This thread is for formulating and discussing proposals for PPNZ's official policy on patent reach. Proposals and ideas will be collated on the wiki page Policy Committee Proposals on Patent Reach (linked)

If you would also like to discuss this topic on IRC, please raise this in the thread, and the Policy Committee will try to arrange a meeting time. To help us select an appropriate time, please ensure you update your preferences in the poll Board index > General > Polls > What time of the week should PPNZ have IRC meetings? (linked)

The process will be as follows:

• Members have the opportunity to put forward and discuss proposals
• Proposals are collated, and a last call is made for member input--see here (linked)
• Voting instructions are posted, and voting is open for at least 5 days--see here (linked)
• Results of the vote are posted--see here (linked)

Looking at the overall goal of other pirate parties:

• No policy: 2 parties (France, Russia)
• Reform: 12 parties (Austria, Brazil, Canada, Italy, Kazakhstan, Luxembourg, New Zealand, Portugal, Slovenia, Spain, Switzerland, United Kingdom)
• Condider abolition: 3 parties (Australia, Finland, Germany)
• (Eventual) abolition: 6 parties (Belgium, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Denmark, Serbia, Sweden
  ?: 4 parties Ireland, Morocco, Netherlands, Romania)

Particular areas of concern mentioned:

• Non-tangible (especially software, notably also business methods): 13 parties (Australia, Belgium, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, Germany, Italy, Luxembourg, New Zealand, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, UK)
• Pharmaceuticals: 9 parties (Australia, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, Kazakhstan, Luxembourg, Serbia, Sweden, UK)
• Life (organisms, genes, plants): 9 parties (Australia, Belgium, Czech Republic, Germany, Italy, Louxembourg, Portugal, Spain, Sweden)
• Trivial patents: 5 parties (Austria, Luxembourg, Portugal, Switzerland, UK)

Can we get this moving again soon plz? (James g, zcat, kiwipeso)

Those look like good points to start from. I suggest 2 STV votes in parallel (one for software, one for all patents) and then consider pharma,life, non-tangible, trivial afterwards in wake of the results.

i) abolish and revoke all current patents
ii) stop granting new patents
iii) restrict liability to cases where patents were knowingly infringed / not independently developed
iv) status quo

Anything else that should be in the continuum?

iv) as far as this question goes.

My opinion is that the existence of patents is not a problem. Although I'm not convinced that they help anywhere near as much as some people think they do, I also don't see too much harm either except in a few areas.

The length of patents is likewise perfectly appropriate. I don't know if it's "ideal" or not, but it's certainly not a problem as compared the the length of copyright. Patents are short enough that someone might see the patent granted and also see it expire within their working adult life.

The only policy we should have on patents is that some areas should be excluded because patents in those areas cause an indisputable amount of harm. Software and pharmaceuticals are the two big ones in my opinion and the New Zealand government is already well on track to making software patents invalid.

Also the policy that patents should cover 'inventions' and not such things as mathematical formula or naturally occurring discoveries. But for the most part I think New Zealand is already immune to this madness.

I probably wouldn't worry too much about the difference between i and ii at this stage, since the result would be the same after 20 years either way.

For iii, I think the not independently developed idea might be problematic for a couple of reasons--it may be difficult to prove, and also it may be more expensive to refine an invention and/or have it approved than to get it to the stage of being patentable (approval for pharmaceuticals is an expensive process), so a ban on independent development may provide part of the incentive for refinement and approval.

Restricting liability to cases where patents are knowingly infringed, though, sounds like an interesting idea to me. If patent holders have to notify others if they sell something covered by a patent, and sale prior to the notice is not considered infringing, this would lessen the damage that might be suffered from lawsuits over accidental infringement. I think this might make sense as a separate vote though.

So of the above options, I think probably only abolish and status quo are needed for the continuum, but with a new intermediate option of abolishing once an alternative system is in place. And I think this probably needs to be voted on for each of non-tangible, pharmaceuticals, life, and sundry (if there are no further classifications), because someone might want to vote to keep some, abolish some ASAP, and abolish others once alternative systems are in place.

I think we probably all agree that patents should not be granted for trivial things, the trick here would be finding an appropriate definition for 'trivial'.
According to the reference (ABA, 2007, p. 108) from the policy wiki page, a literature review of research on patents suggests pharmaceuticals to be one of the few areas where patents significantly promote innovation, so it probably makes sense to aim to abolish this once an alternative system is in place, as the Swedish pirate party suggests.

