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Jonathan Roberts wrote: > Yeah, I know this comes up from time to time and it may well never > happen, but there's an interesting article over at Forbes business > week: > > http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune_archive/2007/05/28/100033867/ > > It's long. It's about patents and it's actually a pretty good read. In > my opinion, or what I've read so far, they paint free software in a > very favourable light and I think suggest that if Microsoft were to > sue over patent infringement free software stands a good chance of > winning any such case... > > Best, > > Jon I came across this post on a blog concerning this issue: ******** Mutual Assured Destruction Submitted by Anonymous visitor on Wed, 2006-11-22 18:13. While Microsoft is and has produced a great deal of FUD about patent infringement, it is unlikely that they will actually initiate any action against users or even developers. Large companies tend to use their portfolios of software patents as defensive weapons. They use their portfolios to sign cross-licensing deals with each other as a method of self-defense. This leaves the little guys out in the cold, but even then it would be unwise for someone like MS to go after the little guys, because even they may have a patent or two up their sleeves,and MS stands to loose more than they would gain. The real threat is from patent firms, companies that produce nothing but acquire intellectual property. They have no products and therfore do not infringe on anyone elses patents, thus no counter-claims are possible to keep them in check. Should MS start suing individual open source developer/users, they would most likely unleash a flood of patent lawsuits and counter-claims against MS filed by those same developers. MS has historically faired poorly in patent lawsuits having to cough up millions to other firms. If big software business thought things all the way through they would realize that software patents are the industry's version of mutual assured destruction (MAD), and like nuclear weapons, its not big guys you have to fear, its the little guys. The only real solution is complete disarmament, get rid of software patents. ******** from http://www.freesoftwaremagazine.com/polls/how_long_will_microsoft_wait_before_suing -- The Mailing List for the Devon & Cornwall LUG http://mailman.dclug.org.uk/listinfo/list FAQ: http://www.dcglug.org.uk/linux_adm/list-faq.html