Arithmetic coding in Fedora libjpeg (bug #639531)

[Björn Persson]

Peter Lemenkov wrote:
> Just for the record, AFAIK there are only two countries which allows
> software patents - USA and South Korea.

That's not the whole story. The situation is quite weird in countries that 
have signed the European Patent Convention. The convention and the national 
laws all state clearly that computer programs are not patentable, and yet 
software patents are granted on a daily basis, justified with some irrational 
reasoning that makes sense only to mentally deranged patent lawyers and some 
gullible politicians. Tens of thousands of these illegal patents have been 
granted.

Several years ago the patent lobby attempted to push through an EU directive 
to legalize software patents. The directive was eventally dropped after years 
of massive campaigning for and against, but that only means that the granting 
of illegal patents continues as before.

Such a patent might not hold up in court if it were contested by a good lawyer 
and the judge had some basic understanding of how computers work, but that 
doesn't make the patents harmless. Due to the high cost and the uncertain 
outcome of a patent lawsuit, small companies often have no choice but to pay 
the license fees.

Björn Persson
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