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EuroParl Press Release - The Ball is in Our Court Now |
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Wednesday, March 09 2005 @ 10:25 AM EST
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Here's a smoking press release from Europarl on the plenary debate Tuesday night, in which Charlie McCreevy tried to tell the MEPs why he didn't submit the software patent draft directive for a new first reading by Parliament. It's a riot. They are not buying the story, and to my reading, they are ready to fight. I'd call that a good sign. The press release is from their website, but the site is now broken. Here is where you'll find it when they are back up. FFII transcripts here. Here's more from ZDNET: The European Commission (EC) will not stand in the European Parliament's (EP) way if it decides to reject the draft directive on software-related patents, the Commission told the Parliament on Tuesday evening.
If the EP does decide to kill the directive, there will be no new proposal from the EC, Charlie McCreevy, commissioner for the Internal Market, told a Parliament plenary session. "You can of course reject or substantially amend the proposal," he said. "If the Parliament decides to reject it, then the Commission will respect your wishes. I will not propose a new directive." He wants it to be their fault, I gather, if they can't get a majority, and they only need a majority now because he made it harder by not asking for a restart. And the article says McCreevy is challenging them by saying, It's the current language or nothing. That makes it harder to get a majority too. Ugh. Politics.
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9 March 2005
Computerised inventions: the ball is in Parliament's court
The quarrel between the Commission and Parliament over the directive on the patentability of computer-implemented inventions goes on. During a plenary debate on Tuesday evening, MEPs attacked the Commission's refusal to submit its draft directive for a new first reading by Parliament. They also criticised the directive's scope.
Internal Market Commissioner Charlie McCreevy told MEPs that the Commission could not have put forward a new proposal, since the Council had been about to adopt its common position (which it did on Monday). He then also defended the scope of the directive, saying "it does not include software as such".
Mr McCreevy argued that the Commission had drafted its proposal in such a way as to avoid including software patents. He said the directive is needed to ensure legal clarity and that "in the absence of the directive, software patents will continue to be granted". The Commissioner then stressed his eagerness to take account of the EP's second-reading opinion. "If the Parliament will reject the proposal, the Commission will respect it and I will not put forward another proposal", he said.
"This is a disastrous situation", said Michel ROCARD (PES, FR), Parliament's rapporteur. He argued that it was important to limit the scope of the directive to avoid confusion, since the text was not clear about "what is patentable and what is not". All political groups criticised the directive's scope as too vague, saying it risked limiting freedom of expression and encouraging unfair competition from big software firms. Some MEPs also stressed the need to protect smaller firms from additional legal costs, saying that copyright already provided legal protection for software.
Asked by numerous MEPs how he was going to take into account all the criticisms made by MEPs and national governments, Mr McCreevy replied "the ball is now in the Parliament's court".
Some MEPs have also accused the Commission of ignoring Parliament's opinion. Criticism of the Commission's behaviour followed Mr Barroso's rejection of the request for renewed consultation, made last month by the EP Conference of Presidents under Rule 55 of Parliament's Rules of Procedures, which allows Parliament to demand a fresh look at any legislation following elections. The Commission President's response was that restarting the legislative procedure would create chaos but this argument was regarded as inadequate by MEPs.
In the common position it adopted on Monday - despite a unanimous request from the EP's political groups to withdraw it - the Competitiveness Council ignored most of Parliament's first-reading amendments. The European Parliament now has three to four months to adopt its second reading. To reject the text or to approve any amendments requires a majority of the EP's component Members (367 votes).
Background
The directive is intended to harmonise the various national patent laws by clarifying what is patentable and what is not. The central issue is whether the current practice of the European Patent Office, which issues patents for computerised inventions, should be formally legalised. Since its first reading, the directive has been criticised by supporters of "open source" software, mainly smaller companies, who are afraid that patenting would raise legal costs. They claim copyright already protects their inventions and, unlike patents, is cost-free. On the other hand, the directive is supported by big software firms, which stress the need to defend European inventions from US competition and to encourage research spending.
In September 2003, the EP proposed amendments to ensure that computer programs as such could not be patented. MEPs argued that, in order to be patentable, computerised inventions must have an industrial application (e.g. cell phones or household appliances), involve an inventive step and bring a technical contribution to the state of the art. In other words, Parliament's amendments sought to make it clear that the mere use of software is not a technical contribution.
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Authored by: MadScientist on Wednesday, March 09 2005 @ 10:46 AM EST |
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Authored by: MadScientist on Wednesday, March 09 2005 @ 10:46 AM EST |
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Authored by: macrorodent on Wednesday, March 09 2005 @ 11:13 AM EST |
And the article says McCreevy is challenging them by saying, It's the current
language or nothing. That makes it harder to get a majority too. Ugh.
