Videocast With Georg Greve On Software Patents

The World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) Standing Committee on the Law of Patents discussed exceptions and limitations to patentability on 24 March. Intellectual Property Watch spoke with Georg Greve of the Free Software Foundation Europe about exceptions on patents and software.

A WIPO report on exceptions and limitations to patentability discussed the economic benefits of patentability, which Greve said constitutes a “three-step test” to determine whether a certain kind of product should be subject to patent law. These steps include: the existence of market failure that requires correction in the form of incentives for innovation, a pathway for disclosure of information, and a mechanism for dissemination of that information to create broader public knowledge on the issue — issues which can potentially be solved by patenting. Greve argues that software fails to need patents on all three fronts, and that WIPO should undertake a study specifically aimed at identifying criteria for whether or not an area of technology should be patentable.