Field of Use restrictions

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I consider the allowance of field of use restrictions patents that apply
to w3c standards to be a serious threat to the freedoms of the World
Wide Web.  As these restrictions conflict with section 7 of the GPL,
they may prevent the implementations of the standards in future
technology not covered by the field of use excemptions.

I consider this to be an affront to the free nature of the WWW.
Preventing standards from being implemented by free software through the
~ application of software patents is unacceptable.

Software patents are here to stay, even if we beleive them to be evil.
Incorporating them into standards, however, is true folly.  Standards
should be implementable by all, not just some subset of people as
dictated by some land-grab patent holder.

The hyper-link patent that BT holds is a perfect example of the dangers
that patents pose to the freedom of the web.  I expect that every effort
should be made to prevent the negative effects of software patents on
the freedom of the web.  Thus field of use restrictions must not be
allowed.  Instead, if a party wishes to allow the use of patented ideas
in a standard, there must be no restriction on how it is used.

Yours Sincerely,

Robert Hutton.

- --
Robert Hutton,
Information Technology Officer,
Therapeutic Guidelines Limited
email: rwh@tg.com.au
Ph  9326 9959
FAX 9326 5632



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Received on Tuesday, 10 December 2002 19:40:34 UTC