Microsoft has recently been rattling the sabre on the notion that it holds a large number of patents on the software or ideas and execution in the software that is within the GNU/Linux, and related FOSS products. 235 violations to be precise.
Now, this one has been done before by SCO, but without significant success. The problem with software patents is that they are often process or fundamental physics/mathematical related, and that does not lend itself to demonstrable non-obviousness.
The other problem is who do you sue? Neither Richard Stallman or Linus Torvalds have enough money to be interesting as a target, the other developers are not any more interesting, and anyway, a lot of them don't work for the development groups in any formal or legal sense, which leaves the distributors, and the end customers.
Now, SCO would have been happy to sue IBM, because they knew they were on a "shit or bust" approach, and if IBM never spoke to them again, well, that's OK, because you have made your money, and now you're out of here. Microsoft would have a problem with a hostile IBM, competitors though they may be, because IBM has enormous influence via both its platform and consulting activities. Or, if even worse, they sued end customers like Goldman Sachs, or others, how disastrous would that be in PR terms?
That is not to say that patents are without effect, if we witness Vonage, and Blackberry, but recent court decisions have made the patent portfolio less attractive, as the burden on getting a patent is higher. Indeed, in good old communist pinko Europe, we cannot patent software at all. (Provided we remain vigilant...)
So, is MS serious? Well, many are saying that this is just the usual FUD, designed to try and slow adoption, but what if MS sense the end game coming on? Windows and Office are mature at best, adoption rates are not stellar, and many people are not liking Vista at all. This for a product that took five years to deliver, and had all the interesting bits taken out. Do they see that Mac OS/X, and Ubuntu, which recently announced a link-up with the last great Linux hold out Dell, as being ready to hit the tipping point, and this is a reasonable defence? Because if not, then why are they playing with their PR like this?
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