Del FON s’en parla a un caramull de blogs: és impressionant, Bill o Linus i guiris, què divertit, quina pensada més xarxaire i cool la d’en Martin Varsavsky, una persona singular, no és la primera bona idea que té, és un innovador, completament disruptiu…

Idò jo espero que FON acabi en fum:

FON is Patent Pending

When I invented call back I did not bother to patent it. I hated the way international telecom companies were ripping consumers off and while I wanted to make money with Viatel I also wanted to destroy the global oligopoly that the telcos had established. And Viatel and other call back companies like IDT did that. Still some smart guy out there patented call back and years later when his patent was granted he tried to collect payments from call back companies. I then had to testify that I had invented call back and in the end we had enough proof and we prevailed. In order to avoid the same this time with FON not only we have registered the brand FON but we have filed for patenting the FON idea, namely a piece of software that synchronizes the behavior of all the wifi access points to join into a network. This does not mean that we don´t want to collaborate with others and freely roam on other networks. But I don´t want the call back story all over again with someone else patenting my idea.

—Blog d’en Martin Varsavsky. Destacat meu.

No és ètic patentar programari: significa patentar idees. Fet i fet ell mateix ho diu: «patenting the FON idea».

Si les intencions den Varsavsky prosperen, els desenvolupadors de programari lliure correm el perill de no poder escriure codi per a compartir una cosa que és ben nostre: la connexió a Internet. Ja ens basten les restriccions artificials que hi posen les operadores!

Em sap greu el que li va passar, però no és cap motiu per demanar-nos ara, a tota la societat, que li concedim l’exclusiva d’un mecanisme per a fer quelcom tant bàsic i natural com compartir la nostra connexió.

Tampoc puc acceptar que ara vulgui usar, contra tota la societat, el mateix que el va perjudicar abans: les patents. En comptes de demanar una patent podria lluitar per a fer-les desaparèixer. Tal com va comprovar, poden ser rematadament injustes i per això –entre d’altres coses– cal que ningú no en pugui fer.

Publicar la idea FON hauria de bastar perquè ningú la pogués patentar. Ningú ha patentat altres idees brillants, com el web, perquè els autors de la idea la van fer pública. Per això tampoc em puc creure les bones intencions que en Varsavsky vol transmetre en anunciar la intenció de patent.

No oblidem que les patents són una concessió que fem entre tots per estimular la innovació. No van sorgir per limitar-nos cap dret bàsic, com és aquest cas, amb un mecanisme tant simple com un programa, això és, unes instruccions escrites en un llenguatge informàtic en comptes d’un verbal. Qualsevol tècnic pot escriure-ho, de la mateixa manera que hom que sabi parlar i escriure pot redactar unes instruccions en la seva llengua. Patentar programes també significa patentar simples redaccions. Què passaria si es pogués fer el mateix amb la literatura? En Richard Stallman ho explica:

A novel and a modern complex programme have certain points in common: each is large and implements many ideas. Suppose patent law had been applied to novels in the 1800s; suppose states such as France had permitted the patenting of literary ideas. How would this have affected Hugo’s writing? How would the effects of literary patents compare with the effects of literary copyright?

Consider the novel Les Misérables, written by Hugo. Because he wrote it, the copyright belonged only to him. He did not have to fear that some stranger could sue him for copyright infringement and win. That was impossible, because copyright covers only the details of a work of authorship, and only restricts copying. Hugo had not copied Les Misérables, so he was not in danger.

Patents work differently. They cover ideas — each patent is a monopoly on practising some idea, which is described in the patent itself.

Here’s one example of a hypothetical literary patent:

Claim 1: a communication process that represents, in the mind of a reader, the concept of a character who has been in jail for a long time and becomes bitter towards society and humankind.

Claim 2: a communication process according to claim 1, wherein said character subsequently finds moral redemption through the kindness of another.

Claim 3: a communication process according to claims 1 and 2, wherein said character changes his name during the story.

—Patent absurdity, una article d’en Richard Stallman a publicat a ZDnet UK.

Consentir patents de programari és disparar-nos als peus. Espero que FON triomfi per bo i no per estar protegit per restriccions artificials absurdes. Del contrari, voldria que tot plegat es convertís en fum.