Video: Stallman on software patent fears

By Liz Tay on Sep 23, 2010 12:59 PM
Filed under Software

Why GNU founder crashed the European Patent Office’s presentation.

Free software activist and GNU founder Richard Stallman spoke with iTnews following his unexpected appearance at a World Computer Congress patent discussion this week.

Armed with a placard that read "Don't get caught in software patent thickets", Stallman warned that the European Patent Office was campaigning in favour of software patents in Australia.

He briefly interrupted a presentation by European Patent Officer Ralf Abbing, who spoke about the "big issues in IP in relation to computing technology".

Stallman spoke with iTnews on the condition that the video be made available in a non-proprietary format.

Accordingly, the full interview may be downloaded in the free, open standard OGG format here (38Mb).

Video: Stallman on software patent fears

8 comments in this discussion

"On the contrary, guy_from_Europe: it's well known that the big corporations are currently much happier with the EPO's relatively 'restrictive' software patent granting practise than they are with ..."

By phayes

Tags

stallman, patent, epo, foss, wcc2010

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Comments: 8

Gnstr Sep 23, 2010 6:34 PM	With all due respect Mr Stallman, too many errors in your assertions, my heart aches: 1 "Mega Corporations own all the Patents in all the fields in Au" Perhaps Mr Stallman should check with the Australian Patent office before making his preposterous statements, as there are hundreds of Patents not owned by what he described as corporations in Au. 2. "If AU allows foreign Patent, almost all the Patents will belong to foreigners" Does he seriously think that there are no smart people in AU, who will continue innovating, be there software patents or not?? 3. "..Will give them an opportunity to sue Au's ..." In fact not necessarily. If matter is already in the public domain prior to the Patent, then surely it is invalid. Stallman should know, as do his colleagues at the Open Source foundation. In any case, isn't it curious that the EPO, which does not grant "software patents" in Europe, but can grant "Computer implemented Inventions" (trust me there's a difference) is being accused of lobbying for software Patents in AU, when there is clearly little chance(ask Patent attorneys in Europe and they'll tell you why) of Europe ever adopting software patents? gnstr.wordpress.com
dazlari Sep 23, 2010 9:10 PM	@Gnstr 1 Stallman actually says:"Mega Corporation own half the Patents in every field", so you're only half right about that one. A bit of a throw away line though, I wasn't expecting a pure statistic. On that basis he was probably understating it. 2 Should software patents come to Australia "almost all will be owned by foreigners". I'm pretty sure this is not a statement about the intelligence of Australians, his point is that with these Patents, innovation will be stifled and everyone will be poorer for that, even software Patent owners who must now defend themselves from other Patents by stockpiling them. Who can afford to do that? Oh, that's right, the Mega Corporations. 3 This will depend on the nature of the agreement which is why it is such an important moment in time. If Au were to accept Eu software patents, and assuming Eu adopt them in advance, then we're instantly at a disadvantage. The idea that prior art in the Public Domain makes it ok for the future to be littered with Patents offers up an interesting thought experiment: what would the world be like now if this happened to software back in the 70's? Would we even have the internet to discuss this?
Ace Sep 23, 2010 10:41 PM	I think youse have missed have of what Stallman said. He's been around a long time, and knows this stuff really well. If Australia accept EPO and/or US software patents, then it won't matter if you have prior art, because Mega Corp will shoot you down with numerous claims. Most companies will be defenceless against these giants. Read this bit "It would be a suicidal mission for an SME to sue a large corporation over a patent if the SME depends upon revenue streams from its own product sales." on http://www.nosoftwarepatents.com/en/m/untruths/sme.html for a slightly better understanding.
phayes Sep 24, 2010 10:45 AM	“ ... there is clearly little chance(ask Patent attorneys in Europe and they'll tell you why) of Europe ever adopting software patents ...” --Gnstr. Good grief... The EPO's, UKPO's and some PAs' - but not all and not the Polish PO's - infamously making the mutually conflicting claims - depending on audience - both that the EPO does not grant software (and business method) patents, and that it does do so and had always done so, played a large part in the unprecedented near-unanimous rejection of the CII Directive in 2005 here in Europe. Of course the EPO does grant software patents and had been doing so in apparent contravention of the statutory law (EPC) for many years before the Directive. That supposed sharp distinction between software invention and CII was quickly exposed by independent experts as bogus and many MEPs were not at all amused by what was clearly an attempt to deceive them and corrupt the political process. Why the EPO et al did that (instead of just making an honest pro-software patent argument), and how on earth they hoped to get away with it when, among other things, the publically accessible EPO database is chock full of clear examples of USPTO-parallel software patents, remains a mystery.
