[Gllug] Patents article in the Guardian (an open letter)

[Richard Jones]

Re: http://www.guardian.co.uk/online/story/0,3605,975126,00.html

I'm a free software developer, and a some-time Labour voter, and
(ironically) the author of two US software patents, but I'm not happy
about any extension of the patent system.

Patents are being knowingly used by large software companies to extend
their monopolies - the classic example being the use of patented video
and audio formats. MP3s are patented, with the result that Red Hat
cannot distribute any MP3 decoding software with its Linux
distribution (Red Hat has upwards of 80% share in installed Linux
systems, so this is significant). Red Hat also cannot ship decoders
for common video formats (patents are owned by Microsoft who,
naturally, would never license them to a Linux distributor). How is
Red Hat supposed to begin competing against Windows in the huge
desktop PC operating system market? This looks to me like an
anti-competitive government-enforced monopoly. Nothing to do with
competition or "helping the little man".

Patents last too long to be applicable to software. 20 years ago the
state of the art was the Sinclair Spectrum, the word processor and the
spreadsheet. Luckily for us today the inventors of those breakthroughs
were unable to patent them, otherwise free software developers would
only just be permitted to implement a free word processor, spreadsheet
with multi-colour display and one-tone beeping sound!

Patents are used by large companies (in the form of large portfolios)
traded with other large companies to keep small competition and free
software firmly out. How exactly they lead to more jobs, more
competition and lower prices as you state is mystifying me.

Yours,

Richard Jones.

-- 
Richard Jones, Red Hat Inc. (London) and Merjis Ltd. http://www.merjis.com/
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