[Sussex] A letter to our MEPs and MPs [spelling]
Karl E. Jorgensen
karl at jorgensen.com
Sat Oct 9 22:16:06 UTC 2004
Hi!
I'm impressed!
On Sat, Oct 09, 2004 at 02:06:47PM +0100, Steve Dobson wrote:
...
> If you have corrections please submit them. If you think we shouldn't send
> the letter, then voice that too. SLUG is run by its members for its members,
> so we must have a consensus if we (SLUG) are to take this action. It is
> not my intent to hijack this club for my own political goals.
I have a couple of comments. Unfortunately, some of them are probably
pedantic (Don't worry: it takes a Dane to speak English properly :-)
Apologies for excessive quoting - don't want to risk loosing context in
this...
> I am not going to take all the names on the mail-list and added them. If
> you want to be associated with this letter then please send me the name and
> e-mail you would like attached when (if) this letter is sent.
Feel free to put my name on it.
And (if the SLUG and the rest of µThink agrees) our company name.
What is the opinion in the SLUG on mixing SLUG business with company
business? The SLUG does not represent our company nor vice versa...
What about timing of the letter? Would it be better with a (extremely
feeble attempt at) "shock-and-awe", coordinated with
the-chosen-magazine/paper hitting the streets?
Anyway... on to the comments:
> Dear .......
>
> 1. We, the undersigned, as members of the Sussex Linux User Group, would
> like to draw your attention to the effect US Patent Law is having
> today [1].
We run the risk of loosing readers at this point, as they might think
"oh. It's the US. Not here. Not my constituency"...
What about following on with something like:
"We are very concerned that the UK will adopt similarly destructive
legislation".
Either way, a policitician will probably be familiar with the UK patent
office FAQ on this:
http://www.patent.gov.uk/about/ippd/faq/softpat.htm
and we need to make sure that we cannot just be "repelled" by of those
answers...
> 2. Over ten years ago now Sun Microsystems, an American company, developed
> Java, a technology to write computer programs that run on any computer.
> Sun Microsystems give their intellectual property away for free, anyone
Is there any way we can avoid the term "intellectual property"? I'm
against treating pure ideas as property when there is no physical
representation...
Besides, it mixes copyrights, trademarks and patents into one phrase...
> can download it from their web site. In ten short years a large and
can download it from their web site. In ten short years, a large and
comma: ^
> active community has grown up around Java. Sun Microsystems reasoned
> that by having a large community using Java it would enable them sell
> their own computer hardware, the operating system, and support in a
> one-stop-stop deal where you could get everything you need from just
> one company. Giving away their Java product for free has proved to be
> a very profitable business move for Sun Microsystems. Others have
> befitted too, by November 2000 Java skills were the most sought after
benefitted != befitted
> 3. It is software that turns a computer into a useful tool. Without
> software a computer will just sit on your desk, humming to itself, as
> it consumes electricity. With the right software on your computer can
> now read e-mail, surf the Net, write a letter (having your spelling
> and grammar checked as you write). In fact anything that someone can
> invent for a computer to do.
idea: "...write a letter (...) or even participate in the search for extra
terrestial life. In fact ..."
> 4. Kodak, a company struggling to adapt to a new digital photography
> age [2], sued Sun Microsystems for some of the technology in Java
> which was covered by a Software Patent Kodak hold. The two companies
.. held by Kodak.
.. or Kodak holds.
> have now settled out of court to the tune of US$92 million [3]. If
> Sun Microsystems had fought the case and lost what effect would that
> have had on the Java community? Would Sun Microsystems have continued
> to develop Java? Without Sun Microsystems driving Java what effect
> would this have and on the thousands of Java programmers here in the
> UK and Europe?
This point is slightly dangerous territory, as it can also make it appear that
Sun the bad guy... For the purposes of this, we don't want them to be
the bad guys...
> 5. In classical manufacturing the engineering prototype is just the
> first of many prototypes that are refined and refined in order to
> produce a product suitable for manufacture. Then there are the costs
> of building and tooling up a factory for commercial production. It
> can take years to recoup these development costs, especially as there
> are the ongoing production costs of raw materials, factory works' wages,
> etc. to also content with. A twenty-five year patent is justified
wrong word: contend
> when viewed against all these costs and the risks involved.
probably worth emphasising that this is justified only for "classical
engineering" as opposed to software. Somebody's bound to take it out of
context...:
"...patent is justified when viewed against all the classical
engineering costs and the risks involved"
?
>
> 6. By comparison software engineering is relatively cheep. You need
wrong word: cheap
pls dont get young fowls involved here...
> office space and furniture, computers, staff to develop the program,
> and that is about it. Your first production prototype is your
> commercial product. Production costs for software are just about
> zero; press a button a get the computer to make a copy. Change the
and
> copy program and press the button again and get ten thousand copies.
> CD copies, when produced in quality, are less than a penny per unit,
wrong word: quantity
i assume...
> and even that cost can be avoided by uploading the software onto the
> Internet and letting your customers come and copy it for themselves.
>
> 7. Today companies do not need ten years to recoup their investment in
Where did the 10 years come from? We were talking about 25 years
above...
> software development. As an example take Microsoft's Windows95
> operating system: it was first released in 1995 and on 1st January,
> 2003 Microsoft stopped providing any support, patches and fixes, or
> downloads for Windows95. Did Microsoft abandon a profitable Windows95
> market? Of course they did not. Microsoft is far to shrewd at
> business for that. Rather the world had moved on to use Microsoft's
> own replacement operating systems: Windows98, Windows2000, WindowsNT
> and WindowsXP.
Windows98SE, WindowsME ?
> 8. We do not need a software patent law to protect software property,
> copyright law is more than adequate. Copyright law protects companies
Copyright <- title case
> who have their software property stolen by pirates. A company wishing
> to enter a software market must first take the time and trouble to write
> and test their own software. An innovating company has this time to
> add new and better features and so stay ahead of its competition.
> This all creates choice and competition in the marketplace, which can
> only be good for the consumer.
>
> 9. The pace of computer development is unmatched by any other industrial
> sector. Thirty-five years ago NASA was sending people to the moon.
> The computer on board the moon lander is not as powerful as one of
> those credit card calculators that are given away as free gifts.
> If you took all the computers that NASA used to put a man on the moon
> they would not be as capable as a single modern laptop. It is
> software innovation and its need for ever more bigger, better and
> faster computers that has driven this computer hardware development.
> The pace of computer hardware and software development is so rapid
> that to grant an exclusive license for twenty-five years, or even
> twenty years, is to grant an effective monopoly.
A
/ \
life-time ?
...
> 12. Finally here is Bill Gate's perspective on patents [4]:
> "If people had understood how patents would be granted when most
> of today's ideas were invented and had taken out patents, the
> [software] industry would be at a complete standstill today.
> The solution [] is patent exchanges [] and patenting as much as
> we can... A future startup with no patents of its own will be
> forced to pay whatever price the giants choose to impose. That
> price might be high: established companies have an interest in
> excluding future competitors."
Although we run the risk of say "HE said so", this is definitely a
worthwile point. It helps highlight that even BG's opinion has changed,
possibly as a result of obtaining a few patents...
[no: the fortune at the bottom isn't entirely random. But is is
appropriate...]
--
Karl E. Jørgensen
karl at jorgensen.com http://karl.jorgensen.com
==== Today's fortune:
Advertising Rule:
In writing a patent-medicine advertisement, first convince the
reader that he has the disease he is reading about; secondly,
that it is curable.
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