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Union, a committee of 700 European industrial property lawyers, wants the
European Commission to clarify the law on patenting computer software. The
present law confusingly says that programs “as such” are not patentable. No one
knows what this means. Inventors often describe their software as “systems” to
get round the law. One patent examiner admitted: “It is like a camel, difficult
to define, but you know it when you see it.” Union fears it could take ten years
to get all 15 states to change their laws. So it wants the European Patent
Office to rule that a computer program cannot be patented because it is already
protected by copyright.