"[The EPO] can’t distinguish between hardware and software so the patents get issued anyway", —Marshall Phelps, Microsoft (at the time)

Summary: India's loopholes for software patents aren't too easy to exploit, unlike the EPO's because of the management, which goes out of its way to make software patents in Europe really easy to attain

THE EPO's loopholes for software patents in Europe have long been faux relation to a "device", which makes the algorithms not 'pure' software "as such" (or "per se" in India). We wrote a lot about it, even more than a decade ago.

This new article by Rajeev Kumar and Pankaj Musyuni says that the Indian "Patent Office has also been developing examination guidelines in different technology areas, and, based on the stakeholder's feedback, revised the guidelines for computer-related inventions in June 2017. The revised guidelines were significant for patent applicants since the revision involved the removal of the requirement that software patents can be claimed only in conjunction with novel hardware."

"The above 'article' from LexOrbis is pure marketing and Mondaq masquerades as a news site. Its business model is charging money for law firms to be syndicated in 'news' form."Whatever they mean by "novel hardware" (usually just some general-purpose computer on which the algorithm is run/executed). LexOrbis is a frequent proponent of software patents in India, as we noted before [1, 2]. So whatever it says on this subject ought to be taken with a grain of salt. They just try to sell services, such as software patent applications. The same goes for Managing IP, which is like a front group of this whole 'industry', albeit in Europe. After several EPO tweets to that effect, combining software with something about "medical" or "health" (we wrote about it earlier this week; last week the EPO attempted to associate software patents with "green" and "environment"), Managing IP comes out with this article titled "Life sciences firms reveal how AI could disrupt patent strategies" (euphemisms galore).

Combing their "Life sciences" nonsense with the buzzword which is "AI", sites of the patent extortion (or litigation) 'industry' push patents on life and on maths in tandem. They're shameless about this sick EPO agenda, which we last saw in yesterday's EPO tweets. To quote the summary (there's a paywall):

In-house counsel at life sciences companies reveal how machine-learning innovations are driving uncertainty over future filing strategies

They're alluding to algorithms; I know this, having done programming in the area of machine learning a decade and a half ago during the Ph.D. programme. They hope that by throwing some words like "medical" they will manage to dress up computer programs as "ethical" and make patents on these seem "ethical" as well. As if lives are being saved by these patent monopolies. That's just objectionable, but then again consider the objectionable people who nowadays run the EPO. António Campinos is just a quieter Battistelli.

Apropos or vis-à-vis, mind this new press release about a "medical" European Patent. It's worth noting that the Associated Press (AP) disseminates such press releases as much as I've never seen before. Has AP been reduced to a 'spam farm' of press releases? A new business model? Business ads disguised as news using the "AP" brand? It'll backfired surely because it can cheapen the brand, making "AP" synonymous with ads. Yesterday we wrote about how law firms hijacked and are presently paying the media to relay their marketing in 'article' form. The above 'article' from LexOrbis is pure marketing and Mondaq masquerades as a news site. Its business model is charging money for law firms to be syndicated in 'news' form. AP is apparently going down a similar route. ⬆