Bonum Certa Men Certa

Failing SCO, Microsoft Eyes EU and Software Patents

Languishing case dragged on for half a decade

"[Emerson, Microsoft senior vice president for strategy] stated that Microsoft wished to promote SCO and its pending lawsuit against IBM and the Linux operating system. But Microsoft did not want to be seen as attacking IBM or Linux."

--Larry Goldfarb (of BayStar)



Readers might be wondering what all those SCO-related quotes are about. We've posted many of them so far today in order to symbolise and draw attention to the Halloween Documents, which intersect with today's special day. As stated in Wikipedia, there was an "e-mail from consultant Mike Anderer to SCO's Chris Sontag revealing Microsoft's channeling of US$ 86 million to SCO."



“It's worth remembering that Novell approached Microsoft for this deal, not the other way around.”Failing copyrights libel, as implicitly suggested inside the Halloween Documents, Microsoft has already resorted to unbacked patents libel. It's the next logical step and a last option too. That resistance phase was ignited a year and a half ago and it was empowered by the patent deal Microsoft had signed with Novell. It's worth remembering that Novell approached Microsoft for this deal, not the other way around.

Software patents are 'softer' than copyrights and their legitimacy is constantly being questioned; their very existence is challenged. Software patents are still illegal in the large majority of the world, so Microsoft has reasons for concern about its unfounded claims and threats. After all, SCO was fined in Germany for such slander. Can Microsoft too be fined? Either way, there is an endless pursuit for software patents in Europe, courtesy of Microsoft, a few other companies, and the pressure groups they employ [1, 2].

In reality, owing to existing confusion and lack of clarify, “they [EPO] can’t distinguish between hardware and software so the patents get issued anyway," says Microsoft's Marshall Phelps.

Europe's assignment of the infamous software patent situation to the enlarged board was mentioned here earlier [1, 2, 3]. The following report from IDG suggests that Pieter Hintjens, former head of FFII welcomes this decision.

In an interview at the beginning of this year, shortly after she took over the top job in Munich, Brimelow said she wasn't ready to refer the software patents question to the EBoA, perhaps out of respect for her predecessor.

Now that she is ready, the reaction has been positive.

"It will be a landmark case with a sizeable effect on the interpretation of patent law even beyond Europe," said Thomas Vinje, an intellectual property expert and partner at the law firm Clifford Chance.

Pieter Hintjens, a prominent campaigner against software patents during the political debate in 2005 and founder of software company Imatix, welcomed Brimelow's decision.

"The (EPO) has resisted doing this for many years. In the past it didn't want to clamp down on software patent applications for economic reasons: The EPO makes money from patent applications and renewals. Brimelow at last is taking a healthier approach, prioritizing the long-term interests of society ahead of the short-term financial ones," Hintjens said.


There is some more background reading to this in The Register.

The European Patent Office (EPO) has asked its ultimate legal authority to look at the European Patent Convention (EPC) and issue advice on the patentability of software. The EPO said that such advice was necessary to ensure the uniform application of the EPC.


We have been writing quite extensively about what Symbian (Nokia) has done in the UK. It harmed the country's treatment of software patents [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]; however, according to this, the situation in the UK can be impacted by the conclusions reached in continental Europe.

The thorny issue of software patents in the EU was again in the news last week. Regular readers will recall the ongoing row between the UK Intellectual Property Office (UK IPO) and the courts over the former's application of both UK and EU case law on the extent to which computer software can be patented. The most recent round a couple of weeks back saw the Court of Appeal find the UK IPO was wrong to deny a patent to Symbian's PC performance enhancing software. Now the European Patent Office (EPO) has sought clarification by way of a reference to the Enlarged Board of Appeal (which hears appeals against EPO decisions) seeking to clear up some of the finer points of the application of European patent law. Those clever kitties at the IP Kat reckon the referral should end some of the uncertainty over computer software at the EPO level and (indirectly) aid the UK IPO as well. Let's hope so.


These are interesting times and an important test for the European patent system. Brimelow does not want another riot.

