Oh snap! Shutlleworth is calling out the real patent threat

greggh · Post by **greggh** » Mon May 21, 2007 1:29 pm

it's not Microsoft...

http://www.markshuttleworth.com/archives/118

So, Microsoft is not the real patent threat to Linux. The real threat to Linux is the same as the real threat to Microsoft, and that is a patent suit from a person or company that is NOT actually building software, but has filed patents on ideas that the GNU project and Microsoft are equally likely to be implementing.

Yes, Nathan, I’m looking at you!

You go girl!

Kidding aside, I think Marky is pretty off the mark. As much as he wants to defend MS, for what reasons I couldn't guess, it seems clear to me that Mr. Softy is the most immediate and most dangerous threat to FOSS. Great advice Mark, let's stop worrying about the guy in the ski mask pointing the gun at your head now, and concentrate instead on the white collar criminal that might be out there looking to bounce a check on me.

Vogateer · Post by **Vogateer** » Mon May 21, 2007 2:21 pm

I might agree with him. I seriously doubt Microsoft will actually sue. Like many have said, it's much more cost effective to threaten and bully companies to give you money than it is to sue and likely get your patent overturned with the new test of obviousness that the Supreme Court laid down recently.

I would say that the Intellectual Ventures company would be more likely to sue than Microsoft. Just an opinion, and not even a knowledgeable one, but I really doubt Microsoft wants to repeat the SCO lawsuit and risk a Mutually Assured Destruction showdown with other massive patent holders like IBM.

Tsuroerusu · Post by **Tsuroerusu** » Mon May 21, 2007 7:40 pm

Vogateer wrote:I really doubt Microsoft wants to repeat the SCO lawsuit and risk a Mutually Assured Destruction showdown with other massive patent holders like IBM.

Remember though, that SCO's lawsuit was about potential copyright infringements, not patent infringements. Copyright infringements are much much easier to verify, because you just need to look and see whether the code in the Linux kernel is identical to what you might own the copyrights for. Patents would be seeing if the code did something that you patented, like send a packet onto some network.