From: Rui Miguel Seabra (rms_at_1407.org)
Date: Tue Nov 18 2003 - 04:34:20 EST
On Tue, 2003-11-18 at 04:42, Javier F Serrador wrote:
> I think that almost in EU it's not illegal "reverse ingeneering" for
> interoperability.
Definitely not in all countries (in Portugal you can't do that), and
irrelevant since we're talking about software patents.
> If US law is so strict (and forbides importing that software) there
> should be a chance to non-US citizens to use that plugings.
IIRC Microsoft is the biggest (if not simply one of the top 3) owner of
Software Patents in Europe.
That's why it is so important to help http://swpat.ffii.org if you live
in Europe.
> Also, this is a force-position to change US law (like criptography
> export ) by creating a competitive-disadvantege on the American side...
The USA already have a competitive-disadvantage: Software Patents
Now some companies are trying to bring that disadvantage to Europe.
But this is off-topic. You can subscribe to patents_at_aful.org if you're
interested in discussing software patents in general.
The thread I initiated affects us directly, as a project that "requires"
import/export to Microsoft Word, but abiword-dev is not the proper place
for copyright, or patent or trademark general discussion.
Hugs, Rui
-- + No matter how much you do, you never do enough -- unknown + Whatever you do will be insignificant, | but it is very important that you do it -- Gandhi + So let's do it...?Please AVOID sending me WORD, EXCEL or POWERPOINT attachments. See http://www.fsf.org/philosophy/no-word-attachments.html
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