be careful how you code a new european directive could put software writers at risk of legal action warns former programmer and technology analyst bill thompson if it gets its way the dutch government will conclude its presidency of the european union by pushing through a controversial measure that has been rejected by the european parliament lacks majority support from national governments and will leave millions of european citizens in legal limbo and facing the possibility of court cases against them if the new law was about border controls defence or even the new constitution then our tv screens would be full of experts agonising over the impact on our daily lives sadly for those who will be directly affected the controversy concerns the patenting of computer programs a topic that may excite the bloggers campaigning groups and technical press but does not obsess middle britain after all how much fuss can you generate about the directive on the patentability of computerimplemented inventions and the way it amends article 52 of the 1973 european patent convention yet if the new directive is nodded through at the next meeting of one of the eu s ministerial councils as seems likely it will allow programs to be patented in europe just as they are in the us many observers of the computing scene including myself think the results will be disastrous for small companies innovative programmers and the free and open source software movement it will let large companies patent all sorts of ideas and give legal force to those who want to limit their competitors use of really obvious ideas in the us you cannot build a system that stores customer credit card details so that they can pay without having to reenter them unless amazon lets you because they hold the patent on oneclick online purchase it is a small invention but amazon made it to the patent office first and now owns it we are relatively free from this sort of thing over here but perhaps not for long the new proposals go back to 2002 although argument about patentability of software and computerimplemented inventions has been going on since at least the mid1980s they have come to a head now after a year in which proposals were made endorsed by the council of ministers radically modified by the european parliament and then represented in their original form some national governments seem to be aware of the problems poland has rejected the proposal and germany s main political parties have opposed it but there is not enough opposition to guarantee their rejection early in december the british government held a consultation meeting with those who had commented on the proposals science minister lord sainsbury went along to listen and outline the uk position but according to those present it was embarrassing to see how little the minister and his officials actually understood the issues concerned the draft directive is being put through the council as what is called an