FSF Calls Software Patents A Disease Amid COVID-19 Crisis, USPTO A Super-Spreader

[vladpetric]

Also, there have been more than a few news articles posted in the last few months about 'novel AI' algorithms being used to detect COVID-19 in x-ray images, with presumably pending patents (judging by their US big tech research sponsors).

There's a reason most countries have utterly rejected the mere concept of software patents. Obsession with patents is one of the many forms of US self-harm.

In the Netherlands, we have a nice saying, "nood breekt de wet", translated: "emergency breaks the law". It's about time the US populace stops self-flagellating and joins the rest of the world in some (deserved) self-respect.

Willingly breaching software parents in civil disobedience is probably the far easiest step, as the legal threats are frankly (and practically) non-existent, even in the US.

While I am totally against software patents, the problem with "novel AI" algorithms is not the patents, but rather the fact that it takes a lot of effort to test them properly.
Vendors/manufactures/etc make a lot of claims (typically using weasel wording) that simply evaporate when you scientifically test them.

Nonetheless, it is specifically the IP protections (which in the US can be overly broad, yes) that encourage vendors/manufacturers to develop new things.

As I mentioned in another recent post here, this is a politicization technique - the superzoom. You pick up on an issue, you blow it out of proportions and ignore everything else.

Nothing is stopping your country (or any other western European country where software patents don't apply) from developing these techniques. Yet most medical research is still done in the US (for instance, the US has most antibiotics developed after 2000s - using that because it's a round number really; I'm not counting a single one developed in the Netherlands since 2000). It is done by multinationals, yes, but in the US.

[You-]

If the FSF wants to improve things, they could give us GPLv4 without the anti-Tivoization clause and remove the relinking requirement from LGPL.

your suggestion for improvement of the patent scenario is... for the licence to remove redistributions clauses for patent encumbered code?

i think that people have forgotten of why the GPL and LGPL even came around. BSD style licences are still useful, but if there was no GPL, Apple would have forked the Konqueror engine and kept in in house. Just imagine how much that would have limited competition (though granted it has now lead to the market dominant engine...) ... but they couldnt and webkit/blink will always be opensource.

[vladpetric]

Just like the FSF sjw ragemob to exploit a horrible crisis for their suspect agendas

Never let a crisis go to waste ... True for any good politician or political party.

[DanL]

It doesn't say patents are worse than Covid, and it doesn't blame USPTO for Covid either. Have you read the post? It's very sensible.

Of course most people didn't read the post. They just jumped straight to ranting about unrelated politics, the SJW's and other irrelevant nonsense (Stallman? Really?)
In other words, a typical day on Phoronix forums.

I think this ad should be slapped with a trigger warning for showing outdated attitudes.

I think you should be slapped for really lame political satire.

We live in times where every moral crusader is supercharging and overloading their arguments with such types of exaggerated comparisons, trying to paint their adversaries as monsters.

Considering that you're basing your statement on something that was never said/done, you just may be the one supercharging, overloading, and exaggerating here. Just maybe...

[wswartzendruber]

your suggestion for improvement of the patent scenario is... for the licence to remove redistributions clauses for patent encumbered code?

I never said anything about the patent situation. I simply meant that if the FSF wants to make itself useful, they can stop telling people what they can and can't put in their code with GPLv4, and they can permit static linking with LGPLv4 so that it actually serves a purpose this day in age.

i think that people have forgotten of why the GPL and LGPL even came around. BSD style licences are still useful, but if there was no GPL, Apple would have forked the Konqueror engine and kept in in house. Just imagine how much that would have limited competition (though granted it has now lead to the market dominant engine...) ... but they couldnt and webkit/blink will always be opensource.

No one forgot anything. People just quit caring about how their work is distributed and started caring more about people being able to actually use it.

Personally, I prefer MPL-2.0 as it seems to do the best job of balancing everyone's interests while being highly compatible with other licenses in both directions.

[8r34k0u7_57y13]

problem with "novel AI" algorithms is not the patents, but rather the fact that it takes a lot of effort to test them properly.
Vendors/manufactures/etc make a lot of claims (typically using weasel wording) that simply evaporate when you scientifically test them.

Exactly, the last thing the world needs is another Theranos situation.

[vladpetric]

Exactly, the last thing the world needs is another Theranos situation.

Theranos was an outright fraud from the beginning ... there are plenty of other situations in which well meaning, bona fide vendors come up with something that they believe works, but independent testing shows much less of an effect.

In other words, trying and failing is ok ... not great, but ok.

The kind of fraud Theranos perpetrated is, well, criminal.