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#title: Europarl Hearing of 2002-05-15

#descr: A group of members of the European Parliament invited Anthony Howard
(who is in charge of the software patentability directive at the
European Commission's Industrial Property Unit) and Hartmut Pilch from
FFII/Eurolinux for a public hearing in Strasbourg.  Here you find the
details of the conference as well as some presentation slides.

#Eag: Invitation Text

#cph: %(cl|Cinéma, Audiovisual policy and Intellectual property
Intergroup|invites you to its meeting| Should we patent
%(q:computer-implemented inventions)?)

#cWn: %(cl|Wednesday 15 May 2002|from 15h00 to 16h30|Room S2.1|European
Parliament in Strasbourg|Languages : %(LANGS))

#CeW: %(q:Programs for computers) are not %(q:patentable inventions)
according to Article 52 of the European Patent Convention (EPC).
However since 1978 around 30,000 patents for %(q:computer-implemented
inventions) have been granted by the European Patent Office and by
national patent offices. Indeed, the jurisprudence of these offices
considers programs which present a %(q:technical contribution) to be
patentable. This idea of a %(q:technical contribution) is similar to
that of the %(q:technical process) used for the patent of genes in the
controversial directive on biotechnological inventions. They are both
just as ambiguous.

#Tjt: The proposed %(q:directive on the patentability of
computer-implemented inventions) intends to normalize the
jurisprudence of the European Patent Office and the national courts.
Computer technology is in a state of uncertainty making it difficult
to differentiate between creation, public good and the market.

#Tei: To patent computer advances, like medicines, the knowledge and the
living, poses questions of access and transmission for everybody, and
equality between persons and people.

#Wit: With

#ruW: president of the Foundation for a Free Information Infrastructure
(FFII) and speaker of the Eurolinux Alliance

#aMa: administrator, DG MARKET, intellectual property service.

#mpn: member of the European parliament, industry committee.

#Cna: Contact

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