Software Patents in Western Europe :: Software Technology Patent Paperes

Software Patents in Western Europe Introduction The world is becoming smaller and smaller. It’s a catch-line clichà © anyone who is familiar with the internet has heard a thousand times. Email provides nearly instant communication across the globe, massive files containing every imaginable piece of information are transmitted in the blink of an eye, and the World Wide Web makes it all accessible to the common individual with moderate computer skills. There is no denying it, just like the IBM slogan, the internet has changed the way the world does business. One key to doing business is the patent. Meant to reward and encourage innovation, the patent gives the creator of an idea or invention a temporary monopoly on their product. This grants small businesses a foothold in a market that would otherwise be dominated by giant corporations. Thus patents give life to competition, the cornerstone of capitalism. However, with the advent of the computer industry the issue of patenting software programs has become an intense debate. These intangible sequences of ones and zeros are coveted like gold and in some cases are the very livelihood of numerous businesses. The State of Affairs in Western Europe There are two camps in Europe battling out the issue of software patents. On one side we have â€Å"Brussels technocrats and technology giants such as Microsoft, SAP, and Nokia, all of which insist that Europe must do more to protect intellectual property or risk compromising its global competitiveness.†1 The basic argument of this side is that patents are necessary if Europe wants to compete with U.S. and Chinese innovation. On the other side of the debate there is â€Å"an army of economists, left-leaning politicians, and programmers such as Linux creator Linus Torvalds†1 who present the argument that â€Å"software patents are a creativity-crushing weapon wielded by multinationals to bash [startups].†1 The open-source community, which produces software without patents for all people to use, is particularly strong in Europe. It is their opinion that software patents put programs under lock and key and they would like to see Europe reject software patents c ompletely. For the past two years the European Union has been working to stiffen its existing patent laws while balancing the sometimes conflicting requirements of its 15 members. However, the process was upended in September when â€Å"the European Parliament -- under heavy last-minute lobbying by open-source advocates -- unexpectedly approved a draft law that effectively banned all software patents.