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Has the “open source” community been saving for a rainy day? Well its raining…
It looks like the “open source” community may not be so “open source” after all. From the Washington Post:
“Open-source programs step on 235 Microsoft patents, the company said. Free Linux software violates 42 patents. Graphical user interfaces, the way menus and windows look on the screen, breach 65. E-mail programs step on 15, and other programs touch 68 other patents, the company said. The patent figures were first reported by Fortune magazine.
Microsoft also said Open Office, an open-source program supported in part by Sun Microsystems Inc., infringes on 45 patents. Sun declined to comment on the allegation.”
I once read a theory that every so often the U.S. goes into some crappy little third world country to throw them up against the wall and slap them around just to remind the rest of the world who’s running the show.
Frankly, I’m shocked that its taken MS this long to act. With $60 billion in cash on hand and pretty much the best lawyers in the world, Microsoft is about to take the open source community and their distribution system, throw them up against the wall and let them know who’s running the show.
Should be entertaining to watch.
I once read a theory that every so often the U.S. goes into some crappy little third world country to throw them up against the wall and slap them around just to remind the rest of the world who’s running the show.
Yeah, it’s called the World Bank…
Left by Connor on 05/15/2007Reminds me of a really funny Simpsons episode where Homer ends up selling his startup CompuGlobalHyperMegaNet to Gates.
Buncha bullies.
Left by Alan Bradford on 05/15/2007Microsoft needed to sit back and watch real people make decent products out of their crappy patented junk. They just used the open source community as their beta testers.
Left by Russell Page on 05/15/2007Bah! MS also said they wouldn’t be seeking legal action. Yeah that makes sense, “We have a case, but we’re not going to sue.” As Torvalds called it, this is just Micrsoft spreading FUD so the numorous companies jumping ship to linux think twice.
Left by Blake Snow on 05/15/2007@ Alan:
You wouldn’t sue?
Left by Chris Knudsen on 05/15/2007@ Russ:
I wouldn’t call all open source “decent products”. As a matter of fact I think a lot of it is junk just like most MS products.
When the Linux dudes stop smoking pot and give me a decent desk top operating system and office suite I’ll give them some respect.
Left by Chris Knudsen on 05/15/2007@ Blake:
I think if they were worried about market share erosion they would have done this a long time ago - the theory doesn’t make a lot of sense to me.
Left by Chris Knudsen on 05/15/2007couldn’t agree more Chris. there’s crap on both sides of the fence
Left by Russell Page on 05/16/2007yeah, I probably wold sue, but I agree with you that seems strange that they took so long to act.
Left by Alan Bradford on 05/18/2007