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“Open source” seeds loosen Big Ag’s grip on farmers

worldsensorium.com

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Re: “Open source” seeds loosen Big Ag’s grip on farmers

#221

Post by dylan604 »

paulmd wrote: post #213
dylan604 wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

or end the offensive/defensive patterns used by modern corporations? someone invents a thing, someone else uses thing for evil. what to do? we ban the thing!!! yes, of course, that's the solution. don't punish the one that did the evil.

the federal reserve doesn't think there's empirical evidence that patents have positive societal benefits and they think there are very empirical and measurable harms. https://research.stlouisfed.org/wp/more/2012-035 this isn't "generally good thing that some people abuse", this is the entire patent system is fundamentally not producing any explicable benefits and significant measurable harm , there is no reason to k…

[flagged]

Re: “Open source” seeds loosen Big Ag’s grip on farmers

#222

Post by digitallyfree »

There are two interesting things here from a legal perspective.

1. Licensing works on the commercial seeds because they are patented, and thus the company that makes those seeds can dictate license terms on the farmers. As far as I can tell, these open seeds are not patented and thus their creators can't really impose license terms on the buyers unless they sign a contract before sale. That would be treated solely under contract law, not patent/copyright law.

2. Apparently these seeds use some sort of shrink-wrap license agreement as quoted below, which attempts to form the contract agreement mentioned in #1.

"The license is printed on every OSS seed package in Europe. Whoever opens an OSS package agrees to never patent these seeds or future breeding of them."

Considering the general dislike for/legal questionably behind shrink-wrap agreements, this sounds like a very poor way to enforce the OSS license. Also it is uncertain how valid this agreement is unless the seeds are patented (in that case the buyer's OSS rights can be granted via patent license terms).

Re: “Open source” seeds loosen Big Ag’s grip on farmers

#223

Post by outworlder »

Vt71fcAqt7 wrote: post #129
SQueeeeeL wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Patents are still being used to protect smaller companies from much larger corporations. Allowing these large corporations to legally ignore patents will only make things worse for the rest of us. Truly small operations don't have the bandwidth or resources to even file for a patent. So it's pretty much only medium sized companies or those with the backing of powerful groups who take advantage of the patent system.

The data are readily available.[0] It seems that small businesses actually can file patents. Even small teams and individuals can file patents, and do. I fact, patents per employee seemingly decreases as company size increases. [0] https://cdn.advocacy.sba.gov/wp-content/uploads/2022/09/1309...

While that's true, have you tried? It's a full time job.

Re: “Open source” seeds loosen Big Ag’s grip on farmers

#224

Post by ProjectArcturis »

randomdata wrote: post #95
ProjectArcturis wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the case being discussed, the neighboring farmer had not signed any agreement with the vendor.

Yup. That’s what the other comment said…

So why did you imply he had signed a contract?

Re: “Open source” seeds loosen Big Ag’s grip on farmers

#225

Post by shuntress »

saalweachter wrote: post #87
andruby wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I didn't know about hybrid seeds: "In agriculture and gardening, hybrid seed is produced by deliberately cross-pollinated plants which are genetically diverse" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hybrid_seed

They're also a huge pain in the ass to produce, at least in my experience. Producing hybrid corn seeds, for instance, is done by planting the two varieties in the same field, with one combine-width of rows of variety A alternating with rows of variety B. Then you need to wait until variety A is grown and ready to tassel, and de-tassel it before those tassels fully form and release the pollen that drifts onto the corn…

Isn't the point of GMO technology that you can use it to accomplish this "in the lab" rather than in the field?

Re: “Open source” seeds loosen Big Ag’s grip on farmers

#227

Post by danuker »

shuntress wrote: post #225
saalweachter wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They're also a huge pain in the ass to produce, at least in my experience. Producing hybrid corn seeds, for instance, is done by planting the two varieties in the same field, with one combine-width of rows of variety A alternating with rows of variety B. Then you need to wait until variety A is grown and ready to tassel, and de-tassel it before those tassels fully form and release the pollen that drifts onto the corn…

Isn't the point of GMO technology that you can use it to accomplish this "in the lab" rather than in the field?

I'd be fine with GMO if it weren't for the pesticides that come with it.

https://nutritionfacts.org/video/is-monsantos-roundup-pestic...

> But pure glyphosate isn’t sprayed on crops, Roundup is, which contains a variety of adjuvants and surfactants meant to help the glyphosate penetrate into tissues. And indeed when the study was repeated with what’s actually sprayed on GMO crops, there were toxic and hormonal effects even at doses smaller than the 1 or 2% concentration that’s used out on the fields.

> Roundup was found to be 100 times more toxic than glyphosate itself. Moreover, Roundup turned out to be among the most toxic pesticide they tested.

Re: “Open source” seeds loosen Big Ag’s grip on farmers

#229

Post by wahern »

photochemsyn wrote: post #79

This is interesting, why can licenses like GNU GPL3.0 be enforced in US courts but not for new plant varieties? > "Legally, Open Source Seeds (OSS) in Europe works slightly differently because of EU seed protection laws. While in the US the OSSI pledge would be hard to enforce if challenged in court, Johannes Kotschi, the founder of OSS Germany, went with an open source licensing model. The license is printed on ever…

> why can licenses like GNU GPL3.0 be enforced in US courts but not for new plant varieties?

I don't know enough to be able to address your question directly, but it's worth nothing that at least in the U.S. IP protections for plant breeding and propagation are often highly specialized, both in terms of how patents operate as well as extending to non-patent regimes. See, e.g., https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plant_Variety_Protection_Act_o... and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plant_Patent_Act_of_1930

Re: “Open source” seeds loosen Big Ag’s grip on farmers

#230

Post by [deleted] »

adamc wrote: post #40
ed25519FUUU wrote: post #37

Article really lacks specifics. The reason so much of the USA grows “patented” seeds is because they’re created specifically to be sprayed with herbicide and not die. There’s no alternative to to patented seeds without making fundamental changes to agriculture practices. Hybrid seeds are also different than open-pollinated in that the children do not grow true to parent. Even if we removed the patents, they wouldn’t…

Certainly there are alternatives. The Congress could make it impossible to patent seeds or other organisms. They haven't, for reasons involving philosophy, money, and perhaps the deep corruption Citizens United has spawned. They probably won't. But alternatives do exist.

[deleted]
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