[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

FRom Groklaw:

Novell Speaks - Updated

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Monday, November 20 2006 @ 08:34 PM EST

Novell has posted a letter to the community. Here's, to me, the heart of it:

Our interest in signing this agreement was to secure interoperability and joint sales agreements, but Microsoft asked that we cooperate on patents as well, and so a patent cooperation agreement was included as a part of the deal. In this agreement, Novell and Microsoft each promise not to sue the other's customers for patent infringement. The intended effect of this agreement was to give our joint customers peace of mind that they have the full support of the other company for their IT activities. Novell has a significant patent portfolio, and in reflection of this fact, the agreement we signed shows the overwhelming balance of payments being from Microsoft to Novell.

Since our announcement, some parties have spoken about this patent agreement in a damaging way, and with a perspective that we do not share. We strongly challenge those statements here.

We disagree with the recent statements made by Microsoft on the topic of Linux and patents. Importantly, our agreement with Microsoft is in no way an acknowledgment that Linux infringes upon any Microsoft intellectual property. When we entered the patent cooperation agreement with Microsoft, Novell did not agree or admit that Linux or any other Novell offering violates Microsoft patents.

Our stance on software patents is unchanged by the agreement with Microsoft....In closing, we wish to be extremely clear that Novell is committed to protecting, preserving and promoting freedom for free and open source software. We recognize that the community of open source developers is essential to all our activities in Linux, and we welcome dialog with the community as to how we can continue to work together toward these common goals.

Ron Hovsepian
Chief Executive Officer
Novell, Inc.

In that case, with all due respect, you should not have signed an agreement called a patent cooperation agreement that gives Microsoft the opportunity to say the things Mr. Ballmer has been saying. I believe that is obvious now. He didn't even wait until the ink was dry. And you should have considered the GPL, its importance to the community, and considered what paying royalties means in that context. And we hope you will fix this.

Update: Microsoft has now responded. You can read it in full on David Berlind's blog. It's a very odd response:

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

fyi

[EternalVigilance]

Trying very hard to understand all of this.

Bottom line, the way I'm reading all of this, is that Microsoft is laying claim to patents for code that is within Linux, without ever being specific about what exact code that might be...and is trying by any means to muscle in on controlling Linux over the long haul. Am I close?

[Golden Eagle]

Novell is now caught between a rock and a hard place, on one hand they're so broke they had to go into an agreement with Microsoft simply for the dollars, on the other hand their primary customer base is so anti-Microsoft they could be destroyed anyway. Bottom line, another American Unix company pays the piper for involving themselves with Linux and open source. Sun, Silicon Graphics, SCO, Cray, Novell, the list continues to grow of companies who are now shadows of their former selves. Even IBM is about to be passed by HP as the world's largest computer company. Microsoft? Still leading in profits, at record levels most every quarter.

[bigdcaldavis]

Novell has sold its soul to Satan himself.