Politics.
Is McCreevy spreading FUD? If I recall correctly earlier
discussions, the Parliament could now in principle, during the second reading,
restore all the amendments it made in 2003, turning it into an acceptable
directive, and that would be that. But doing so would require getting majority
on all changes.
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Authored by: Chris Lingard on Wednesday, March 09 2005 @ 11:14 AM EST |
This is document reference 7060/05 at l
ink
and find "ADOPTION OF COUNCIL'S COMMON POSITION ..... "
If the
link is down I have a copy on my own web site, link and get 84021.pdf
Here
is my transcript:
The Council adopted by qualified
majority today its common position on a draft Directive
laying down rules for
the patentability of computer-implemented inventions, with Spain
voting against
and the Austrian, Italian and Belgian delegations abstaining1. The
Council's
common position will now be submitted to the European Parliament for
second reading.
The proposed Directive aims at ensuring an effective,
transparent and harmonised
protection of computer-implemented inventions
throughout the Community so as to enable
innovative enterprises to derive the
maximum advantage from their inventive activity and
provide an incentive for
investment and innovation. Existing differences in the
administrative practices
and the case law of the different Member States regarding the
patentability of
computer-implemented inventions could create barriers to trade and hence
impede
the proper functioning of the internal market.
The Council's common
position lays down certain principles to apply to the patentability
of
computer-implemented inventions, intended in particular to ensure that such
invention,
which belong to the field of technology and provided they make a
technical contribution,
are susceptible to patent protection, and conversely to
ensure that those inventions which
do not make a technical contribution are not
susceptible to protection.
The key features of the common position
are as follows:
Member States will be obliged to ensure in their
national law that computer-
implemented inventions are considered to belong
to the field of technology. In order to
be patentable, a computer-implemented
invention must be new, susceptible to industrial
application and must involve
an inventive step. In order to involve an inventive step, a
computer-implemented invention must make a technical contribution to the state
of the
art. If the contribution to the state of the art relates solely to
unpatentable matter, there
can be no patentable invention irrespective of how
the matter is presented in claims.
In accordance with the European
Patent Convention, a computer program as such
cannot constitute a patentable
invention. Inventions involving computer programs,
whether expressed as
source code, as object code or in any other form, which implement
business,
mathematical or other methods and do not produce any technical effects
beyond
the normal physical interactions between a program and the computer, network
or other programmable apparatus in which it is run will not be
patentable.
The Council has introduced a new provision in order to
clarify that in certain
circumstances and under strict conditions a patent can
cover a claim to a computer
program, be it on its own or on a carrier. The
Council considers that this would align the
Directive on standard current
practice both of the European Patent Office and in the
Member
States.
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- McGreedy is lying - Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, March 09 2005 @ 11:34 AM EST
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Authored by: Kristoffer on Wednesday, March 09 2005 @ 11:34 AM EST |
I am under the impression that it will require an absolute majority in the
European Parliament to reject the directive, i.e. more than 50% of the MEPs
(potential votes) will have to vote against it (in contrast to a simple majority
which is more than 50% of the actual votes).
Can anyone confirm
this?
Have the European Parliament ever rejected a proposal at it's
second hearing? I heard it did once, but I don't have any details on
that.
./ Kristoffer
Denmark [ Reply to This | # ]
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Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, March 09 2005 @ 11:44 AM EST |
If the patent directive gets forced through, what could be patented anyway,
since all inventions are by this day 'prior art', so things like email senderID,
hyperlinks or you name it .
Basically all software is build upon exsisting concepts.[ Reply to This | # ]
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Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, March 09 2005 @ 11:55 AM EST |
It was a EU plenary debate on 8.March with McCreevy also mixed up with the
Service directive issue. Many persons filed contributions. Unfortunately our
fileserver went down, so no recordings and only incomplete transscripts but
Euparl will release transscripts and the Commissioners speech from yesterday can
be found on the website.
- Rocard, Gebhard, Lichtenberger, Karas and several others with very angry short
remarks
- Mccreevy's speech was a kind of cut'n paste job from the Bolkestein speech
23-09-2003.
- A slap in the face of Europarl:
a) ball in the court of Eu-Parl (he denied the restart request of Euparl
earlier)
b) but: Parl needs 66% majority.
c) Parlament could kill the directive and McCreevy would accept it... but no
good directive. The council version was a unacceptable rejection of the
parliaments proposal.
++ We do not really know whether the Directive really was adopted in a legal
manner.
