Linked by Thom Holwerda on Fri 8th Jun 2007 15:01 UTC, submitted by AdministratorX
In its second such agreement this week, Microsoft has struck a deal under which it will extend amnesty to a company that's using what the software maker claims is patented Microsoft intellectual property embedded in the open source Linux computer operating system. Under a deal with LG Electronics, disclosed late Wednesday, Microsoft will forgo any Linux-related patent claims against the South Korean electronics manufacturer. In return, Microsoft will gain access to certain intellectual property produced by LG.
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Member since:
2005-11-15
Microsoft does not want to show its hands, as it would mean nothing for must of the OSS community. Think. If there were offending non trivial, non prior art and enforceable in court patents on their hands the code/paradigm in question could, in theory, be changed without too much effort. Remember that most, if not all, of the computer interface that could really affect users have already come to age these days. The rest could be replaced, right? I think not so easy.
MS had worked with hardware vendors for years on interface specifications, drivers technology and so on. That is where I think they are planning to get legs and why they are going after hardware guys, they need control where it can hurt and is not that old.
And all in all, if you are a computer hardware company and want to sell your products to ~= 90 of the market you better work with them. And in this case you really can not afford to see your sales be blocked by litigation, don't you?
I expect to see more hardware vendors inking deals. It is disgusting, but it is real life.