New Zealand leads the way. “The government has announced a change to planned new patent rules today which has put an end to fears that computer software might be covered by new patent protection.” Also, here’s the evidence that nobody (except lawyers, (un)paid company lackies, and corporate managers) wants software patents: “Matthews said a recent poll of more than 1000 Kiwi IT professionals found 94 per cent wanted to see software patents gone.” Let that sink in for a while: 94%.
Faith in humanity…restored!
The key there is “IT Professionals”. It’s not the developers that want this stuff; we want to be free to do whatever we want without having to worry about getting sued or having our work suppressed. It’s the executives and legal people who are convinced that without patents they’ll hemorrhage money (though in my opinion they’re dead wrong).
… which I realize was just in the quoted text. Perhaps I need to quit skimming.
Edited 2013-05-09 16:48 UTC
94%! Its not the “IT Professionals” either but only those who profit, the lawyers and patent-troll companies.
Edited 2013-05-09 17:49 UTC
At last some sensible change.
Anyone know what New Zealand’s immigration policies are like? ;^)
They allowed hobbits, orcs and elves to enter and settle.
Edited 2013-05-09 17:40 UTC
Ariel Atoms and other kit cars are said to be road legal in NZ, and unlike England (country that makes said kit cars), they have good roads and great weather.
We should all move there!!
Competition with Iceland?
I know nothing about their immigration policies but one thing I know for sure is: they have the most amazing landscapes of all world packed on a surface you are able to travel without expending a year (and a lot of money) to visit. You can actually visit very different environments on a weekend! I am fascinated by their geography and geology.
Know nothing about the citizens though and would miss my friends and members of family, as also my favorite sport (football, the real one, initial, true UK sense).
Edited 2013-05-09 20:14 UTC
They have the Maori. What more do you need? And rugby is so much more violent and enjoyable to watch than soccer.
After watching a game or two of rugby you simply cant watch football for a month without shouting at the TV!
How can a rugby player get up and be fine after being crushed by a 150kg player in a tackle yet a footballer roll around for 5 mins because someone pulled his shirt…
Contact in football can be very painful, remember they’re running fast and essentially almost kicking each other. If not for rules, there would be lots of broken legs.
http://www.kyon.pl/img/5708.html
Pretty tough. Keeps most of the riff-raff out, but we (NZ) now have a steady stream of Somalians that the UN forces us to take. They treat women pretty badly (due to their Islamic upbringing, where it’s a hypermacho culture).
Aside from them it’s all parties and hangovers. If you have skills or money then immigration like you. In fact, a british guy who cut my hair today was allowed to stay in NZ – so the skills that are required to immigrate are kind of random (and published on our Ministry of Immigration website).
Everyone is welcome to visit, of course. We like Americans, Europeans, Russians, Asians, Pacific Islanders, Africans, Israelis – everyone. Trolls are not so popular.
I would guess he had it easier due to being from another Commonwealth country?
PS. Plus a traditional ~invading country
Edited 2013-05-11 16:26 UTC
It’s fitting that the guy’s name is ‘Foss.’
Edited 2013-05-09 20:31 UTC
While an happy occasion against abuse (99.9%)
…Will ever be a recognition for the
original patent usage and reason to born?
Priority is to eliminate abuse from those
distorting and reversing the patent purpose:
– To protect innovation and it’s due reward.
Something Corporations cannot do, only people
sequestered by contract with them.
The question made on recognition being possible
refers to a second aspect: How to distinguish
innovation from fake ones, when most work
… is based on previous work?
The answer could lie in Copyright, if only
good sense existed. When it comes to Software,
there are art in a method and no way to evaluate
it’s originality to 99% of ideas being really
born from a shared pool.
Only 0.1% (Supposedly much less) is truly original,
and it could be determined that those are never
rewarded… at least on the present Corporation
sequestered scheme that plagues patents,
software and otherwise.
Remember Tesla and the Microsoft Mouse-Click,
as extremes, to shame all those involved…
… in “the scheme”.
Edited 2013-05-09 22:13 UTC
Did you type that on a smartphone, or are you attempting some sort of weird tech poetry?
As an Australian, I’m supposed to somehow look down on the New Zealanders as a bunch of semi-literate sheep herders, but I find myself unable to give them anything other than mad props.
If you need any further evidence they’re a particularly enlightened bunch, you only need to look at the way they dealt (40 years ago, mind) with the rising insanity of US-style ambulance-chasing injury compensation litigation.
From Wikipedia:
ACC is the sole and compulsory provider of accident insurance for all work and non-work injuries. The ACC Scheme is administered on a no-fault basis, so that anyone regardless of the way in which they incurred an injury, is eligible for coverage under the Scheme. Due to the Scheme’s no-fault basis, people who have suffered personal injury do not have the right to sue an at-fault party, except for exemplary damages.[2]
http://www.acc.co.nz/
In other words, you can’t sue anyone for accidental injury, except in the most extreme negligence cases. And in return, the ACC will cover all of your medical costs – even as a foreigner visiting the country. Brilliant.
In theory the idea is great. In practice it has created a society with a low regard for safety.
As a kiwi I would say the disregard for safety predated ACC by a considerable margin. ACC helps mitigate the risk though. But please don’t confuse cause and effect.
Cheers bro. Most Aussies don’t actually notice what goes on in enzed.
Oh yeah, and thanks for your tax dollars paying for our defence – I loved seeing the SuperHornets you paid for flying at the Avalon Airshow a few months ago. We’d rather spend our money on ACC
Hey Brew! That’s amazing eh!
Once again the NZ government has shown some actual common sense. I would have said “unbelievable”, but it really isn’t, because this is not the first time something similar has happened in NZ. Kudos.
Now if you could just talk some of your sense into your neighbouring government, Australia, I for one would be tremendously grateful.
Edited 2013-05-10 01:53 UTC
It looks like it might not apply to all software.
http://qz.com/82945/new-zealand-declares-software-isnt-an-invention…
In México software patents had been banned since day 0.
gumoz,
South africa also specifically excluded software patents in it’s 1978 patent act.
http://www.cipc.co.za/Patents_files/Patent_Act.pdf
(2) Anything which consists of—
(a) a discovery;
(b) a scientific theory;
(c) a mathematical method;
(d) a literary, dramatic, musical or artistic work or any other aesthetic creation;
(e) a scheme, rule or method for performing a mental act, playing a game or doing business;
(f ) a program for a computer; or
(g) the presentation of information, shall not be an invention for the purposes of this Act.
Also interesting is that they also exclude patents on biological creations, which is highly controversial in the US today. I’m not sure what they had in mind with the morality clause though.
(4) A patent shall not be granted—
(a) for an invention the publication or exploitation of which would
be generally expected to encourage offensive or immoral behaviour; or
(b) for any variety of animal or plant or any essentially biological process for the production of animals or plants, not being a micro-biological process or the product of such a process.
For that matter, the European Patent Convention also disallows software patents twice over.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patentable_subject_matter#European_Pat…
The European Patent Convention effectively says that patents on software should be disallowed in Europe firstly because software is a mathematical method and secondly because software is programs for computers.
This doubly-stated intention that software is not patentable subject matter is, unfortunately, almost completely ignored by many European patent offices and courts.
Edited 2013-05-10 10:35 UTC
it’s Fantastic!