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Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, March 09 2005 @ 12:03 PM EST |
"He wants it to be their fault"
Actually... I think it's more correct that he'd rather see the directive die or
get it changed. So he dare the EP to kill it.
The reason is that what he (and those who advice him) really wants is for the
European Patent Office to continue their drift towards an american system. ...
and that is *exactly* what the current text codifies.
If he can't get that text, he'd rather have no text, because that would leave
the EPO under no control. (like today)
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Authored by: MathFox on Wednesday, March 09 2005 @ 12:06 PM EST |
I've seen a BSA Press Release (in Dutch):
De Business Software
Alliance (BSA) is verheugd over de goedkeuring van de ontwerprichtlijn voor
softwarepatenten door de Europese Raad. Over een periode van tien jaar zijn al
meer dan 300.000 Europese patenten toegekend voor 'computer-implemented'
uitvindingen zoals antiblokkeerremsystemen en GPS-systemen, wat een duidelijke
stimulans betekende voor de Europese innovatie- en concurrentiekracht.
[...]
The Business Software Alliance (BSA) is pleased with the approval
of the proposed directive for software patents by the European Council. [of
Ministers] In a period of ten years over 300.000 European patents have been
granted for 'computer-implemented' inventions like no-block breaking systems[?]
and GPS systems, which ment a clear stimulation for European innovative and
competition powers.
Did anyone see this release in
English?
Most EU software patents are in the hands of US and Japanese
companies... --- When people start to comment on the form of the message,
it is a sign that they have problems to accept the truth of the message.
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Authored by: Eagle on Wednesday, March 09 2005 @ 12:25 PM EST |
The problem is that at numerous points in the EU legislative procedure, undue
weight is given to the principle of "qui tacet consentire videtur". Not
only is it every bit as ancient and uncommon to modern law as it looks ("so
Latin, so learned", ROTFL), it is the grammarians' delight of a "passive
subjunctive": "they shall be deemed to agree".
And this is said to happen in
the Council when "adopting" A-items (however, we still don't know for sure if
the French member has really been "shut up" as reported in an earlier thread, in
which case there may not
really have been adoption under the Council's own Rules of Procedure, cf.
3.8) as well as in Parliament on second reading: the Common Position,
deemed to have been adopted by silence in the Council, will then be
deemed to have been adopted by silence once more, this time in the
European Parliament, unless, within just a few weeks, the EPs manages to
get a majority of MEPs to reject it.
Anyone else getting
the feeling that there may be way too many unnecessary assumptions used in this
process? (Which is not a matter of minor importance, but one that, to a
considerable extent, replaces national parliaments in making the laws by which
approximately half a billion people are governed...) [ Reply to This | # ]
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Authored by: amcguinn on Wednesday, March 09 2005 @ 12:26 PM EST |
The nature of a legislative sausage-machine like the EU is that they only have
to win once; we have to win every time. How I read this statement is "We want
what we've asked for. If we don't get it, we'll drop the whole thing, and try
again another time, when you're not looking."
The problems are systemic
. The friends we've made in the European Parliament will move on, a new
"scare issue" will allow patents to be tucked onto something else.
You
may triumph on the fields of the the Pelennor for a day, but against the Power
that has now arisen there is no victory
Of course, that story had a
happy ending.
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Authored by: aj on Wednesday, March 09 2005 @ 01:32 PM EST |
Karl-Friedrich Lenz has a piece on his blog in which he's trying to figure out
if a vote actually occurred. This could be interesting...
http://k.lenz.name/LB/archives
/000998.html [ Reply to This | # ]
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Authored by: clark_kent on Wednesday, March 09 2005 @ 01:34 PM EST |
I was reading a
Bill Gates Document and came across a reference to an interesting piece
of literature called
Against
Software Patents, written by The League for Programming Freedom, dated
February 28, 1991. In it they discuss the dangers of software patents in the
United States.
In Bill Gates' letter, he is openly dicussing issues
that realate to the same issues we are dealing with today in the U.S. and the
E.U. He has had a head start on all of us. I wasn't aware of the very existence
or the concept of software patents until 1996. Read both articles for yourself
and see what you come up with.
Please read up on your history,
because when history repeats itself, it becomes our
future.
(Also feel free to browse around the webservers of these
two documents and Google names and references that stick out. You might find a
treasure trove of golden information in other documents on the same server that
might help you defeat software patents. When you read what Bill Gates has
written, you will probably find out what he is thinking, even to this day. He
doesn't always invent new ways of defeating his competitors. He builds on what
he already knows. He is human just like the rest of us. And if you are into open
source programming and Linux, you are his competitor and he is coming after
YOU!)[ Reply to This | # ]
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Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, March 09 2005 @ 01:34 PM EST |
The Ball is now in the EU Parliament, the question today
is which flavor of
Software Patents should be adopted.
