🚀 go-pugleaf

>thomas@duteca4.et.tudelft.nl (Thomas Okken) writes:
>> Why weren't the LPF urging a boycott of AT&T when they suddenly decided they
>> owned some vital patent, and started demanding license payments for X?
>> Whenever the Apple boycott is defended, people point out that it's visible
>> and all that, and when the LPF's decision not to sanction AT&T is defended,
>> we hear the good ol' argument that "you can't get them all anyway".

>  first, let's point out something - there is an *important*
>distinction between sending someone a "vaguely threatening letter"
>such as "pay up or get sued" and actually bringing a suit to court.
>AT&T has *not* done the latter, though Apple has.

Sure, AT&T just threated lawsuits which, if filed, would be incredibly
expensive to defend. This, of course, has no chilling effect and doesn't
result in people shying away from things that AT&T might have a patent
on. And, as we all know, Apple has sued anyone developing graphical
user interfaces, not merely a couple companies, because they know that
failing to sue all the other vendors renders them immune to later
challenges. Yeah, right.

>If AT&T *were* to
>actually sue someone, I'd imagine that the FSF would organize a
>boycott of AT&T - at least, I'd be urging them to.

What's the good of waiting until AT&T starts suing people? Failure to
prosecute patent infringement is not a bar to later action, unlike
Apple's case (failure to prosecute either copyright infringement or
breech of license both require prompt action). Failing to boycott
patent-holders such as AT&T, MIT, MIPS, IBM, and a host of others (if
you believe boycotts are a useful step) now means that they get the
benefits of your labors now and can think up yet more things to patent.
Threats of lawsuits, when made by behemoths such at AT&T and IBM, have
plenty of effect without a claim ever crossing the desk of some court
official. Similarly, failure to prosecute a claim (such as Apple's
failure to act on all but 2 GUI's out there) has plenty of legal value
as a defense.

>  Apple provided quite a few people (such as my girlfriend) with an
>easy to use interface to computers - they also put enough weight
>behind it to make it become *imperative* that other vendors supply it
>as well.  For that they deserve thanks and congratulations.

>   They then turn around and try to *prevent* other vendors from
>providing the very thing which they made so *necessary* - the obvious
>logical result being that only Apple's will have GUI's - and everyone
>else will suffer.  For that they deserve to hang.

Apple hasn't tried to "prevent other vendors from providing the very
thing which they made so necessary", they've tried to prevent a few
vendors from stealing work they consider theirs. They _haven't_ tried to
prevent other vendors from providing GUI's. Of course, many people
disagree that Apple has a right to protection on the elements they
claim (I tend to agree with this; there has to be some medium position
between outright theft and overblown copyright protection), and
certainly these elements will be annoying if others cannot put them into
their GUI's, but the idea that somehow an Apple victory will result in
their being no GUI's on other machines, free or proprietary, is a hunk
of nonsense.

--John

--------------------------------------------------------------------------
John L. Coolidge     Internet:coolidge@cs.uiuc.edu   UUCP:uiucdcs!coolidge
Of course I don't speak for the U of I (or anyone else except myself)
Copyright 1991 John L. Coolidge. Copying allowed if (and only if) attributed.
You may redistribute this article if and only if your recipients may as well.