[Fsf-friends] Join the campaign against "Software Patents"

[Ramanraj K]

I had forwarded a cc to Holger Blasum, one of the maintainers at 
ffii.org, wishing them more victories on this front. He requests Indian 
entities also to join the campain against "software patents" by signing 
up  at http://www.economic-majority.com/  Please do so, as India or 
Europe being free from "software patents" is not sufficient, and soon 
enough the scene should shift to the US.  If you distribute your 
software in the US, then the campaign is immediately relevant to you.  
It is ironical that such a campaign has to be done in US, which was once 
upon a time, a model state for the ultimate in liberty and freedom, but 
today, it stands as a symbol for a shackled state with all its  
"Software Patents", DMCA, DRM and even more unconceivable things like 
corporate run "prisons" (California alone has 21 (yes, twenty-one) 
mostly corporate run prisons and more about this at: 
http://improbablevoices.net/intro_frameset.html ).  Digital anarchy and 
industrial prisons make a deadly and dangerous combination making it a 
serious concern to netizens.     Fortunately, these aberrations are very 
recent, and could be nipped in the bud. Your participation could make a 
big difference to the momentum of the movement, that may help in 
restoring sanity where it is most required.

Ramanraj.

-------- Original Message --------
Subject:     Re: [Fwd: EU Software patents directive crushed in the flat 
new world]
Date:     Mon, 11 Jul 2005 00:41:35 +0200
From:     Holger Blasum <holger@blasum.net>
To:     Ramanraj K <ramanraj.k@gmail.com>
CC:     campaign@codeliberty.org
References:     <42CF50FD.400@gmail.com>



On 07-09, Ramanraj K wrote:

> <quote>
>   Declaration
>
>   Our enterprise is worried about  plans to legalise patents on software
>   solutions ("computer-implemented inventions").
>
>   We rely on software copyright. We need  to be sure that we own what we
>   write.
>
>   We need to be sure that we can publish and distribute our own programs.
>
>   We need to be sure that, as long as we respect the rules of copyright,
>   we can run any software on any office or network computer.
>
>   We  urge legislators  to confine  the  patent system  strictly to  the
>   limits of applied natural  science. In principle, only knowledge which
>   had to  be obtained through  costly experiments with forces  of nature
>   should  be  eligible  for  the  broad,  slow  and  expensive  monopoly
>   protection which the patent system offers.
> </quote>


Note that care has taken (unlike petition.eurolinux.org) to make
this pledge perfectly signable everywhere you want ... Indian
companies are welcome too ;)

-- 
Holger Blasum +49-174-7313590 gsm   SMEs are the economic majority.
             +49-89-420959220      http://www.economic-majority.com/   
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