Hey drop us a line about the show. Feel free to ask questions, provide feedback and criticism, or just ramble on about anything your little heart desires.
Moderators: snarkout, Patrick, dann
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greggh
- Posts: 1036
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- Location: Brooklyn, NY USA
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by greggh » Mon Dec 11, 2006 9:46 pm
http://lxer.com/module/newswire/view/76270/index.html
Patents in the software industry are like patents in many other industries – innovations can be protected through patents that then provide a basis for licensing those innovations to others. Microsoft’s extensive patent portfolio has allowed for significant license agreements with other industry innovators, including: Novell, Cisco Systems, HP, SGI, Xerox, SAP and Siemens. These agreements permit the parties to cross-pollinate their development efforts with each others’ patented innovations, which results in making key innovations more broadly available across varying technologies.
One of the benefits of patent agreements is that they allow freedom of action now and in the future.
See, software patents are really all about freedom and the ability to innovate. And I foolishly thought it had just the opposite effect. I'm glad Microsoft cleared that up for me.
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metrolinux
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by metrolinux » Mon Dec 11, 2006 11:33 pm
See, software patents are really all about freedom and the ability to innovate. And I foolishly thought it had just the opposite effect. I'm glad Microsoft cleared that up for me.
Made it as clear as tar
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KStorm
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by KStorm » Tue Dec 12, 2006 6:42 pm
Patents in the software industry are like patents in many other industries – innovations can be protected through patents that then provide a basis for licensing those innovations to others. Microsoft’s extensive patent portfolio has allowed for significant license agreements with other industry innovators, including: Novell, Cisco Systems, HP, SGI, Xerox, SAP and Siemens. These agreements permit the parties to cross-pollinate their development efforts with each others’ patented innovations, which results in making key innovations more broadly available across varying technologies.
What a mouthful.
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dann
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by dann » Wed Dec 13, 2006 2:29 pm
What I keep reading time and again is some many people accusing Novell of violating section 7 of the GPLv2 and implying there is patent/ip infringment against MS by Linux. Then Novell says they do not state this, which is true, because nothing is specifically identified as infringing. So they can say the convenant is for Novell products not associated with Linux and MS products as they do not need to reveal any specifics of the details, or for that matter probably even list specifics in the legal filings.
Then MS comes out of the gate saying hey, Linux violates our IP, Linux users have an account balance overdue with MS. So this implies there is infringement and thus the deal would violate gplv7; but Novell begs to differ.
It's all smoke and mirrors it seems. I believe Novell when they say they wanted to provide their customers with "Peace of Mind." I think in their research these problems came out and they wanted to provide a solution. I in no way agree with their solution and think they jumped the gun. Instead of trying to fix the core problem they just tried to throw a tarp over it. In a fashion, they wanted to make "one fast dime instead of two slow nickels."
It was only a matter of time before some company did something like this; as it is only a matter of time before another company tries to flex it's patent muscles and brings the whole system crashing down. While I dislike the agreement Novell has made with regards to the covenant; at least this brings to light some issues that need addressing and Linux as a whole can start moving forward a lot faster as we weed through these issues properly.
