Submitted by wftl on Tue, 2007-05-22 11:29
Want to get sued by Microsoft? Then read on. At the end of this post, you'll have your opportunity. By now, you've no doubt heard the story that Microsoft claims that Linux and FOSS violates at least 235 of their patents. Once again, Microsoft innnovates through intimidation and litigation. Does anyone really think they'll come clean as to which patents Linux supposedly violates? To quote Ballmer, "What's fair is fair." Well, fair comes with a price, even for the mega-rich like Mr. Ballmer. If he honestly means what he says, that is. In that corner wherein our wildest imagination wanders about, can we even begin to conceive that Microsoft might allow their closed source to be examined for the patents it might violate?
Among my favorite lines in the article is "The Redmond behemoth asserts that one reason free software is of such high quality is that it violates more than 200 of Microsoft's patents." In other words, only commercial software could be of high quality so if free software is good, it must have stolen from non-free software. If it's got to be commercial to be good, then you have to wonder what their excuse is for putting out so much crap.
Well, Christian Einfeldt, over at the Digital Tipping Point, has thrown down the virtual gauntlet and started an online petition where signees request that Microsoft sue them first. Or to put it another way, "Hey, Microsoft! Put up or shut up!" To add your name to Christian's list, head over to his Sue me first Microsoft list.
Re: Sue Me First, Microsoft!
Sounds just like SCO to me.
"only commercial software could be of high quality so if free software is good, it must have stolen from non-free software."
What a load of crap! Why can't they admit that there are lots of capable programmers that want to develop applications and are generous enough to give them away for free?
Re: Sue Me First, Microsoft
This sounds nuts to me. My understanding of a patent is that it is a monopoly that is granted for a period of time in exchange for disclosure. The idea being that others then will be able to build upon the technology of the patent and produce even better technology. It sounds to me like Microsoft is getting both the monopoly and the ability to keep the technology as a trade secret. They should not be able to have it both ways. I should think that a good patent attorney would be able to tear them to pieces on this.
Microsoft's patent threat is
Microsoft's patent threat is another example of the truth of Franklin Delano Roosevelt's saying that the only thing to fear is fear itself. Here's why: First, Microsoft has succeeded as a company because they have mostly refined the innovations that other companies pioneered. So Microsoft has some major problems with "prior art" and "obviousness" defenses to its patent claims. Second, the creators of GNU and Linux were inspired by Unix, not Windows, and Unix is much older than Windows. Again, prior art and obviousness defenses. Third, Microsoft once actually sold Unix licenses, called Xenix (which they licensed from SCO), but Microsoft later abandoned Xenix in favor of Windows NT, which would indicate (to me, at least) that the ideas for Microsoft's Windows-related patents are probably quite different technology from Xenix. Fourth, our beloved friend SCO actually owned Xenix, and you know that if they could have asserted patent claims against GNU Linux they would have done so. Maybe SCO never patented Xenix. We'll have to wait to see how this wiki page gets edited by people more knowledgeable in this area.
Fifth, and perhaps most important, Linus Torvalds emailed InformationWeek's Charlie Babcock claiming that most of the important innovations pertaining to operating system functions lost patent protection long ago, because most of the basic operating system theory was pretty much done by the 1960s. The Slashdot discussion of this last point can be found by clicking here.
Sixth, IT lawyer Andy Updegrove has said that he is not all that impressed with Microsoft's patent claims. The Slashdot discussion for that story can be found by clicking here.
Okay, reason number seven. Eben Moglen, the lawyer who wrote the GPL with Richard Stallman, says that Novell has tricked Microsoft into shooting down its own patent claims against GNU Linux users. Heh. This is really funny if it is true. Here's how it works: remember when Microsoft agreed to distribute those SuSE GNU Linux coupons? Well, those coupons have no expiration date, so if even one person uses one of those coupons to get SuSE GNU Linux distros after the GPL 3 goes into effect in July, BINGO, Microsoft is covered by the GPL 3, and its patent claims against any user of GNU Linux are dead. Pamela Jones and her Groklaw team has picked up this coupon story, as has Slashdot and Digg.
Number eight: Speaking of Eben Moglen also believes that Microsoft will not sue because suing is expensive and commits Microsoft to a course of action that is unpredictable. And so, Eben says, it is much easier to continually issue vague patent threats in the media. But those threats have strength only so long as they remain unchallenged. The light of an actual patent trial will clear away the shadows of doubt.
Number nine: Micheal Dell said publicly on 12 October 2007 that Microsoft's patent threats have not hurt sales of Linux computers, in this ZDNet article by Tom Espiner:
Claims made by Microsoft that Linux violates its software patent have not affected sales of Linux-based hardware, according to Michael Dell. Speaking to ZDNet.co.uk at the Gartner Symposium/ITxpo in Orlando on Thursday, Dell's chief executive officer said his company has seen Linux uptake for servers increase faster than Windows server products, despite Microsoft's claims. "On the server side Linux continues to grow nicely, a bit faster than Windows," said Dell. "We're seeing a move to Linux in critical applications, and Linux migration has not slowed down."
So apparently, Microsoft is just going to have to try harder if it wants to scare people away from buying GNU Linux computers. Thus far, its patent threats are not gaining a lot of credibility among end purchasers of Dell computers.
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Caballos
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