Traditionally, most European countries don't allow patenting software at all, but there has been a huge variety of differences between EU member states as some of the countries have similiar software patent laws to those of the U.S. Now the new software patent directive is trying to enforce all member nations to approve software patents, pretty much in identical way to American software patent system.
Many European scientists and software developers -- both commercial and specially open source developers -- have raised their voices against the proposed legislation and now the grassroot movement against the legislation is getting ready for real life protest in Brussels tomorrow.
Some of the prime examples of valid software patents in the U.S. include blinking cursor and nested menus.. Do we want similiar patents that would curb software development and make lawsuits such as the one that SCO has filed against the Linux community possible in Europe? If you don't want this to happen, please consider signing this petition and visit this page as well for questions on how to oppose the directive.
Written by: Petteri Pyyny @ 26 Aug 2003 15:08
