Article View: nz.comp
Article #641Re: Are Microsoft’s patent lawyers really this dumb?
From: Kurt Häusler
Date: Sun, 08 Jul 2007 08:21
Date: Sun, 08 Jul 2007 08:21
22 lines
2739 bytes
2739 bytes
On Sun, 08 Jul 2007 19:15:48 +1200, Jonathan Walker wrote: > Any person who distributes GPL3 code cannot subsequently sue the recipient > of that code - or anybody else - for any alleged patent violations because > the GPL3 requires that or else that person is in violation of the license > which is the only right that person has to distribute that software. Interesting. I am involved quite a bit in interoperability and the legal issues are quickly making the technical issues seem trivial in comparison. I am a bit worried myself as I used to work for a company writing open source linux drivers (but not in the kernel or any distros) implementing patented protocols and algorithms with permission, under the gpl2 (or any later version), just trying to do the right thing, currently I and a couple of others are still distributing them (and won't be suing anyone for using it!). I think the patents have since been sold. Who knows what the legal consequences are, it might be a good idea to stop distributing them, which seems somewhat counter to the goals of software freedom to me. On the other hand, I like the idea of protecting the users (and other coders) from patent lawsuits so updating the gpl to version 3 seems tempting too but is it my right to do so?
Technical Details
Message-ID:
<wb-dneCodtcaAw3bnZ2dnUVZ8qfinZ2d@giganews.com>Path:
arc1-ca.pugleaf.net!g2news1.google.com!news2.google.com!border1.nntp.dca.giganews.com!nntp.giganews.com!local01.nntp.dca.giganews.com!news.giganews.com.POSTED!not-for-mailReferences:
<46900857@clear.net.nz> <wb-dneGodtc46g3bnZ2dnUVZ8qfinZ2d@giganews.com> <46908f24@clear.net.nz>Show Full Headers
Complete Article Headers
X-Google-Thread: 106e5e,8608b9ce64e03000 X-Google-Thread: 1025b4,ad5699f01d74f4e3,start X-Google-Attributes: gid106e5e,gid1025b4,public,usenet X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII-7-bit Path: arc1-ca.pugleaf.net!g2news1.google.com!news2.google.com!border1.nntp.dca.giganews.com!nntp.giganews.com!local01.nntp.dca.giganews.com!news.giganews.com.POSTED!not-for-mail NNTP-Posting-Date: Sun, 08 Jul 2007 03:21:26 -0500 From: Kurt Häusler <usenet@haeusler.NO.co.SPAM.nz> Subject: Re: Are Microsoft’s patent lawyers really this dumb? Newsgroups: nz.comp,gnu.misc.discuss References: <46900857@clear.net.nz> <wb-dneGodtc46g3bnZ2dnUVZ8qfinZ2d@giganews.com> <46908f24@clear.net.nz> User-Agent: pan 0.120 (Plate of Shrimp) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit Message-ID: <wb-dneCodtcaAw3bnZ2dnUVZ8qfinZ2d@giganews.com> Date: Sun, 08 Jul 2007 03:21:27 -0500 Lines: 22 X-Usenet-Provider: http://www.giganews.com X-Trace: sv3-1oe/ZDVih21FbPtLkXEwdeV10Oji00c2coJPr4VnNKwlTNDVYnxB0KvFhq/KfkY5AlYtfs3QnF6aGCx!XfYEnwOLXIqbSDStw9etfvly8uRx7URAUE7obKRj90Y/P2hIzxxDMeoONFd575BCIXUEsaKVVA== X-Complaints-To: abuse@giganews.com X-DMCA-Notifications: http://www.giganews.com/info/dmca.html X-Abuse-and-DMCA-Info: Please be sure to forward a copy of ALL headers X-Abuse-and-DMCA-Info: Otherwise we will be unable to process your complaint properly X-Postfilter: 1.3.35