You have won the fight to keep software patents — America's disastrous, failed system for awarding exclusive rights to mathematical instructions — out of Europe. Despite the other side's nonstop dirty tricks, subversion of democracy, and outright lies, the will of the people has been upheld in the Euro Parliament. The day was carried because of the tireless efforts of orgs like the FFII, FSF Europe, and EDRI — and because of your tireless support in writing and phoning to your elected reps. You should be very, very proud. Congrats to all the copyfighters who've busted their humps on this!
The European Parliament voted 648 to 14 to reject the Computer Implemented Inventions Directive.
The bill was reportedly rejected because, politicians said, it pleased no-one in its current form.
Responding to the rejection the European Commission said it would not draw up or submit any more versions of the original proposal.
Note: Software patents have been staked through the heart before, but they keep rising from the grave. There's too much monopoly rent waiting to be extracted by anti-competitive companies for them to simply give up and go home. The price of liberty is eternal vigilance.
(Thanks to dozens of Boing Boing readers who submitted this!)
