12.02.12

December 11th an Opportunity for Politicians to Legitimise Software Patents in Europe

Posted in Europe, Patents at 7:22 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz

Summary: A call to arms against software parents in the EU (through the Unitary Patent)

The most vocal activist against the Unitary Patent writes: “Power to the Parliament – No Software Patent! Campaign to save EU from Unitary Patent and software patents” (linking to this page about the “Unitary Patent Plenary December 2012″).

André Rebentisch from FFII, among other FFII members, supports this motion. As a recap, “[t]he European Parliament is about to vote for a regulation on the unitary patent, during its plenary session, on December 11th, 2012.” We wrote about this at the end of November. █

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2 Comments

Agonarch said,

December 2, 2012 at 8:32 am

Actually, I tried the code out like you did but apparently I didn’t succeed. Unfortunately my failed WP experiment got published. It is a call I relay from French organisation APRIL:

The purported goal to have a single patent covering the whole Union may
be praiseworthy. But this regulation, up to its very title, is actually
very deceiving. Indeed, its content leaves the European Union (EU) aside
in many aspects, leading to a fragmented patent system, which will be
untamable by the democratic bodies of the EU. Instead the “patent
microcosm” will gain amazing powers, while its governance has been
highly criticised, specially with regard to its practice of granting
software patents, against the letter and the spirit of European patent law.

You can change this fate by calling Members of the European Parliament
(MEPs), urging them to table, before December 5th at noon, two
compromise amendments.

It’s not about Software Patenting but an 80 yro struggle to get a unified patent system in Europe. Unfortunately the Unitary Patent is not within the EU framework and dispowers the European Parliament. A prior compromise with essential articles between the Parliament and the Council of Ministers was overturned by the heads of state. I think April are right to ask the Parliament to table their two amendments, now that all red lines are crossed:
http://call.unitary-patent.eu/campaign/call2/unitary-patent-plenary-12-2012?setlang=en

Dr. Roy Schestowitz Reply:
December 2nd, 2012 at 9:07 am
The unitary patent looks to me like another step towards the global patent system, which together with Japan and the US can spread software patents through so-called trade agreements/treaties.

http://techrights.org/2011/09/13/nafta-approach-and-swpats/
http://techrights.org/2011/09/17/letters-from-japan/
http://techrights.org/2011/10/01/upls-in-eu-council/

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