Thanks to EU Parliament for Standing Against Software Patents

(Forwarded from Patents list.  Text of page pasted below [sans 
internal links].  -- Seth)

-----Original Message-----
From: Hartmut Pilch <[email protected]>
Date: Tue, 30 Sep 2003 18:08:54 +0200 (CEST)
Subject: [Patents] Petition Initiators Thank the European Parliament

[...]

Permanent URL of this Press Release

   http://swpat.ffii.org/news/03/epet0929/index.en.html

----

Petition Initiators Thank the European Parliament

Brussels 2003/09/29

For immediate Release

Last Wednesday the Parliament voted against software patents and for 
freedom of publication, freedom of interoperation and other basic 
values of the information society, thereby reversing the thrust of a 
directive proposal from the European Commission, so as to basically 
satisfy the demands of a quarter million signatories of the "Eurolinux 
Petition for a Software Patent Free Europe" and 30 eminent computer 
scientists. The initiators of both petitions will speak before the 
European Parliament's Petition Committee on tuesday 18.00 to express 
their thanks and explore with MEPs what still needs to be done. 


Details 
Media Contacts 
About the FFII -- www.ffii.org 
About the Eurolinux Alliance -- www.eurolinux.org 
Permanent URL of this Press Release 

Annotated Links

Details

The Petition for a Software Patent Free Europe and the Scientists' 
Petition are being presented on Tue 30 Sept 2003 at 6 pm in the 
Petition Committee in the European Parliament Room A3G2, Spinelli 
Building (ASP) at Brussels by Bernard Lang and Philippe Aigrain. 

On 10 Nov, software patents are possibly on the agenda for a meeting 
of governmental patent experts from EU member states in the European 
Council. The software patent owner lobby and EU Internal Market 
Commissioner Frits Bolkestein are now counting on the Council, 
whose "patent policy working party" has proven in the past to be very 
responsive to patent owner wishes. Bolkestein and his supporters have 
predicted that the Council will withdraw the directive or, if that 
fails, give in to anticipated US pressure. The day before the vote 
Bolkestein warned MEPs that they would ruin their chances of 
democratic participation if they voted as they did last wednesday. The 
US and UK governments sent warnings of similar content to MEPs earlier 
this month. 

In this atmosphere of fear, uncertainty and distrust (FUD) launched 
against the European Parliament, both Mr Aigrain and Mr Lang are 
expected to strenghten the position of the Parliament in European 
legislation. 

For attending the meeting, please send mail to Benjamin Henrion. 


Media Contacts

mail: 
media at ffii org 
phone: 
FFII Munich (German, English and French): 0049/89/18979927 
Benjamin Henrion (French and English): 0032/498/292771 or 
0032/10/454779 

Jonas Maebe (Dutch and English): +32-485-36-96-45 

Dieter Van Uytvanck (Dutch and English): +32-499-16-70-10 

Erik Josefsson (Swedish and English): +46-707-696567 

Alex Macfie (English): +44 7901 751753 

Joaquim Carvalho (Portugues and English): +35-1-93-6169633 

More Contacts to be supplied upon request


About the FFII -- www.ffii.org

The Foundation for a Free Information Infrastructure (FFII) is a non-
profit association registered in Munich, which is dedicated to the 
spread of data processing literacy. FFII supports the development of 
public information goods based on copyright, free competition, open 
standards. More than 300 members, 500 companies and 40,000 supporters 
have entrusted the FFII to act as their voice in public policy 
questions in the area of exclusion rights (intellectual property) in 
data processing. 


About the Eurolinux Alliance -- www.eurolinux.org

The EuroLinux Alliance for a Free Information Infrastructure is an 
open coalition of commercial companies and non-profit associations 
united to promote and protect a vigourous European Software Culture 
based on copyright, open standards, open competition and open source 
software such as Linux. Corporate members or sponsors of EuroLinux 
develop or sell software under free, semi-free and non-free licenses 
for operating systems such as GNU/Linux, MacOS or MS Windows. 


Permanent URL of this Press Release
http://swpat.ffii.org/news/03/epet0929/index.en.html 


Annotated Links

Bolkestein's warning to MEPs 
Similar statements were uttered previously by Arlene McCarthy and 
later by several patent attorneys, some in names of organisations. 
see Reactions to EP Vote 

EU Parliament Votes for Real Limits on Patentability 
In its plenary vote on the 24th of September, the European Parliament 
approved the proposed directive on "patentability of computer-
implemented inventions" with amendments that clearly restate the non-
patentability of programming and business logic, and uphold freedom of 
publication and interoperation. 

Vote in 8 days: 2000 IT bosses ask European Parliament to say NO to 
software patents 
A "Petition for a Free Europe without Software Patents" has gained 
more than 150000 signatures. Among the supporters are more than 2000 
company owners and chief executives and 25000 developpers and 
engineers from all sectors of the European information and 
telecommunication industries, as well as more than 2000 scientists and 
180 lawyers. Companies like Siemens, IBM, Alcatel and Nokia lead the 
list of those whose researchers and developpers want to protect 
programming freedom and copyright property against what they see as 
a "patent landgrab". Currently the patent policy of many of these 
companies is still dominated by their patent departments. These have 
intensively lobbied the European Parliament to support a proposal to 
allow patentability of "computer-implemented inventions" (recent 
patent newspeak term which usually refers to software in the context 
of patent claims, i.e. algorithms and business methods framed in terms 
of generic computing equipment), which the rapporteur, UK Labour MEP 
Arlene McCarthy, backed by "patent experts" from the socialist and 
conservative blocks, is trying to rush through the European Parliament 
on June 30, just 13 days after she had won the vote in the Legal 
Affairs Committe (JURI).

30 Scientists 2003/05: Petition against Software Patent Directive 
30 famous computer scientists sharply criticise the European 
Commission's proposal to legalise software patents in Europe.