Linked by Thom Holwerda on Tue 27th Feb 2007 16:29 UTC, submitted by anonymous
The UK Government has responded to a petition regarding software patents: "The Government remains committed to its policy that no patents should exist for inventions which make advances lying solely in the field of software. Although certain jurisdictions, such as the US, allow more liberal patenting of software-based inventions, these patents cannot be enforced in the UK."
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Member since:
2005-11-14
In fact, the response really just confirms that the door is still open to the dubious practice of claiming that an "invention" has some "technical" aspect alongside the software that the "inventor" is trying to protect using patents, and that the whole package merits a patent. The "inventor" then goes after anyone writing software that does anything similar. Alleged supporters of this kind of thing apparently include Nokia and Philips.
The only thing preventing insanity on the patent front in the UK is a bunch of judges and the courts. That's not the usual combination of "insanity" and "judges" one reads about, but I suppose one branch of executive power has to function properly in a democracy.