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A wide-ranging AP article surveying the European newspaper landscape finds editors “optimistic” about both the web and the survival of print. The gist: while US newspapers self-flagellate in pursuit of a purpose and a business model in this digital age, European counterparts “see the online media explosion more as an opportunity than as a threat.” A curious mix of surveyed European publishing execs expresses typical confidence in both the survival of newsprint and the expansion of online; Le Monde and Italy’s Corriere della Sera say the papers will likely become the space for longer-form investigations, with breaking news handled primarily on the web.
But, while titles like the UK’s Telegraph have fundamentally repositioned their business for multimedia publishing, some of the promises in which others express confidence (electronic paper, video) sound like the same kind of hypotheticals that have reverberated inside this business for several years. Though not as pronounced as in the US, European print circulations are falling, too, and many of the publishers now staying afloat have the online advertising boom to thank.
Related:
-- UK Telegraph’s Digital & Print Integration May Cost 70 More Jobs

Media research firm Kagan, which was bought by media PE firm MCG Capital in 2004 and merged with JupiterResearch which MCG bought a year ago, has now been sold again. SNL Financial, a Charlottesville, Va-based research firm till now operating in energy, real estate and financial industries, has bought it off.
JupiterResearch itself was sold by parent Jupitermedia last year.
Kagan was founded in 1969 and based in Monterey, CA. More details on the deal here.
David Schatsky of JupiterResearch writes about the deal on his blog here.

Interesting this: Thomson Financial, the Canadian financial info giant, is putting the finishing touches to a global news service it will start selling to clients in May, part of a move to compete more extensively with rivals Bloomberg and Reuters, reports FT. This follows is $20 million buy of AFX News from European news service AFP last year.
Since then Thomson has invested heavily in editorial staff, and employs about 500 reporters, around double the number a year ago...The service will provide about 10,000 stories per day, mostly targeted at financial professionals. General news will be provided by AP news feeds, although users will be able to incorporate news available on the internet alongside Thomson feeds.
The plan is to have about a third of the stories automatically generated by computers from standardised earnings releases (would love to read those), a third of the stories will come from news partnerships such as with local language news services and the rest will come from Thomson’s own network of reporters.
Related:
-- Thomson Financial to Buy AFX News For Reported Price of $20 Million
-- New Global Newswire Threatens Reuters?
-- Thomson and MarketWatch.com Partner on News Service; Reuters Not Happy

Former Penton CEO David Nussbaum and media PE firm Abry Partners are joining forces again, seeking B2B media and service investments. Nussbaum sold Penton to Wasserstein & Co. last year and merged with Prism Business Media, will head the $100 million kitty provided by Abry, reports Folio. The PE firm was Penton’s largest shareholder and preferred debt holder at the time of the sale last year. That of course means Nussbaum is leaving the merged companies.
Both Abry and Nussbaum’s Sundance Business Enterprises are also seeking vertically focused online companies. Potential targets include integrated media companies, business services/data companies primarily focused on e-media platforms, and companies that transact critical business services over the Web. More details in release.
BtoBonline: Nussbaum’s move comes less than a month after B2B media veteran Jim Casella aligned with private equity firm Austin Ventures to form Case Interactive Media.
Related:
-- Penton Sold To Wasserstein for $530 Million; Will Merge With Prism
-- MidOcean Buys 50 Percent Stake In Combined Prism/Penton Merger

I have decided to withdraw definitively from the political debate on the European Patent Litigation Agreement (EPLA). The process itself may very well take several more years, but I will not do any more lobbying nor make any more public statements in this regard.

This year I made a lot of effort to inform politicians, the media and the public of the shortcomings of the present EPLA proposal, and I had the chance to make my contribution in the build-up to the European Parliament’s October 13 resolution, but I kept rather silent in recent weeks and will not speak out on this particular issue again. Until there is a new patent policy process in which I might participate, I will not comment on any patent-related issues. Last year I returned to the fray after three months of absence ? this time there definitely won’t be a comeback as far as the EPLA is concerned.

I am again now what I used to be before my involvement with patent policy: an unpolitical programmer working on a computer game. In this August blog posting, I explained that I have done many things in 21 years in the IT industry other than campaigning.

However, I thoroughly enjoyed the opportunity to vigorously represent political interests at the EU level, and I will very likely do so again at some point in time, possibly even very soon. Working with people from all across Europe and from all parts of the democratic spectrum is a highly stimulating experience. Over the years I have come to like Brussels and many people there, even including a few with whom I was at loggerheads in public.

