07.11.17
Gemini version available ♊︎In an Age of Mass Deception by Team UPC Benjamin Henrion (FFII) to Deliver a Talk About UPC and Software Patents
Summary: A look at some of the latest UPC spin and an upcoming talk about the dangers of the UPC, especially to (but not limited to) the software industry
BEING summer, this time of the year we don’t expect any major development or breakthrough to happen, certainly not when it comes to the UPC. EPO management is also rather quiet (if not altogether absent). Nevertheless, less than a day ago Bristows was distracting from the real lack of progress (with words like “milestone” in the headline). There’s no “milestone”, no “landmark”… nothing.
“There’s no “milestone”, no “landmark”… nothing.”Just about a week ago the patent maximalists said that some body which claims “the UK’s largest membership organisation for business leaders” had said it “[c]an’t see how #UPC will survive post-brexit;if UK goes ahead with scheme will have to reverse out…” (may be paraphrased)
How it will “survive”? It cannot even start! A lot of people have already explained that point. The UPC isn’t going anywhere in the UK and possibly not in the rest of Europe, either. Ever! Nevertheless, Team UPC will say anything to distort the facts or come up with “alternative facts”.
“The UPC isn’t going anywhere in the UK and possibly not in the rest of Europe, either.”Here for example we have a firm that claims to be “the largest UK and European Patent and Trade Mark Attorney firms, with offices in London, Oxford, Cambridge and Munich.” [via]
“Should the UK Ratification process proceed as expected,” it says, “the final major obstacle to the UP and UPC coming into force is the constitutional challenge to German ratification.”
What about Spain, Poland and so on? What about further constitutional barriers?
They try to make it seem a lot more trivial than it really is. Over at IP Kat, UPC hopefuls leave comments every day, proclaiming to know what the constitutional complaint in Germany is about (or who’s behind it). They don’t know.
“There’s a reason why many British software companies oppose the UPC.”In any event, there’s an upcoming (August) event in which Benjamin Henrion (FFII) will speak about the UPC, especially in relation to software patenting. The abstract of his talk says: “In July 2005, after several failed attempts to legalise software patents in Europe, the patent establishment changed its strategy. Instead of explicitly seeking to sanction the patentability of software, they are now seeking to create a central European patent court, which would establish and enforce patentability rules in their favor, without any possibility of correction by competing courts or democratically elected legislators.”
“I will be speaking at SHA2017 on Unitary Software Patents,” he wrote yesterday.
Like many others who write software, the only stake he has in it is the fear of patent trolls that utilise software patents. There’s a reason why many British software companies oppose the UPC. █
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