[Ecommerce] More on EU Software patent off the agenda

[Manon Ress]

http://www.nosoftwarepatents.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=254

Thanks to Pedro Moniz
Master in Laws (LL.M.) candidate, class of 2004/2005
Queen Mary, University of London


http://www.nosoftwarepatents.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=254

BIG SURPRISE IN BRUSSELS:
EU COUNCIL TAKES SOFTWARE PATENT DIRECTIVE OFF ITS AGENDA
DURING TODAY'S MEETING, ACCOMODATING A REQUEST BY POLAND

Undersecretary Wlodzimierz Marcinski asks for additional time to prepare
a "constructive declaration" -- Software patent debate is wide open --
Software patent critics: "The Polish government deserves greatest
admiration for its courage!"

Brussels (21 December 2004). In a totally unexpected turn of events, the
EU Council took its proposal for a software patent directive off its
agenda during today's meeting. Actually the item had been slated for
debateless approval as a so-called "A" item. Polish undersecretary
Wlodzimierz Marcinski asked for additional time in order to be able to
write up a "constructive declaration". The meeting chairman accomodated
the request since no country raised objections. The EU Commission
expressed its regrets but also accepted this decision.

After the political positions of several countries had changed, the
proposal had no more qualified majority, but the Council wanted to
decide on the basis of a majority that existed on May 18th. Florian
Mueller, campaign manager of NoSoftwarePatents.com, commented: "The
Polish government deserves greatest admiration for its courage! At times
it looked like the enemies of democracy would prevail in the EU Council
and force a decision that lacked a legitimate majority. Now Europe has
the opportunity to have a constructive debate on the severe shortcomings
of the current Council text, under the new Luxembourgish EU presidency
next year. Even at Christmas time, Europe has nothing to give away --
and particularly we can't give our domestic software markets away to a
few large U.S. corporations that prefer a litigious environment over a
competitive market!"


--
Manon Anne Ress
manon.ress@cptech.org,
www.cptech.org

Consumer Project on Technology in Washington, DC
PO Box 19367, Washington, DC 20036, USA
Tel.:  1.202.387.8030, fax: 1.202.234.5176

Consumer Project on Technology in Geneva
1 Route des  Morillons, CP 2100, 1211 Geneva 2, Switzerland
Tel: +41 22 791 6727