gnuchris Sep 24, 2010 8:12 PM	lol, that guy said "Stallman should know, as do his colleagues at the Open Source foundation". I think you mean the Free Software Foundation fsf.org
guy_from_Europe Oct 2, 2010 11:32 PM	Unfortunately Stallman seems to know little about the EPO or how it treats software related patent applications. In fact the EPO is probably the one of the five biggest patent offices (see http://www.fiveipoffices.org/about-us.html ) being the strictest on software patents. People who know the subject might say that for applicants it is very easy to bypass the exclusions of Article 52(2) EPC (including the one mentioning programs for computers, see http://www.epo.org/patents/law/legal-texts/html/epc/2000/e/ar52.html ) but it is very important to notice that the part of the claimed subject-matter falling under these exclusions cannot contribute towards an inventive step unless it provides a further technical effect with the areas excluded by Article 52(2) being considered as non-technical. As a result the EPO refuses most applications for pure software patents because there is no technical subject-matter that could justify an inventive step. Compared to that the USPTO grants a lot of patents where the same patent application got refuse by the EPO. Lots of examples can be found in the patent databases. So I find it rather ironic that Stallman attacks the EPO and not the USPTO or one of the other patent offices. But may be it was just a coincidence that the EPO was giving a speech and otherwise he would have addressed any other patent office in the same way. For people truly interested in the subject here are some further links: Book chapter comparing US and EPO patenting in the field of software and business method patents (see chapter 1.2): http://books.google.de/books?id=ffriv6m7khwC&printsec=frontcover&dq=Patent+Law+for+Computer+Scientists:+Steps+to+Protect+Computer-Implemented+Inventions&hl=de&ei=W6wfTNeYMNncsAaNx6CPDg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CCkQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q&f=true
guy_from_Europe Oct 3, 2010 4:45 AM	What I meant is that if the big corporations wanted to lobby the Australian patent office in favour of software patents then they would definitely not send somebody from the EPO because the EPO does not exactly represent their interests in respect of software patents. They probably rather would have sent somebody from the USPTO, which is much more in favour of software patents. So the claim that the EPO is lobbying for software patents in the name of big corporations just doesn’t make any sense.
phayes Oct 8, 2010 7:19 PM	On the contrary, guy_from_Europe: it's well known that the big corporations are currently much happier with the EPO's relatively 'restrictive' software patent granting practise than they are with the USPTO's apparent “just grant everything and let them fight it out in the market and Courts” attitude. But of course it is true that they wouldn't - and couldn't - send someone from the EPO instead of one of their own people. Even the EPO does not directly lobby on behalf of corporations. Anyway... You state how “very important” and how much of a barrier to patent eligibility the much derided “further technical effect” criterion presents and you make anecdotal and quantitative claims - sans actual evidence - about the tangible consequences. I don't have the necessary data to judge the validity of the latter point either, ;-) but I was pleasantly surprised to see that the book chapter you linked to seems to give an honest appraisal of the former point (I loved the bit about the intrinsic 'technicality' of writing with pen and paper!). As every other independent analysis I've ever seen concludes: neither “further technical effect” nor any of the other criteria for patent eligibility present anything remotely approaching a “very important” distinction between software that can and software that cannot be patented. I think the following TBoA decision illustrates this especially well (in light of the XFree86 ICCM clipboard specs, starkly so) to any understandably confused computer professionals who may also remember that the EPO/UKPO et al have in recent times even claimed that they “do not grant software patents” at all!: http://legal.european-patent-office.org/dg3/pdf/t030424eu1.pdf