Since I have stepped down as a patent policy advocate with immediate effect, I have begun unsubscribing from related mailing lists and do not intend to post any more articles to this blog, at least not with respect to the EPLA. However, I will keep this site online for some more time so people can read my old postings and download my book.

This year I have already had several discussions about the possibility of me representing companies and organizations in other contexts. That is what I may indeed be doing sooner or later, provided that it’s an issue I personally care about and that I believe the commitment of those whose interests I represent is commensurate with the importance of the issue and the skills and credentials I bring to the table.

Such new activities may again, but will not necessarily, be directly related to intellectual property rights. For instance, I could imagine an involvement with an initiative for patent quality or one for explaining to SMEs and individual inventors how the patent system works.

While I am not in a position to announce anything definitive yet, I may very soon enter the debate on the future of professional soccer (aka football) in Europe with a particular focus on the regulatory framework under which the clubs sell broadcasting rights. I have read the EU’s “Independent Football Review” and believe that some of the recommendations contained in it do not deserve to be adopted as such by the European Parliament (which is working on a related resolution) and the European Commission. I’m in discussions on this with key “players”.

Please do not write to me concerning this decision unless we already know each other personally. I’m aware that my efforts have received widespread community support, based on the correspondence I had over the last couple of years with supporters. And it’s not for no reason that I managed to beat U2 frontman Bono in an Internet election last year But I’d feel bad about getting a large number of messages that I wouldn’t find the time to reply to.

An explanation

Rather than only state the facts, I would like to try to explain my reasoning. Some people who supported me in the past may be wondering now why I have withdrawn from the EPLA debate even though I personally continue to believe it is a highly important issue.

It was never an easy decision to spend time on patent policy instead of pursuing other opportunities. I got sucked into this, and I’d do it again (if this were 2004 again), but I can’t do it forever. Everyone is entitled to pursue his personal success.

Those of you who have read my book No Lobbyists As Such - The War over Software Patents in the European Union will know that I never claimed to be driven exclusively by idealism. From the outset, I expected companies to attach some commercial value to this important effort. But it’s always been difficult to receive a level of corporate funding for my political work that enabled me to continue. That’s why I resigned as campaign manager of NoSoftwarePatents.com in March last year. In my book I revealed some of the difficulties I faced: the final chapter, The Showdown in Strasbourg, starts with two sections (Go Big or Go Home and Political Naïveté of Small and Medium-Sized Companies) that address this topic.

The war over the software patent directive would have been a first-rate opportunity for entrepreneurs and executives to learn the lesson. The way things worked out, it’s been proven that a successful campaign against ill-conceived legislation is neither a cakewalk (it takes a considerable quality and quantity of resources) nor a losing proposition. It can be done, but not by just anyone and not without a certain amount of money.

Obviously I have to make a fundamental distinction between those companies who never supported me and those who did, but not to the extent that I could have carried on. The first group is the much larger one. I tried in 2004, in 2005 and again this year to make contacts with senior executives of medium-sized IT companies (with revenues at least in the tens of millions of euros). Generally, they wouldn’t even want to meet with me. It’s easier for them to turn a blind eye to the question of patent legislation now: day-to-day business is more important. Well, they may be spending a lot more time in the future on patent issues than they’d ever have had to spend with me.

With respect to those who did support me, even today I feel primarily indebted. I’m really grateful for the fact that I had two and a half absolutely exciting years in politics. Of course, if those who supported me had given me even more support, and if in particular they had made an effort to talk to their colleagues who run similar companies to build a broadbased strategic alliance, I could and would have continued my political work. Just like with the non-supporters, time will tell whether they set the right priorities.

For now, the jury’s out. My own priority is to be so successful with other endeavors that my decision not to continue fighting the EPLA under the given circumstances will be proven to have been the right one. And I have no doubt about that.

Let me make this very clear: I don’t mean to insinuate that companies had a moral obligation to lend me more support. There are ethics in business, but mostly there’s this logic: All entities, be they companies or individuals, make each other proposals, and everyone is free to accept the ones he considers opportune and to turn down all others. They’re perfectly entitled to that choice, and so am I.

At this juncture, a few weeks before commissioner McCreevy is expected to announce his patent policy concept that will be centered around the EPLA, I had to make a choice and I made it. My last assignment ended two weeks ago, and talks about a new one were progressing at far too slow a pace given what is happening in the political process. It had previously occurred multiple times that there was no seamless continuation of my mandate because companies ignored my timely reminders to work out a follow-on solution. My book mentioned a couple of examples. After all this time, enough is enough.

