As for the community patent

As for the community patent

Posted May 14, 2008 10:22 UTC (Wed) by coriordan (guest, #7544)
Parent article: European software patents via treaty?

In a meeting this morning about the community patent, a Commission speaker said they're getting close to agreement.

The offer of automated translations seems to have reassured many countries. They'd be using a new translation engine developed by the EPO which uses a specific translation dictionary for whatever domain the patent is in. etc. etc. The tech details aren't really important.

Spain is the last country openly opposing the current proposal. France would agree but has stated that they're not going to openly conflict with Spain. However, Spain has a new Minister for Science and Enterprise, and she might change Spain's position.

I raised the issue that cheaper, faster, bigger patents is the exact opposite of what most software developers and software companies are asking for. The Commission speaker replied that the current proposal would make granting faster, which would shorten the period of uncertainty, and would make challenging patents easier since it could be done in any country.

She talked about this reducing the problem of "disguised software patents".

I'll try to put a more detailed report in my blog later today.

Just FYI.

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Thank you, that was interesting. Did you officially represent anyone in 
that meeting?

In your question you said "When I talk to SMEs in the field of software, 
they say they want fewer or no software patents."

Did anyone challenge you on that, or is it accepted data now?

I was representing FSFE, and was at an SME breakfast because FSFE is a member of the CEA-PME
SME Federation.

No one questioned my assertion that SMEs were against software patents.  Indeed, the chair
confirmed it (which surprised me since he was a pro-swpat MEP).

...but maybe he would say he's against software patents but that he supports
computer-implemented inventions.  To have a meaningful discussion about this, you really have
to be able to agree on terminology at the beginning :-/

The best way to do that is to bring a few specific patents and then avoid existing terms
completely by just talking about "this type of patent".  Q&A sessions don't really give you
the opportunity for that.

Still, if we stay quiet, we give the Commission a justification to say that they discussed X
issue and nobody complained about software patents.  So even when we can't make a difference,
it's useful to raise an objection.