<p><span>Our vision is for the European Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) industry become the most vibrant in the world - and the European Parliament shared this vision, when it made the necessary amendments to the directive on computer-implemented inventions during its first reading on 24 September 2003.</span></p>
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<p><span>Patents on software provide obstacles to knowledge-based industries by making computers less secure, less reliable and by preventing competition on a basic level. Lack of competition and uncalculable legal risks raise the cost of ICT and cost jobs across the entire industry, for which the enablement through software is a major innovation driver, as highlighted in the UNCTAD Information Economy Report 2007-2008.</span></p>
<pnewsteaser="yes"><span>Patents on software provide obstacles to knowledge-based industries by making computers less secure, less reliable and by preventing competition on a basic level. Lack of competition and uncalculable legal risks raise the cost of ICT and cost jobs across the entire industry, for which the enablement through software is a major innovation driver, as highlighted in the UNCTAD Information Economy Report 2007-2008.</span></p>
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<p><span>The grant of a software patent is not on the individual computer program, but its underlying idea, while the source code is protected by copyright. The result is a case where a stacking of exclusive rights results in overregulation, incurring an anti-innovative effect on software that Microsoft chairman Bill Gates described in an internal memo in the early 90s as:</span></p>
greve
13 years ago