Thank you!

In closing, I would like to thank everyone who supported this important cause and me. Since my book on the software patent story gives credit to many of you, I feel I don’t have to reiterate the things I wrote in it. Still I’d like to make some additions that I consider necessary in view of all that happened this year.

I would particularly like to thank the FFII’s Benjamin Henrion for his great cooperation. Benjamin has become a key player, and if I ever were to set up a lobbying office in Brussels, I’d like to have him on the team for his knowledge and dedication. I also worked together very well with Harald Talarczyk, the manager of the NoSoftwarePatents-Award.com campaign, a Web site that I believe makes an important contribution to the European patent policy debate and deserves to be supported.

Enough said. I’m really excited about the opportunities I am going to have now. Best wishes to all of you!

In today’s vote on its patent policy resolution, the European Parliament approved the compromise text I had previously reported on, but it also voted in favor of a few amendments.

The most notable amendment was number 7. It inserted the subclause “which address concerns about democratic control, judicial independence and litigation costs” into article 1. Two of those three concerns (judicial independence and litigation costs) had been mentioned by commissioner McCreevy in his speech in the EP on September 28. But it was a good idea for the EP to reinforce those points.

Dutch patent litigation attorney and “liberal” MEP Toine Manders, who is very much in favor of the EPLA (obviously, more expensive patent litigation would mean more money in his pockets whenever he leaves the EP and practices law again), seems quite uneasy about that amendment 7. The EP first voted by hand, and it was very obvious that an overwhelming majority supported the proposed amendment. But Manders requested, which is his procedural right, an electronic vote. The amendment won again, and the precise result was 531 (out of 619) in favor. Given such a broad majority, it’s kind of ridiculous that someone would request a verification of the vote, but if you’re really desperate, you might do so anyway, even though your chance to get any different outcome is one in a million at best.

The good news is that the EP is the first institution to have raised major objections concerning the draft EPLA in its present form. The bad news is that the EP stopped short of throwing a spanner in the EPLA works, and we yet have to find the first political body to oppose the EPLA in stronger terms.

Nobody can seriously claim victory or concede defeat based on today’s parliamentary decision, which keeps all options open for the future. For a moment I thought to myself that this is going to be a marathon, not a sprint. However, we don’t know how much time we’ll actually get before it’s too late. If we don’t manage to turn things around in the very near term, the process may still take very long for procedural and legalistic reasons but the tsunami may become unstoppable (even though it would still take a lot of time to hit the beach). In that respect, the glass that looks half-full is actually half-empty.

In this blog I have repeatedly mentioned the European Parliament’s upcoming resolution on future European patent policy in general and the European Patent Litigation Agreement (EPLA) in particular. After a long and intense debate, which went mostly unnoticed by the general public, the three largest groups (international-level parties) in the EP - the conservative EPP-ED, the social democratic PES and the libertarian ALDE - yesterday sealed a pretty reasonable compromise.  Since those three groups have about 550 of the chamber’s 732 seats, it’s a mere formality for that compromise proposal to be carried by a solid majority. The vote will take place in Brussels on Thursday of next week (October 12).

Initially, the chief negotiators of EPP-ED and ALDE wanted the EP to say an unequivocal Yes to the Commission’s plans to get the EPLA ratified with the involvement of the EU. At the same time, the PES, Greens/EFA, GUE/NGL and IND/DEM wanted to say a clear No. On the bottom line, the compromise between EPP-ED, PES and ALDE is to say Maybe, but… and states clearly that “significant improvements” to the proposal are required and that an important piece, the Rules of Procedure for the envisioned new centralized European Patent Court, is missing.

Let’s compare this to the situation last year: More or less the same people who now want the EPLA wanted a directive that would have given software patents an extremely strong legal status across the EU. And more or less the same people who now criticize the EPLA (without necessarily being against the idea of a centralized patent court) made a counterproposal that would have abolished software patents in Europe (and admittedly, more than just software patents). In the end, the two camps, with neither one being sure of having a majority, agreed to reject the proposal and preserve the status quo. One might say it was a draw, and I think it was actually a defensive victory for us. And with the same sense of realism I have to concede that this time around we would have needed a clear decision in our favor a little more than the others. That’s life, but it’s not the end of the world. We can definitely live with this outcome.

