The second day of a conference in and near the European Parliament which brings together programmers, engineers, entrepreneurs, law scholars, economists and politicians to explore the whole chain of causality from proposed patent law regulations to European policy goals, such as promoting innovation, competition, enterpreneurial spirit and consumer protection, unbureaucratic and target-oriented governance, legal security, e-Security, e-Europe, e-Inclusion and "becoming the world's most competitive information society by 2010".

2003/05/08 09:00 BXL EP: Software Patents and Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) The European Commission and MEP Arlene McCarthy are proposing to legalise software patents in Europe and argue that this will help Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) to protect their investments, to compete in the USA and to grow into large companies. This claim is based on references to "evidence" from "studies". However neither the producers of the alleged evidence nor the SMEs themselves have been adequately heard by the European Parliament. This hearing, conducted by the fraction of Greens/EFA, tries to provide the opportunity. 2003/05/08 13:00 BXL Luxemburg Square: Free Ideas for a Free World Free Ideas for a Free World --- Performance and Demonstration on Luxemburg Square beside the European Parliament in Brussels 2003/05/08 BXL 15:00 Dorint: The Economic Impact of Software Patents During this final part of our symposium in the Dorint Hotel near the European Parliament in Brussels, we bring leading software professionals, patent practitioners, economists and politicians from EU and US together to assess the economics of patent portfolios, the use of patents for tax evasion, the impact of patents on standardisation and competition and the prospects of bridging the age-old gap between patent science and patent policy. Major talks will be given by FTC Commissioner Mozille Thompson, Software Entrepreneur and JPEG Standardiser Richard Clark, Software Entrepreneur and Economist Dr. Jean-Paul Smets-Solanes, as well as the scholars Puay Tang (UK), Peter Holmes (UK) and Brian Kahin (US).