This is off-topic, but regarding patent length, patents are different from copyright in that the copyright term begins once development is completed and commercial exploitation has begun, whereas when the patent term begins there may still be a lot of R&D/certification to do before commercial exploitation can begin. If there is 10 years of R&D/certification (apparently not unusual for pharmaceuticals), then that would leave 10 years for commercial exploitation, the same as we suggest for copyright. An issue though is that the less R&D/certification a patent requires, the more time it gets for commercial exploitation, which makes absolutely no sense. Perhaps instead of a flat 20 year patent term, it might be better to have up to 10 years for R&D followed by a maximum of 10 years for commercial exploitation? (If this could be workable.)

I believe that i. & ii. all Software Patents should be declared null and void immediately, and should no longer issue them.
Also, as a person dependant on patented medicine, ii. Pharmaceutical patents should no longer be issued, and existing ones should have their term left to run down. All new medicines should be developed from public funding, with competitive licensing of the marketing of new pharmaceuticals to be the new pharmaceutical system. (In other words, seeing as more is spent on marketing pharmaceuticals than R&D, this would save money for all, consumers, government and corporations.)


I strongly suggest we collaborate with our Swedish MEPs on this, I know Engstrom has written about this in detail, and I would advocate a multilateral agreement between Australia, NZ & EU on joint pharmaceutical research pools.

I think (i) was indented to include (ii). Perhaps this would be clearer if the options were reversed.

I see it as more important to choose between change patent law immediately / once an alternative system is in place rather than between abolish patents / stop granting new patents, but on reflection, I think perhaps the answer to one choice implies the answer to the other. If we want to change patent law in a given area immediately (without implementing an alternative system first), then we don't think patents do anything worthwhile in that area, so it doesn't make sense to continue to pay out patent holders. OTOH, if we want to implement an alternative system first in a given area, then we do think patents are doing something worthwhile in this area, and want this to continue until an alternative system is in place, but for this we have to continue to grant patents that we won't immediately abolish as soon as we've set up an alternative system (otherwise they won't be much of an incentive).

So I suggest for each patent area we have the options:
i) Leave the status quo
ii) Stop granting new patents once an alternative system is in place
iii) Abolish patents immediately

Yes, I think you're right, we especially need more collaboration here, but I think the international pirate movement would benefit from more collaboration across the board in policy development, and preferably from the bottom up rather than from the top down.

I'm happy with those options. So, let's vote for all the areas!

Thinking about how the poll should be set out, I suggest:

Patents on non-tangible 'inventions'
[A] No policy
[B] Stop granting new patents once an alternative system is in place
[C] Abolish patents immediately
[W] No confidence in the vote (if you use this option, you must place it first)

Patents on pharmaceuticals
[D] No policy
[E] Stop granting new patents once an alternative system is in place
[F] Abolish patents immediately (requires 75% majority)
[W] No confidence in the vote (if you use this option, you must place it first)

Patents on life
[G] No policy
[H] Stop granting new patents once an alternative system is in place
[I] Abolish patents immediately
[W] No confidence in the vote (if you use this option, you must place it first)

Patents in all other areas
[J] No policy
[K] Stop granting new patents once an alternative system is in place
[L] Abolish patents immediately
[W] No confidence in the vote (if you use this option, you must place it first)

Voters could send the answers to all polls in a single e-mail, one per line. Immediate abolition of pharmaceutical patents is the only option that I think is a very rare policy among pirate parties, so would count as non-core policy and require a 75% majority to pass.

My views on the issues:
Like zcat, I think it would probably be best to just aim to remove patents in areas where they cause harm. Patents on intangible 'inventions' stifle innovation, and don't appear to do any good. Pharmaceutical patents, although they do appear to promote innovation, also needlessly leave people to die. I think these two are worth addressing, and we've got good cases to make for them backed by research. I think there'd be little point at this stage aiming to remove patents in areas where they don't appear to be doing much harm, even if they don't appear to be doing much good either. This is also pretty much what the policy wiki page says at the moment, I think.

What about patents on life though? Besides intangible 'inventions' and pharmaceuticals, this is a third area that pirate parties have raised concern about, and it's one that I don't think has really been discussed in PPNZ. It doesn't make any sense to me to allow patent holders to sue because a covered patent replicated itself, but are there reasons for opposing patents on GM life that doesn't self-replicate?

I would really like to get some comments from some of the stakeholders in this area, EG Livestock Improvement and the UOW Thermophile Research Unit are two quite close by that come to mind. These companies make a very valuable contribution to the local economy and I would not want to throw the baby out with the bathwater. Perhaps what we need is a compromise where the 'right' of a genetic patent holder can be respected, but only so far as it is not infringing on the 'right' of any other person to affordable healthcare, the natural right to save seed and grow food, etc? Or perhaps there is a better compromise that the industry itself could offer?