This causes what one can call
the Stress of Choice. I just
received the weekly copy of a dutch magazine
called
"Intermediair" here, and on the cover is the article about
the
"Stress of Choice".
One is forced to make a choice out of a insane
amount of
different sun-glasses to wear. But its just a evil plot!
The
EU Parliament for now has NO NEED to wear
sun-glasses, because the current
wheather does not create
a need for that. One should of course interpret
this with
no healthy Software Industry climate at this
time.
In short, the EU parliament is being forced upon a choice
which it
doesn't want to make. Why? rather simple, the EU
is simply not ready yet
for software patents at this time.
And why is that? Even more simple, the
EU has no software
industry of its own _yet_ which can match up and be
competitive with the current USA and Far-East Software
Corporations.
So why does the current EU Council and Commission on
Software
Patents keep on bragging about Software Patents
at this time, forcing the
EU Parliament into a Stress
Situation of Choice, a choice which it doesn't
want to
make at this time ?
I think this is key to the whole
problem at hand. IMHO its
clear the current EU Council does not display a
coherent
agenda at this time. An Agenda which certainly is NOT in
the
interest of the EU itself here, and an agenda which is
covered with
backroom deals and severely troubled by an
audio narrate translate system,
where Delegate Members can
be switched off at random.
Robert
M. Stockmann
stock@stokkie.net [ Reply to This | # ]
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Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, March 09 2005 @ 02:46 PM EST |
In a previous post PJ requested GLers to start thinking about what the
compromise position on SW patents should be.
I am told that Perpetual Motion machines cannot be patented, and that at one
time patent examiners had enough understanding of thermodynamics to recognize
such beasts when they appeared.
I suggest we start working, thru court cases, on getting whole segments of the
SW field declared un-patentable. For example, get the courts to decree that file
formats are un-patenable. Same for communications protocols, etc. Leveraging our
efforts in this manner sems the only cost effective way to approach the
problem.
Let them have their SW patents, but draw boundaries. These would be in addition
to the "un-obvious" boundary that (supposedly) already exists. I
picture a Venn diagram with ever smaller areas lying outside the
"un-patenable" circles.
KH[ Reply to This | # ]
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Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, March 09 2005 @ 05:56 PM EST |
Funny how Tony Blair, when talking about the anti-terror bill that the House Of
Lords wants to amend, says "The directly-elected House of Commons has now
made its view very, very clear indeed."
(http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/4327993.stm)
Hmm. In the UK - listen to the elected house. In the EU - listen to the
appointed house. Cynical? Me??
(I'm not an expert on politics but my understanding is that the House Of Commons
is made up of Members of Parliament who are elected and the House Of Lords
(which wants to amend the anti-terror bill) is appointed. Seems to be a bit of
a parallel with the EU/EC.)
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Authored by: Kristoffer on Wednesday, March 09 2005 @ 07:11 PM EST |
I've not seen anyone take notice of this, but in the audio of McGreedy's speech he states
the following after 13m39s:
Nothing that is not patentable
now will be made patentable by the directive.
I don't
believe a word of it, but he does seem to say that the directive will not make
things patentable that are not patentable today ... I do have trouble with his
use of double negative (Nothing not), though. Playing the devil's advocate, you
could even stretch it to say that "things" must be physical entities, so
software would not be covered by his use of the word "thing" ... i.e. nothing
more will be patentable, because software is not a "thing"?!
That's not
my point of view, but it could be McGreedy's way around an otherwise quite
interesting statement.
./ Kristoffer
Denmark [ Reply to This | # ]
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Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, March 09 2005 @ 09:07 PM EST |
Second sight If you think computer patent law is boring, think
again. Over the past year, factions for and against the patenting of programs
have fought a battle for the soul of European software, and the ramifications of
a recent EU decision on the subject are likely to be huge - and not just for
anoraks...................................... ................................
.....But this time, things may be different. The European Commission has gone
out of its way to thwart the European parliament, disregarding the wishes of
various elected bodies by its insistence that bureaucracy trumps democracy, and
that fiats beat votes. A time was bound to come when there would be a power
struggle over who really runs Europe: the commission or parliament.
Maybe
an apparently obscure battle over software patents will not only go down in
computing history, but also be counted as a decisive moment in shaping the 21st
century's political landscape, too.
