Update: Microsoft wants royalties for open-source software

Computer World ^ | 5-14-07 | Eric Lai and Sumner Lemon

[Anti-Bubba182]

May 13, 2007 (Computerworld) -- Microsoft Corp. on Sunday confirmed reports that it reportedly believes open-source software users owe the company royalties on 235 alleged patent violations.

In an interview with Fortune magazine, Brad Smith, Microsoft's general counsel, and Horacio Gutierrez, the company's vice president of intellectual property and licensing, said open-souce software, including Linux, violates 235 Microsoft patents. And Microsoft wants distributors and users of open-souce software to start paying royalties for these alleged violations.

"This is not a case of some accidental, unknowing infringement. ...There is an overwhelming number of patents being infringed," Gutierrez said.

Microsoft executives in Singapore were not immediately available to comment on the article.

However, according to in an e-mail received by Computerworld late Sunday night, a Microsoft spokesman said the company was motivated to speak over concerns that the latest draft of the General Public License version 3, which governs distribution and use of Linux and many other open-source software, "attempts to tear down the bridge between proprietary and open source technology that Microsoft has worked to build with the industry and customers."

"The Free Software Foundation’s efforts with GPLv3 while not harming existing contracts can harm the desired interoperability and open exchange that we have increasingly seen between proprietary and open source over the past several years," he wrote........"

[Anti-Bubba182]

This should be lively.

[kinoxi]

If they own. Give it to them.

[Paladin2]

M$ owes me tens of thousands for all the buggy, overpriced stuff I’ve waited days, weeks, months to get working and rebooted.

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

Isn’t Dell being sued by new York for less,,,,?

[randog]

In keeping with current mega-corp patent practices, MS probably patented “Use of Air Within a Computing Device”.

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

Meant post #4 for your comments at post #3.

[HarmlessLovableFuzzball]

Google needs to hurry up with their secret OS project.

[Kimmers]

Of course M-soft is not responsible if it takes your computer to hell and back once you have installed their latest software and or updates.

[mylife]

Im sick of MS throwing their weight around

[Anti-Bubba182]

I hope it is a good one. It must be very tough to do. I doubt MS would deliberately make an OS as buggy and unstable as some of theirs are.

[DJtex]

Microsoft must really be afraid of Linux. First they prop up SCO in it’s lawsuit against Linux and IBM. That isn’t working, so now they announce that their billions could be used in legal fees against the GPU. I wouldn’t bet against them—they’ll get the best justice that money can buy.

[Dinsdale]

Update: Dinsdale wants an Enzo and three hot very limber girls (for a menage-a-quatrovalvae).

I expect I'll be getting them about the same time MS gets anything for this FUD.

[Anti-Bubba182]

It is too bad it works that way, but money rule. IMO the SCO
deal was a total scam. Those shysters should be in jail.

[Notforprophet]

Ha HA! I suspect you're right about that!

NFP

[Logophile]

Update: Microsoft wants royalties for open-source software

And my daughter wants a pony.

[surely_you_jest]

This just redemonstrates a time-honored axiom in the tech world - “When innovation fails, it is time to resort to litigation.”

It keeps small armies of lawyers fully occupied, and covers their country club dues. Spoken by one who has been there, and done that . . . .

[familyop]

It was bound to happen sooner or later. The Berkeley (BSD) license is great for business. BSD operating systems are great for customizing (with your own closed source code) and selling. The viral GPL/LGPL in Linux systems was not and is not.

Some BSD systems also have much more stable kernels and userland software than does Linux. I installed and ran FreeBSD recently, and even it is too Linux-ized. Although a stable version, it left piles of core all over the place--not something that I see with NetBSD. ...once worked with Debian Linux, but the noisy commies drove me out (not to mention all of the lockups and zombie processes). OpenBSD is very stable and secure, too, but its leadership is somewhat anti-American (DARPA even dropped a contract because of anti-American comments from its founder).

[nickcarraway]

Would they be satified with a percentage?

[familyop]

"He went on to claim that the Open Office application suite violates 45 patents..."

BTW, that's a Sun Microsystems project. Microsoft is stepping into a hole with that accusation. ...probably another anti-trust swamp, sooner or later. There's nothing wrong with writing filters for changing certain file formats into other formats.

And there are very large numbers of people and organizations (businesses, defense, schools, etc.) already using OpenOffice.org. It's a great office package, and nothing's wrong with making such a great suite (2.0 and after) for the everyday admin. office tasks and distributing it for free (or very small fees for the bells and whistles of the StarOffice commercial version).

And yes, there is a great office admin. package for UNIX systems.

[Duke Nukum]

Why don’t they just withdraw Vista. Apologize. And put out an OS people want that is actually usable?

It seems like a lot less effort then this.