Software patents protest against EPO

Recent Techrights' Posts

Even Microsoft (MSN) Covers Richard Stallman's Public Talk in Milan 2 Days Ago
He spoke in Spanish earlier this month (Alicante)
Very High Attendance Level at Richard Stallman's Talk Shows People Can Relate to His Message
Smear campaigns have their limits
 
Links 28/05/2025: 'Emulation Layers' (Measurements and Linguistics), Libraries, and Discomfort
Links for the day
Links 28/05/2025: More Arrests for Bitcoin-Connected Torture and Prosecutions for Dieselgate-Linked Executives
Links for the day
Gemini Links 28/05/2025: Techo-authoritarianism With Slop Plagiarism and "No Online June" (Going Offline)
Links for the day
Links 28/05/2025: GitHub MCP Exploited and MathWorks Discovers Huge Windows TCO
Links for the day
Microsofters Were Scheming to Take Over This Entire Web Site (in Their Own Words!)
Money gets spent censoring/deplatforming people who speak about real issues; no money gets spent actually tackling those underlying issues
Gemini Links 28/05/2025: Celsius-Fahrenheit, Endless Scrolling/Infinite Scrolling, and Trapping LLM Slop Bots
Links for the day
Bicycles for the Minds and the Story Harrison Bergeron
"The goal of having people in charge of the tools they use and that the tools should amplify ability" has long been abandoned
Prison gate backdrop to baptism by Fr Sean O'Connell, St Paul's, Coburg
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
More Photos From This Week's Milan Talk by Richard Stallman
The posts are in Italian, not English
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Tuesday, May 27, 2025
IRC logs for Tuesday, May 27, 2025
Links 27/05/2025: Science Defunded, India Arrests an Academic
Links for the day
Gemini Links 27/05/2025: From Celsius to Fahrenheit and Deleting Social Control Media
Links for the day
Microsofters Have, in Effect, Attempted Extrajudicial Action Against Us
Courts and Judges (or Masters) don't exist to facilitate this kind of "bro" culture
UK High Court Masters Are Not Your Jesters, Microsoft
Judges aren't there for "funny" spectacles, they're there to act as arbiters in critical cases, not SLAPPs
Links 27/05/2025: Mass Layoffs at Volvo and More Evidence of 'AI' (Slop) Being a Passing Fad
Links for the day
The Code of Conduct (CoC) Gaslighting Phenomenon
There are still many people and projects foolish enough to outsource their labour to Microsoft via GitHub
They're Very Jealous of Richard Stallman and His Freedom (or Simple Lifestyle)
Jealousy is toxic because it can cause rational people to act irrationally and even severely harm themselves
Akira Urushibata on GNU coreutils
new message
Anouk Rozestraten (Deputy Director) Appears to Have Left the Free Software Foundation
Let's hope Rozestraten is still using and promoting Free software
There's Nothing Funny About Lawbreaking
There's plenty of room in society for humour, but "hacking" the state by breaking laws isn't cool or hip
More Mass Layoffs Coming Soon to Microsoft, Just a Question of When and How Many
Numbers from Washington were close to 5% and judging by prior rumours, it would be 5% + 5% (total 10%) at a later month
Links 27/05/2025: Bikes, Ideal Computers, and BYO
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Monday, May 26, 2025
IRC logs for Monday, May 26, 2025
Richard Stallman's Milan Talk (Public Presentation) Was Packed, Video Available Soon
Looks like they even ran out of seats
Gemini Links 26/05/2025: Intangible Stuff and Slop Issues
Links for the day
The Openwashing Shills Initiative (OSI) - Part I: Complaints to IRS or USDOJ Needed
If enough people do it, this will be more effective, more so if people who are based in the US do it
Open Source Initiative (OSI) Lobbying and the OSI's Status at Stake
At the end we plan to summarise all the issues in one very long article
Breaking Into Other People's Devices Without Authorisation Isn't "Funny" or "Research"
“Chaos was the law of nature; order was the dream of man.”
The Issue Isn't the Internet, the Issue is How People Are Taught to Use or Misuse It
The Web is circling down the drain. The Internet is not.
A Healed Reputation of a Movement's Leader and His Robust Message
The more aggressively you push against resistors, the more credibility they will gain
Links 26/05/2025: Deletions from Microsoft's GitHub, Telegram Blocked in Vietnam
Links for the day
Linux Released Last Night and There's Already LLM Slop With Slop Images
BetaNoise does not seem to mind this anymore
Links 26/05/2025: Walmart Layoffs and DRM Dumpster Fire ('Old' Fire TV Devices Lose Netflix Access)
Links for the day
Gemini Links 26/05/2025: USB Camera Viewer and Fantasy Life
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Sunday, May 25, 2025
IRC logs for Sunday, May 25, 2025