杏吧原创

RETURNING to school for a refresher course in biotechnology, becomes alarmed when each concept is presented along with a corporate logo and ownership claim. Here鈥檚 a technique, her professor tells her: expression of proinsulin in E. coli 鈥� 鈥渙wned鈥� by Hoechst and Eli Lilly. And here鈥檚 another: expression of mini-proinsulin in S. cerevisae 鈥� 鈥渙wned鈥� by Novo Nordisk.

Hope鈥檚 fellow students are focused on careers in the corporate world, a focus that seems to overshadow any wonder about science itself. She contrasts this state of affairs to that of free software development, an area that earlier caught her fancy when she heard a talk by free software guru . In the world of free software, freedom and openness are defining principles of a new model of social organisation involving collaboration between peers and a 鈥渂azaar鈥�-style production model without formal hierarchies.

In , Hope attempts to apply the principles of free software to biotechnology. The book is centred on what she refers to as the 鈥渋rresistible analogy鈥� between the two fields. But while the analogy works some of the time, at other times it is strained. It works best in asking how a research community can use licensing strategies to protect scientific knowledge from enclosure by corporate interests. It is least persuasive in providing a business model for new drug development.

The open source software movement is built on innovative intellectual property licences. The most influential is the Free Software Foundation鈥檚 . GPL grants a 鈥渃opyleft鈥� licence that allows people to take freely shared software code and modify it, so long as they make their modified version freely available under the same GPL terms.

Can a GPL-style licensing strategy protect biotechnology research from proprietary controls? Hope reports on efforts to do just that, and the frustrations that accompany them. The , for example, rejected a restrictive licensing strategy and made important genomic information publicly available, but now faces increasing threats from an explosion of patents that limit the rights of researchers to use that information. The International cataloguing common human genetic variants employed a copyleft-type clause that prohibited users from patenting their data, but ultimately abandoned this approach because it led to difficulties when trying to incorporate the project鈥檚 data into other genomic databases.

Among the core difficulties in adopting the software model to biotechnology is the nature of the rights themselves. Unlike lines of software code, data doesn鈥檛 qualify for copyright protection so, at least in the US, it can鈥檛 be both public and protected. Inventions can be patented and licensed, but that is costly.

Even if one could design legal strategies to 鈥渃opyleft鈥� biotechnology, would it, or should it, catch on? There is a tension between a researcher鈥檚 desire for freedom to operate and his or her need to ensure financial returns for investors, and this has to be resolved before the principles of free software can be applied to biotechnology. As long as proprietary control ensures investors鈥� returns, it will be difficult to stop researchers and companies from legally enclosing medical knowledge. Wishing it were not so isn鈥檛 enough. One has to explain where the money will come from, and Hope only hints at some solutions.

鈥淭here鈥檚 a tension between researchers and private investors鈥�

More government grants, for instance, might help, but there has to be space for competition and private-sector decision-making. Hope cites a proposal by Tim Hubbard and myself for the creation of 鈥渃ompetitive intermediaries鈥�, privately managed R&D outfits that invest in open source projects. They would be financed by contributions from individuals and companies, who would be required by law to pay into the fund of their choice. Separately, many are calling for a vastly to replace marketing monopolies as the source of income for drug developers.

So can the lessons of open source software be applied to biotechnology? The answer is a qualified yes. There is much to be learned and replicated from the free software field, but the differences are also important. Are we on the verge of an open source revolution? If not a revolution, surely a growing rebellion. Hope gives us food for thought on the possibilities.