From: Max More (max@maxmore.com)
Date: Wed Dec 22 1999 - 11:36:13 MST
At 03:04 PM 12/22/99 +0000, Charlie wrote:
>On Wed, Dec 22, 1999 at 05:43:10AM -0800, Robert J. Bradbury wrote:
> > > (Witness
> > > attempts to patent large chunks of the human genome, for example.)
> >
> > This is interesting, because you would never have gotten the funding
> > to accelerate progress in these areas (Human Genome Sciences or Celera
> > for example) if there was not a perception that these companies *would*
> > have patentable "products".
>
>That's a rather American-centric viewpoint. Over here, we have the example
>of the Welcome Trust -- which is pumping huge amounts of money into HGP
>research because it's got a duty to provide money to beneficial medical
>research in general. This money is going to academic research units
>who are specifically _not_ patenting their sequences, but demonstrating
>prior art, so that a biotechnology industry can be built on these publicly-
>accessible foundations.
I don't that is American-centric at all. The Gates Foundation is now second
only to the Wellcome Trust and it and other US foundations (such as
Ellison's foundation) do the same kind of thing. Naturally many foundations
give money without regard to patents. The question is -- where did those
foundations get their money from in the first place? In the case of
Ellison's trust, which is funding some great biotech research, you bet that
much of it would not have existed if not for software patents.
FWIW, I'm not sure that patents could not be replaced by something better.
At the very least, I'm completely with you in seeing the fixed patent
period as ridiculous. Patent length should vary depending on industry and
market conditions. Now, how do we devise a system to make the patent system
more flexible?
Onward!
Max
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