Hi, Some of you may already be aware that on 1st September the European parliament will vote [1] on the issue of software patents.
This is something that will directly affect all ASF projects, despite the care that we take in guaranteeing copyright of contributed code. Approved patents are not made public for 18 months, so there's no way we can know in advance what code will infringe patents. This is not the only reason patents are bad. This letter [2] to MEPs explains more. In protest against the directive, an online demo [3] is being co-ordinated, proposing that web sites shut [4] on 27th August. Obviously, the more sites that shut, the more impact it will have. I'd like to propose that we "close" (ie swap the front page for a protest page) as many of the Apache web sites as possible. Obviously, if we could get a mass turnout of ASF people to the demo in Brussels [5], that would be even better! [1] http://swpat.ffii.org/news/03/plen0620/index.en.html [2] http://www.compsoc.com/~coriordan/docs/dear_mep/dear_mep.html [3] http://swpat.ffii.org/group/demo/index.en.html [4] http://swpat.ffii.org/group/demo/demo.en.html [5] http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/4/32457.html Thanks for listening, Andrew. -- Andrew Savory Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Managing Director Tel: +44 (0)870 741 6658 Luminas Internet Applications Fax: +44 (0)700 598 1135 Orixo alliance: http://www.orixo.com/ Web: www.luminas.co.uk --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