It will take two years or more before the EPLA will, if ever, be ratified. The EPLA has significant momentum and made lots of headway over the last 12 months in particular. However, there is now also a lot of awareness for what’s wrong with the draft EPLA in its current form. Last week, commissioner McCreevy recognized that we have “legitimate doubts and concerns”. The EP did not rubberstamp the EPLA as we know it today: it made it clear that renegotiation is needed, but it also left a door open that we, if we had had a solid majority in favor of such a move, would have tried to close.

So why didn’t we have that majority in place? Rather than answering that 2020 hindsight-style question I’d like to focus on the challenges ahead of us. Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) stand to lose a lot if the EPLA in its current shape or in any form materially consistent with the current proposal were to be ratified. The financially stronger ones among those SMEs have to make a much more significant commitment in order to win this new political debate. Without the support I received from 1&1, MATERNA and MySQL, there wouldn’t even have been much of a debate for most of the time, and the commissioner wouldn’t have had to say the things he said last week in Strasbourg. We would have lost completely. With more resources, we could have achieved a lot more, but most of the medium-sized companies that speak out against software patents and would have the financial ability to make meaningful contributions to the fight are even unwilling to give serious consideration to the issue.

Also, the activist movement that did a fantastic job opposing the software patent directive has, with the exception of about half a dozen people who took decisive action over the last ten days, mostly been a “passivist” scene. Any resistance movement that depends on contributions from volunteers is disadvantaged versus a deep-pocket lobbying organization, and in this case there was simply a lack of volunteer contributions in terms of translations of documents or other things that could have been done to influence the opinion-forming and decision-making process.

May it serve as a wake-up call to many people and especially companies that the EP is now going to say Maybe, but… instead of No to a proposal that, among other things, would make software patents strongly enforceable in Europe.

Almost six months ago, I firstly wrote about the effect the EPLA could have on software patents in Europe in this blog entry. I reiterated this concern on various occasions, including the Commission’s July 12 hearing. Earlier this month I published a two-page diagram and a three-page briefing document to explain the nature of the problem.

My related concerns are shared by a growing number of people and organizations. Yesterday, the Greens/EFA group in the European Parliament issued this press release with the headline “EU Commission must not introduce EU patents by the backdoor”.

Today a large SME (small and medium-sized enterprises) organization at the European level, named UEAPME, came out with this press release on the European Commission’s new patent policy initiative. UEAPME demands a comprehensive patent policy proposal and says the litigation agreement EPLA is not sufficient. Let me quote:

UEAPME also voiced concerns about the possibility of the EPLA being used to introduce patents on software ?through the back door?. ?The European Patent Office policy towards software patents has been very liberal so far. Applying the EPLA to software patents granted by the EPO would create a dangerous body of jurisprudence on an issue which was clearly discarded by the European Parliament and by European stakeholders one year ago?, continued Ms Cimaglia. According to UEAPME, the Munich convention excluding the granting of software patents must be respected by the EPO ? consequently, only well founded cases should be accepted under the EPLA. Effective measures should also be put in place to ensure the independence of the EPLA judges from the EPO.

Klaus-Heiner Lehne, a German conservative MEP on the payroll of a leading patent litigation firm, is not amused at recent developments in the European Parliament, and in particular he is frustrated to see that other MEPs call for a more balanced approach to patent policy. Lehne much prefers commissioner McCreevy’s push for the EPLA, the Excessive Patent Litigation Agreement (the official long form starts with “European”, but “Excessive” would be more accurate).

The day before yesterday, Lehne vented his anger by issuing this polemical press release. The first few paragraphs are just confused and confusing, but the final one is completely out of line. He describes some of his colleagues, who unlike him fight for the public interest rather than for the special interest of a patent litigation firm, as “die-hard, anti-innovation MEPs”. But when you look at the MEPs quoted in yesterday’s three-group press release on a patent policy motion, you find among them Michel Rocard, a former prime minister of France (i.e., someone who proved responsible enough to govern an entire country), and Umberto Guidoni, a two-time Space Shuttle astronaut. I always thought astronauts were in touch with technology and at the forefront of innovation. But it may be that in Lehne’s opinion only patent lawyers, or those who hire legions of them, are deemed to be innovators.

His press release also lashes out at “so called ‘no-software-patent’ people”. We should thank him for this recognition No matter what he says, we’re going to continue to fight for innovation and competitive markets, and against the excesses of the patent system.

