[Zakeet]

"All your software are belong to us." - Steve Ballmer

Read how in this rather long article.

[RightWhale]

Frankly anybody can write an operating system. Since a patent is on actual code and your code will be different without doubt, home free. Is it possible to disable 95% of this Windows stuff so the computer boots up in less than a cigarette and cup of coffee?

[chiefqc]

Nothing, nothing beat the greed of big business and elected officals, local, state and the greedest of all the ones in the sewer called Washington.

[noblejones]

Wait; you can copyright the “Blue Screen of Death” or having your financial information stolen?

Who knew?

[xcamel]

Ballmer can “bite me”

[raybbr]

computer ping

[goldstategop]

Microsoft: The Borg Of The Software World

"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus

[vbmoneyspender]

At the same time, Smith was having Microsoft's lawyers figure out how many of its patents were being infringed by free and open-source software. Gutierrez refuses to identify specific patents or explain how they're being infringed, lest FOSS advocates start filing challenges to them.

Boy that sounds familiar.

[LexBaird]

This is what happens when the patent system is harnessed to stifle innovation and variety, instead of its intended purpose of rewarding creativity and individual effort.

Patent law is in dire need of reform to cope with the “virtual” products if the information age.

[bvw]

To promote freeze and degrade the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times Forever to Authors and Inventors Bureaucratic Corporations and Lawyers the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries

The Constitution 2007

[KStorm]

Just one more reason for me to jettison XP in favor of another Linux distribution, heh heh heh...

...wonder if I’ll actually pull the trigger, tho’...

[2 Kool 2 Be 4-Gotten]

Methinks the microsoft lady doth protest too much. If what they got is so good they need to bring it, not sing it. Else it’s “This time we’re REALLY going to get mad - so mad we just might sue you”. They got nothing, IMHO.

[Viking2002]

I was just thinking about Windows vs. Linux on my way to a Dell warranty call last week - if Microsoft wanted to keep another dog from whizzing on it's fire hydrant, they should have done something about it ten years ago. Millions of users run Linux now - everywhere. This money grab - and make no mistake, that's what it is - is the very reason why Linux exists. Windows is unstable, bug-prone, and obscenely expensive. Linux isn't. Microsoft knows it, anyone who's used Linux knows it, and now Microsoft is feeling Linux's teeth biting it in the seat of the pants.

I love it.

[RichInOC]

I didn’t realize Microsoft owned Unix. Who knew?

[cloud8]

It seems to me M$ would have to reveal its source code if it wants to prove that Linux has stolen it.

[Cvengr]

Then imprison Bill Gates for violating every state law regarding rendering professional service without a license. Microsoft is the major reason software isn’t signed off upon by registered engineers. When Microsoft went around the law by promoting patent law over professional registration, he molded the industry so that his firm attempts to reclassify public service as a competitive service destroying thousands of professional jobs while creating a monopoly.

MS stole windows from X and UNIX, previously developed by Xeorx Parc but to mention a few.

IMHO, MS set the computer science industry back decades and stifled intellectual achienvement for millions of Americans, while riding the wave of PC software throughout corporate America to create his monopoly/oligopoly.

Considering the amount of lead start MS has held in OS SW, he only has himself to blame for incompetence in leading the market further. Now he has to further leach off of public domain SW created by thousands of unpaid programmers serving the public.

[padre35]

And Ballmer said “I am the Lizard King, I can do anything”

I hope Linux whips their backsides, they need to innovate, not litigate.

[SpaceBar]

Microsoft is now just a legal firm and government lobbying group that happens to sell software and technical support on the side to supplement their corporate income.

[upchuck]

Microsoft, the largest software company in the world, desperate to protect it's shrinking market share, mostly because they haven't really innovated since Windows 2000, decides to take the sleazeball way out and impugn it's competitors.

This paragraph from the article sums up MSFT's problem in a nutshell:

Now that Microsoft had identified the infringements, it could try to seek royalties. But from whom? FOSS [free and open-source software] isn't made by a company but by a loose-knit community of hundreds of individuals and companies. One possibility was to approach the big commercial Linux distributors like Red Hat and Novell that give away the software but sell subscription support services. However, distributors were prohibited from paying patent royalties by something whose very existence may surprise many readers: FOSS's own licensing terms.

Microsoft has long been known to use FUD (fear, uncertainty and doubt) to intimidate its customers. Now Microsoft may be experiencing a little FUD itself. From the article (edited slightly):

... just last month the Supreme Court stated in a unanimous opinion that patents have been issued too readily for the past two decades, and lots are probably invalid. For a variety of technical reasons, many dispassionate observers suspect that software patents are especially vulnerable to court challenge.

IMHO, lots of smoke and mirrors. A nonstarter.

[DenverCossack]

It’s about time this happened! I have been watching this going on for years wondering when the shoe was going to drop. Good for Microsoft! The rest of you sound like a bunch of Walmart whiners.

[goodnesswins]

Didn’t Gates take his “software” from IBM???? Or am I misremembering something.