[E. Pluribus Unum]

Is anybody out there in Washington starting to realize that copyrights and patents are just a thinly-disguised mechanism for a few cartels of lawyers to own everything, and that if this is allowed to continue the advancement of technology will be completely thwarted, except in China where they pay no attention to such nonsense anyway?

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[MineralMan]

"Web developers face the possibility of having to significantly rewrite their pages or strip them of commonly used technologies like Macromedia's Flash."

Easy for me. I don't use anything but pure HTML on my pages. You can view my site using any version of any browser. I wouldn't have it any other way.

[MineralMan]

Wrong Headline. It should read:

Eolas Wants Microsoft to Buy Them

Silliness.

[Saturnalia]

Yes, but what about the REST of Rohan?

/nerd

[HAL9000]

Lueck said Eolas would still permit Microsoft to distribute IE as is, as long as it's being used in conjunction with an application provider or a corporate intranet that has an Eolas plug-in licence.

Corporate intranet users don't need to buy a license. Microsoft has agreed to pay the full legal bills of all their customers. Just keep using the old Internet Explorer and send the bill to Microsoft.

[Bloody Sam Roberts]

Eolas wants Microsoft to stop browser distribution

Awww...he's just a little guy. Microsoft shouldn't worry about him.

[HiTech RedNeck]

Knock Knock Nick!

I just saw a little article in the IEEE Spectrum that says the Eolas patent is an encumbrance on "all" browsers not just IE. Netscape would be affected, as would a number of niche and freeware browsers (everything except lynx I guess). Tim Berners-Lee, Mr. World Wide Web himself, has been trying to persuade the US Patent Office to rescind the Eolas patent, pointing out a similar implementation by one of the W3C employees that allegedly predates Eolas. This sounds potentially much more hugh and series than the SCO-Linux wrangle, because the size of the potentially affected population is so much greater, yet a search on "Eolas" comes up with only one item on FR, this one.

[Nick Danger]

filed a motion to permanently stop Microsoft distributing Internet Explorer browsers that infringe the patent

I don't think they will get this. Or if they do, it will be quashed quickly by some appeals court. Such an order would effectively halt PC shipments. Dell and HP would be ruined by it. Intel and AMD would be next, along with a lot of retailers. There are monetary remedies available to the court that do not severely punish innocent third parties.

[antaresequity]

I have a software technology patent application on file with the USPTO...and as small guy who has tried to sell or revenue share the technology, the heavy hitters seemed determined to just steal the idea despite the NDA's and agreements we sign.

The most common line I get from the big boys is: "No we won't pay you for your idea or do a revenue split as a value added service, BUT...we will give you fat 6 figure contract to code it in for us if and only if you sign over any claim you have or believe you have to 'YOUR' technology..."

Thats what I call a rock and a hard place.

I thank god that the little guy like me can have somthing to try and hang his hat on. Its not a patent yet, but if it does become one, any of these big fish will be taken to court fast.

[Peelod]

I think burst.com is trying to do the same thing regarding streaming/bursting video in Windows Media Player 9.

FR had a thread on the topic a few months ago.