Three groups in the European Parliament (i.e., international-level parties) yesterday authorized me to distribute the press release below to my media contacts:

European patent controversy heating up again

PES, Greens/EFA and GUE/NGL groups in European Parliament file motion for resolution — Proposal calls for “balance between the interests of patent holders and the broader public interest in innovation and competitive markets” — Commissioner McCreevy’s preference, the EPLA, is seen as weakening EU democracy, increasing litigation costs and “exposing SMEs to greater risks” ? McCreevy to speak in parliament next week, vote to take place in mid-October

Brussels (21 September 2006) — More than a year has passed since the European Parliament’s historic rejection of the Commission’s and Council’s software patent bill. Now the hot potato is back in the parliament’s oven: on October 11 or 12, the EP is set to vote in Brussels on two competing motions for a resolution on future European patent policy. Next week, internal market commissioner McCreevy will speak in the EP in Strasbourg and outline his patent policy plans, which have already come under fire.

A joint proposal of three groups — PES, Greens/EFA and GUE/NGL — calls for “balance between the interests of patent holders and the broader public interest in innovation and competitive markets”. The motion criticizes McCreevy’s preferred measure, the European Patent Litigation Agreement (EPLA), as weakening EU democracy, compromising judicial independence, increasing litigation costs and “exposing SMEs [small and medium-sized enterprises] to greater risks”. The proposal also warns against the effect the EPLA would have on the scope of patentable subject-matter, and a decision of the European Patent Office (EPO) to uphold a Microsoft software patent (on clipboard data formats) is mentioned as an example.

Conversely, the chief negotiators of the EPP-ED and ALDE groups want the chamber to support McCreevy’s push for the EPLA.

The spokeswoman of the PES on legal affairs, Maria Berger, and former French prime minister Michel Rocard explained: “We are all for improvements to the European patent system, but we must continue the search for solutions within the framework of the EU. That includes the need for democratic control and truly independent courts.” The two socialist MEPs insisted that “there has to be a comprehensive strategy for lower costs and higher quality if patent policy is supposed to foster Europe’s economy in general and SMEs in particular. Merely expanding the system itself, which is the spirit of the proposed EPLA, gets us nowhere.”

Eva Lichtenberger, Austrian Green MEP and member of the Legal Affairs Committee, said: “If McCreevy were to succeed with his plans for the EPLA, he would hurt the EU institutions and Europe’s SMEs at the same time. Even some large players such as Nokia and GlaxoSmithKline don’t seem to consider the EPLA to be a good idea. It’s high time for the Commission and for certain conservatives to stop this constant, anachronistic push for ever more patents.”

For the GUE/NGL group, Italian MEP and former Space Shuttle astronaut Umberto Guidoni issued a warning: “After the failure of the software patent directive, the EPO has come up with another proposal backed by McCreevy, and it’s even more undemocratic and dangerous than the previous one. EPLA is about much more than software patents. Still, software patents are one of the key motivations behind it. The Parliament made it very clear last year that we largely disagree with the EPO’s granting practice in certain areas. That’s why we don’t want a new court that would be controlled by basically the same people as the EPO.”

On Friday, EU internal market commissioner Charlie McCreevy (whose historical ties with Microsoft and similar companies are mentioned in my book) delivered this speech on his intellectual property rights (IPR) strategy. He flew all the way up to Helsinki for an informal meeting of the ECOFIN (economic & finance) Council of the European Union.

In his speech, he said the European Patent Litigation Agreement (EPLA) “is a goal worth pursuing” and that he wanted to involve the EU in the EPLA negotiations “and bring them to finality”. He falsely claims that the EPLA would “offer valuable cost savings”: even Nokia and pharmaceutical giant GlaxoSmithKline have already pointed out that the opposite would be the case.

His claim that the EPLA is compatible with the idea of an EU-wide Community patent is also a misrepresentation. The EPLA is only about strengthening the European Patent Office (EPO).

Let me make this very clear: the EPLA is not only about software patents, but the effect it would have on the legal status of software patents in Europe is the primary reason for many (even though not all) lobbyists, and definitely for McCreevy, to push for it so hard. For a simple graphical overview of how the EPLA basically leads to the legalization of software patents in Europe, please take a look at this two-page diagram (PDF file). For more detailed information, please read this three-page briefing document, and you can find some more information about the EPLA in the archive of this blog.

The anti-software patent movement has to get going again. Everything we achieved as a movement last year (with the rejection of the software patent directive) is at stake now.

As I explained in this blog, it’s always a difficult decision for me to keep postponing my own project in order to work on the patent policy front. But once again, like so many times before, I have decided to do so for some more time. Given what happened at the July 12 hearing, there are some important things to do right away. I’ll talk a little more about my personal future on some other occasion, but suffice it to say that I’m still actively involved in the European patent policy debate!