The Guardian - UK National Daily My bold Brian S. [ Reply to This | # ]
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Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, March 09 2005 @ 11:28 PM EST |
To trot out when some of the eurofolks get too big about how bad US government
is.
;-)[ Reply to This | # ]
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Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, March 10 2005 @ 04:13 AM EST |
So what do you think the going rate is to get a MEP to find an excuse to absent
themselves from a particular vote. I wouldn't think it would cost very much.
Those guys are absent most of the time anyway.
In any case, whatever it costs is probably peanuts next to the cost of
purchasing the European commission. Having already invested so much I really
can't see them quitting now.[ Reply to This | # ]
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Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, March 10 2005 @ 05:02 AM EST |
And it took 24 years to make it to Europe. [ Reply to This | # ]
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Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, March 10 2005 @ 05:06 AM EST |
Diamond vs Deihr was the beginning of software patents in Europe. Does anyone
know where I can find a copy?[ Reply to This | # ]
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Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, March 10 2005 @ 08:01 AM EST |
Only an organisation like OSI could do this; but the best way to kill software
patents is for a friendly party to patent the "piece of software everyone
needs", obviously the hard part, and then make the license to use it
conditional on the other party agreeing to put their patent into open domain or
face being sued.
As for the "piece of software that everyone needs", that hasn't been
patented yet, but for which there is NO prior art... I have an idea which I will
email to AllParadox.
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Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, March 10 2005 @ 08:05 AM EST |
Even the Soviet Union and Mao's China had parliaments. The
ancient Roman Senate existed for entire period of the empire,
and even a short time beyond the fall of the empire. Shams,
all of them.
Is the same thing happening now? How much will it cost to bribe
each member of the European Parliament, or each member of the
U.S. Congress, or the House of Commons, or the Duma, or the
Bundestag, or the National Assembly, $1 million to approve
software patents? As we say in the U.S., this would be "chump
change."
How many votes are for sale?
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Authored by: rezende on Thursday, March 10 2005 @ 09:47 AM EST |
Software patents are being pushed with desregard for democratic principles
not only in the EU, but also at WIPO.
For details, and in reaction, a Manifesto
by EFF European Affairs Director and two academia has been posted as an
on-line petition. I
urge groklawers to take a moment to visit and read.
The manifesto calls for
an immediate PARTICIPATION of civil society and consumer-interest
non-governmental organizations (NGOs) within WIPO's activities. Specifically,
but not limited to, getting WIPO to accept applications from NGOs to serve as ad
hoc observers at the upcoming Inter-sessional Intergovernmental Metting next
11-13 April 2005, and for the Permanent Committee on Cooperation for Development
Related to Intellectual Property, next 14-15 April 2005, in order to provide a
BALANCED discussion on the Development Agenda and on the IP system in general,
observing an equilibrium between IP right holders and consumers. [ Reply to This | # ]
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Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, March 10 2005 @ 10:11 AM EST |
Barroso means 'Muddied' or 'Lots of Mud' in Spanish. I'm sure it means something
'grubby' in Portugese too.
Ricardo,
Argentinian/australian.[ Reply to This | # ]
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- Barroso - Authored by: johnzap on Thursday, March 10 2005 @ 10:25 AM EST
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Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, March 10 2005 @ 09:30 PM EST |
I don't believe that he will drop the matter. He will continue to drive it
forward any way he can[ Reply to This | # ]
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Authored by: Anonymous on Monday, March 14 2005 @ 07:17 AM EST |
The words "I will not propose a new directive" should be seen in the following
context:
It could be possible that some MEPs might be
thinking:"The Council's version is beyond reparation in the second
reading (with the absolute majority requirement and all that); might as well
reject it outright in order to allow for the process to start anew properly
(like we requested earlier)."
McCreevy, in his COMPLETE EVILNESS,
is simply taking away this line of reasoning that could have led to the
rejection of the directive as it stands now. However, this does mean that
McCreevy has in effect now burned his bridges behind him.
You see, from the
second reading on, the European Commission can no longer stop the process on its
own. It might come to a third reading, but the Council and the Parliament could
theoretically come to an agreement on their own.
Should the forces of Good
prevail and we get a directive that unambiguously forbids software patents, this
would be a HUGE victory; not only would we have even better legal protection,
but if 'they' were to try for a new directive, they could no longer hide behind
the excuse of "harmonization" or "codification" and they would have a very hard
time not just coming out and admitting THEY. WANT. SOFTWARE. PATENTS. Also, they
could no longer renegotiate the European Patent Convention on their own.
In
short, this would mean that the European Union would be free of the danger of
software patents for a long time to come.[ Reply to This | # ]
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