Re: [tlug] [OT] Say _no_ to the Microsoft Office format as an ISO standard

[Jean-Christophe Helary <fusion@example.com>]

On 5 juil. 07, at 01:39, Stephen J. Turnbull wrote:

> Jean-Christophe Helary writes:
>
> > http://www.orpheusweb.co.uk/john.rose/ttech.html
>
> I don't see the connection.  I can see that there's a threat to
> biodiversity and that there is a definite resemblance of the role of
> Monsanto in this to the pusher distributing heroin to kids in the
> schoolyard, but the technology itself is clearly patent-worthy (if
> anything is), and is not a matter of "patenting genes".

I think I am trying to make a parallel between the "virality" of  
living processes and of GPL software.

The patent here is not what I intended to point at.

I rather meant that here, you have a (IP protected) process that  
removes the "virality" from the seeding (open) process and thus it  
lock the "free" DNA code into an unopenable object that serves as a  
commodity.

It is not possible to say that such a technical appropriation of the  
process is theft, since other seeds are still available and since the  
object provides "new" functions. And I am really at loss to find an  
appropriate word here.

But I feel that there is something deeply wrong here.

If Monsanto provided the method to create such seeds (contribute  
back) then people who be free to choose: use/don't use, implement/ 
don't implement. And it is likely that common sense would keep those  
seeds out of the market. But Monsanto has ways to force the closed  
product on the market and used that as a competitive advantage,  
rather than the quality of the product itself.

Just like closed software tries to create a situation of dependancy.

I just watched that video of Moglen the other day and he talked about  
mathematics and code. And I found that extremely convincing.

Besides, in the current capitalist system, property is not a neutral  
concept. Property is used _for_ the reproduction of capital as well  
as to alienate the non proprietor. So trying to tilt the balance to  
favor, even a tiny bit, the non-proprietor seems to me like a moral  
thing to do.

But I am way past bed time...

JC