Microsoft has said it will not sue Linux users with regards to the company's patent claims. "We're not litigating. If we wanted to we would have done so years ago," said Horacio Gutierrez, Microsoft's VP for intellectual property and licensing, in an interview. When asked for a reply regarding the claim of Microsoft that the Linux kernel infringes 42 of its patents, Linus Torvalds replied: "Can you get a list of which ones? Before that, it's just FUD, and there's not a whole lot I can say or do. Is there prior art? Are they trivial and obvious to one skilled in the art? Would we need to work around them? We don't know, because all I've heard so far is just FUD. If MS actually wanted us to not infringe their patents, they'd tell us. Since they don't, that must mean that they actually prefer the FUD."
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Member since:2005-08-18
"which is an indeterminate number of users of FLOSS are also occasionally developers thereof."
Right but that does not automagically make you the manufacturer or make you responsible for the product. Many companies have contests and such where you can voice your ideas on how to make their products better. If they accept my ideas does that make me responsible for their product? No. The fact that you contribute to something does not make you responsible for it.
Granted this analogy isn't a 100% match but it's serviceable.
This raises another interesting question though: exactly who IS responsible for Linux?
Edited 2007-05-16 13:43
Member since:2005-11-11
Right but that does not automagically make you the manufacturer or make you responsible for the product.
And I'm not saying that. My original post simply states that someone who eats a Big Mac is a little different than someone who uses and makes changes to software and sometimes sends it upstream. Please people if you read more into that statement than is there, it came from you. Don't blame me for it.
Member since:2007-02-17
"This raises another interesting question though: exactly who IS responsible for Linux?"
A large corporation with a titular head is not the only model for running a business or enterprise.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Co-operative
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consumers%27_cooperative
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rochdale_Principles
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Collective
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_ownership
Edited 2007-05-16 13:58
Member since:2007-02-17
{Stop blindly reacting to what I am saying like it's an attack on FLOSS, and read it for what it is: me saying that users of Linux sometimes act in a limited capacity as developers.}
What you don't express is, what is special about developers?
I am co-developing a bit of code right now, as it turns out. I think of a method to do what I want, to fix the problem I'm having, I get it coded & compiled and then test it out. I even bone up on the topic using (say) Wikipedia sometimes when I'm not quite sure of the math.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coefficient_of_lift
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drag_equation
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moment_of_inertia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cross_product
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geographic_coordinate_system
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Navigation
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gps
It is just math. It is in the textbooks. There is no secret to it.
I put the math into the computer source code. At the end of the exercise, a copy of the source code will go to my customer.
This makes me so different from other people doing their job ... exactly how?
Why should I get to rip people off and threaten other people with lawsuits if they happen to do the same task next year as I did today?
Edited 2007-05-16 14:50
Member since:2007-02-22
[i]I put the math into the computer source code. At the end of the exercise, a copy of the source code will go to my customer.
This makes me so different from other people doing their job ... exactly how?[i]
The scenarios you mention above doesn't apply (and is unlikely to happen in real-world scenarios), as you are just copying the work of others. And, like you said, it's in the textbooks; it's common knowledge and public domain (with the possible exception of GPS), owned by no-one. If you had created something new, then patent law could be applicable.
Any good coder is closer to an inventor or an artist than they are to a McDonald's fry chef. That should be enormously evident.
Member since:
2005-11-11
Me: ... one has to admit a user of Linux isn't the same as a consumer of a Big Mac. (With FLOSS you have) the freedom to make changes. I bet lots of companies make changes in the source code, and some probably donate it back (making) the line between developers and users is a bit blurred.
you: So you are saying that it is silly to sue a consumer for buying a Big Mac, but look out anyone who buys an electric frying pan from Wallmart?
What the .. Way to put words in my mouth that aren't at all similar to what I actually said.
Fark's sake how do you make that leap? I'd lump the idea of buying a frying pan in with buying a Big Mac. Same thing. The eater of the Big Mac and the user of the frying pan have no part in the creation thereof. I still say users of FLOSS are different from both both of those examples. People who use Linux often make changes to it and donate the changes back. How the hell do you go from "the line between users and developers is a little blurred with FLOSS" to buying a frying pan?
Is your next counterexample going to be something equally nonapplicable? Maybe you'll throw out a strawman like "so you think Ford could sue Chevy users if Chevy drivers if Chevy infringes on Ford patents?" If you do that, you will again be missing the point of my original post, which is an indeterminate number of users of FLOSS are also occasionally developers thereof in the sense that they edit code and send it upstream.
I don't think this opens them to litigation, assuming they aren't violating patents in patches they send upstream; even then it's a question of whether they or upstream are liable since upstream is responsible for applying the patch or not. Of course that is assuming the patent is valid (even though the very existence of software patents is IMHO a travesty). Stop blindly reacting to what I am saying like it's an attack on FLOSS, and read it for what it is: me saying that users of Linux sometimes act in a limited capacity as developers.
Edited 2007-05-16 13:45