Porridge for Patent Infringement? No. 2
In my first post to this blog I criticized proposals for a Council directive on criminal measures aimed at ensuring the enforcement of intellectual property rights and a framework decision to strengthen the criminal law framework to combat intellectual property offences. I am glad to see that I was in good company.
In "The Second IPR Enforcement Directive — A Threat to Competition and to Liberty", the response to the consultation of the Foundation for Information Policy Research, Professor Ross Anderson of Cambridge University Computer Laboratory attacked the proposals on the following grounds:
(1) criminalization of patent infringement will damage competition, resulting in higher prices for consumers;
(2) new business formation and economic growth in Europe will be hit, especially if patent infringement remains a civil matter in our competitors;
(3) it will interfere with free speech over the internet;
(4) it will weaken still further the UK software industry;
(5) it will reduce access to books for the disabled; and
(6) it will interfere with academic freedom by imposing further restrictions on librarians and teachers.
The professor concludes:
This directive is a gift to UKIP, Veritas and all the Tory Eurosceptics who yesterday voted out of their leadership race the only MP who might ever have won back my vote to their party. Imagine the headlines if an importer of generics anti-virus drugs were to be prosecuted for patent infringement at the height of a bird flu pandemic.
In "The Second IPR Enforcement Directive — A Threat to Competition and to Liberty", the response to the consultation of the Foundation for Information Policy Research, Professor Ross Anderson of Cambridge University Computer Laboratory attacked the proposals on the following grounds:
(1) criminalization of patent infringement will damage competition, resulting in higher prices for consumers;
(2) new business formation and economic growth in Europe will be hit, especially if patent infringement remains a civil matter in our competitors;
(3) it will interfere with free speech over the internet;
(4) it will weaken still further the UK software industry;
(5) it will reduce access to books for the disabled; and
(6) it will interfere with academic freedom by imposing further restrictions on librarians and teachers.
The professor concludes:
"The UK's interests are not at all well served by this directive, and I strongly urge you and your colleagues to use the opportunity of the UK Presidency to kick it into touch."Amen to that.
This directive is a gift to UKIP, Veritas and all the Tory Eurosceptics who yesterday voted out of their leadership race the only MP who might ever have won back my vote to their party. Imagine the headlines if an importer of generics anti-virus drugs were to be prosecuted for patent infringement at the height of a bird flu pandemic.
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