Ireland draws international ire for pro-software-patent stance

international | sci-tech | opinion/analysis Monday February 28, 2005 23:24 by A. Programmer - The Internet

Favors multinational interests over European citizenry.

The only vaguely democratic institution in the EU, the european parliament, has repeatedly and firmly rejected software patents (or "computer implemented inventions" in Newspeak). But the European Commission and Council, spurred on by none other than our old pal McGreevy, is still trying to introduce a new law that would hand the european software industry to multinationals, mainly Microsoft and IBM, on a plate, in a sickening little "What's good for Microsoft is good for Ireland" show.

How fellow europeans now see Ireland thanks to McGreevy

For years, software in europe has been governed by copyright law. Many feel this restriction is itself too harsh, but that is a debate for another day.

Now, multinational corporations and patent lawyers are pushing for the introduction of patenting to the software field.

Patents, contrary to popular belief, have very little to do with invention - what a patent actually does is grant you a state-enforced monopoly. Patents are tools of control - the person who pays the central bureaucracy gets to stop anyone else building something, even if they developed it independently (unlike copyright)! For 20 years!

And multinationals collect them by the thousand into vast "patent portfolios". They then "cross license" with other large companies, and the companies can then form a cosy _government-supported_ cartel against small companies and ordinary citizens - it's not like you need more than a cheap PC to start writing software... But if the multinationals have their way, you'll need a cheap PC, a multi-million euro legal team, a patent or three to bargain with. and that's only if you're willing to sign everything away to them!

You might think your enemy is "capitalism", but it's really corporatism - the merger of state and corporate power, whereby a company doesn't need to compete in a free market. Patents are a tool of corporatism, and you'll note that the USA's "free" trade agreements always quietly include patent recognition agreements. A real free market capitalist system is just as much of an unattainable ideal as real communism, but patents are blatantly hypocritical if used by anyone preaching free market capitalism- they're state-enforced monopolies!

Real free trade means no patents!

Help stop the encroachment of patenting into yet another field, fight software patents today.