In a similar move to IBM’s much talked about patent handout for OSS developers, Sun Systems are offering more than 1,600 patents that they own for open source developers in Solaris projects. Although many will complain that this is another PR exercise, it must be said that there seems to Read more
Poland has saved Europe once more from the proposed software patent directive. The item was to be viewed as an A-item in the Agriculture and Fisheries agenda, but Poland has once more opposed its inclusion there. The official Polish statement reads: “In regard to the news about the possible inclusion Read more
The good folks at FFII are announcing that the software patent directive will once more be presented as an A-Item in the Agriculture and Fisheries meeting next Monday. Yes, you heard right, Europe’s agriculture ministers will decide whether we are stuck with software patents. I apologise in advice for the Read more
This is a very good article in The Economist talking about the problems with the American patent system and IBM’s 500 patent handover. They state that studies claim that 30% of all patents awarded in the United States are duplicate claims. 30%? I am surprised, I thought that the figure Read more
There have been several interesting moves about software patents in Europe. The proposal was introduced sneakily by members of the Commission to an Agriculture meeting dealing with fishing, which was struck down by Poland (thank you Poland, again!). Now, 61 MEPs have pleaded for the directive process to be restarted.
(Registration required) IBM continues to champion the open source movement by allowing access to 500 software patents that it holds to open source developments. However, IBM is only allowing access to a minimal amount of its patents, as it was awarded more than 3,000 patents in 2004.
IP consultant and patent advocate extraordinaire Greg Aharonian has presented a lawsuit to attempt to get a court to determine that copyright doesn’t protect software adequately and that patents are sufficient protection. Aharonian edits the popular and interesting site Patenting Art, and publishes an email newsletter. It is difficult to Read more
The Nosoftwarepatents.com website has posted a statement by European OSS superstars Linus Torvalds (Linux), Michael Widenius (MySQL) and Rasmus Lerdorf (PHP) against software patents. The statement pleas to the European Council to consider the damage caused by software patents. They call the proposed directive “deceptive, dangerous, and democratically illegitimate”.
The latest FUD from Microsoft may just be mere rubbish. Steve Ballmer recently made it clear in a conference in Asia that Linux violates 283 software patents. The problem is that this is done by quoting a study that actually says that Linux has similar patent risk than proprietary software. Read more
Poland’s vote against the proposed software patent directive means that the pro-software patent lobby now is 16 votes short of a majority, and it will have to renegotiate their current position with the European Parliament. This is great news because it helps to defuse the coming crisis in software patents Read more