Pro-patenten lobby = erg fout

Sommigen van jullie weten wellicht dat er in de Europese Unie een felle discussie woedt over softwarepatenten. Het gaat erover hoe ver je mag gaan in de bescherming van idee?n/patenten.
Die strijd is behoorlijk vuil geworden, getuige de chantage door Microsoft aan het adres van de Deense regering...
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Update: zie ook webwereld.nl en slashdot.org

Enkele reacties van nosoftwarepatents.com:

It would not be the first threat of its kind. A group of large corporations including Philips is reported to have previously threatened European governments to outsource all of their European software development jobs to low-wage countries unless the EU were to allow patents on software through the directive that is currently being worked on. Hans Streng, chief executive of Philips' software division, was quoted by Dutch newspaper Algemeen Dagblad in the summer for publicly making the threat in question.

In January, leading Polish daily Gazeta Wyborcza reported on a letter addressed by the Polish subsidiaries of Siemens, Nokia, Philips, Ericsson and Alcatel to Poland's prime minister Marek Belka. The exact content of the letter was not disclosed but it is said to have indicated that the respective companies would reconsider making investments in Poland if the Polish government upheld its resistance to the legalization of software patents in the EU.

"It's utterly despicable to use the basis of people's livelihood for a disgusting threat", said Florian Mueller, the manager of the pan-European NoSoftwarePatents.com campaign. He claims to have been an earwitness to such a threat by a Philips official, and to have learned from political sources about similar threats by other corporations. "The country in which you develop a technology has nothing to do with where you can take out patents. If they move jobs to Asia, they won't get a single additional patent, neither in Asia nor in Europe. If you warn politicians of consequences that are directly related to a legislative issue, that's acceptable. If you threaten with causing damage that has no factual connection whatsoever, then it's blackmail. Plain and simple."

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door form, 2005 02 19

en deze microsuck.com

door form, 2005 02 19

www.microsucks.com