at the European Patent Office - http://petition.eurolinux.org/pr/pr14.html
[6] Software Patentability with Compensatory Regulation: a Cost Evaluation.
Jean Paul Smets and Hartmut Pilch. Upgrade February 2002
http://swpat.ffii.org/stidi/pleji/
[7] Fraunhofer Study about the Economic Effects of Software Patents. Micro
and Macroeconomic Implications of the Patentability of Software Innovations.
German Federal Ministry Economics and Technology. November 2001.
http://www.bmwi.de/Homepage/Politikfelder/Technologiepolitik/Technologiepolitik.jsp#softwarepatentstudie
[8] Stimulating competition and innovation in the information society. Conseil Général des Mines. September 2000. - http://www.pro-innovation.org About EuroLinux - www.EuroLinux.orgThe EuroLinux Alliance for a Free Information Infrastructure is an open coalition of commercial companies and non-profit associations united to promote and protect a vigourous European Software Culture based on Open Standards, Open Competition, Linux and Open Source Software. Companies, members or supporters of EuroLinux develop or sell software under free, semi-free and non-free licenses for operating systems such as Linux, MacOS or Windows. The EuroLinux Alliance launched on 2000-06-15 an electronic petition to protect software innovation in Europe. The EuroLinux petition has received so far massive support from more than 100.000 European citizens, 2000 corporate managers and 300 companies. Press Contacts France & Europe: Jean-Paul Smets jp@smets.com
+33-6 62 05 76 14 Permanent URL for this PR http://petition.EuroLinux.org/pr/pr17.html LegaleseLinux is a registered trademark of Linus Torvalds. |
Collusion Discovered between BSA and European
Commission