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Domain: openinventionnetwork.com

Stories and comments across the archive that link to openinventionnetwork.com.

Comments · 64

  1. Re:Sad or Telling? by Pecisk · · Score: 1 · on Linus Responds To Microsoft Patent Claims

    Maybe inform politely your bosses and legal departament about such statement?

    http://www.openinventionnetwork.com/press_release. php

  2. Ai ... I panicked needlessly by golodh · · Score: 1 · on Microsoft Says Free Software Violates 235 Patents
    It seems I panicked ... and needlessly at that. How about this response from microsoft? http://tech.blorge.com/Structure:%20/2007/05/15/mi crosoft-will-not-sue-linux-for-patent-violations/

    Yes, that's it" "No lawsuits" ... according to senior Microsoft Executives.

    In addition there is a retort by Linus, here http://www.informationweek.com/news/showArticle.jh tml?articleID=199600443

    and a scathing reply by OIN here, http://www.openinventionnetwork.com/press_release. php

    and the ever insightful replies on Groklaw here: http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=200705151 25107293

    It seems that this was again a case of Microsoft FUD and hot air. For which we can all be mighty gratefull I should think.

  3. Re:Nothing new here by Skrynesaver · · Score: 4, Insightful · on Microsoft Details FOSS Patent Breaches
    Indeed this is just a random number series associated with various FOSS apps.
    I mean really, are they going to claim that outbreak's calendar integration is patentable, I can think of 15 mailers that do calendar integration, no bother and that covers the 15 breaches of their patent.
    As for UI/Menus really guys do you think you'll get "Heirarchical menus" past a wide awake patent court?
    Don't Sun have a cross licensing deal over Star Office, so there go those
    And if your trying to tell me that the Linux kernel infringes, where, in the drivers?
    • SMB/NET Bios was an IBM technology from '84
    • vfat, I heard you intend suing camera/flash card manufacturers for this too, but do you really want to start a war with (the much derided) Sony, they're also part of the OIN
    Look I could go on playing guessing games but unless you are willing to stand up a case why in the name of Xenu should I take you at all seriously?
  4. Open Invention Network by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0 · on Successful Startups and Patents?

    Talk to these guys.

  5. Linux patent pool by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0 · on Mr. Ballmer, Show Us the Code

    http://xml.coverpages.org/ni2005-08-10-a.html

    http://www.pcpro.co.uk/news/76034

    http://lwn.net/Articles/163038/

    http://www.patent-commons.org/

    http://www.openinventionnetwork.com/

  6. OIN by EvilRyry · · Score: 1 · on Ballmer Repeats Threats Against Linux

    This is exactly what would happen. Ever hear of the Open Invention Network? http://www.openinventionnetwork.com/

  7. OIN Founding Member-- Novell by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting · on Microsoft Taking Heat For Patent Stance
    It appears one of the founding members, Novell, was left off the text when referring to the OIN.

    Members of the OIN.

    Information about Novell and patents.

  8. What about OIN and the Patent Commons? by caudron · · Score: 2, Interesting · on Ballmer Says Linux "Infringes Our Intellectual Property"

    What effect will the Patent Commons project have on a patent assault by Microsoft? Also, will the newly formed Open Inventions Network also affect the way Microsoft approaches this issue?

    I mean, both of those organizations essentially grant rights to their patents royalty free only to companies that don't sue F/OSS projects. If MS starts a suit, wouldn't they have to contend with both of these patent holding portfolios as well as the enormous portfolio of companies like IBM who have a vested interest in seeing Linux succeed?

    I get the feeling (though I could be dead wrong) that MS gets far more benefit from the current ambiguity and the occasional stirring, scary statement than from actually pursuing a legal remedy.

    Tom Caudron
    http://tom.digitalelite.com/

  9. OIN? by quantaman · · Score: 2, Interesting · on Novell Gets $348 Million From Microsoft

    Novell is a member of the Open Invention Network. A patent collective that is used to defend certain open source projects (if you sue project X or used of project X for patent infringement than they sue you). Afiak OIN is the reason that mono was included in fedora, because they were able to use it to defend against Microsoft patents.

    Thus if Microsoft sues someone for using one of those protected open source projects than OIN sues back.

    This brings up two interesting questions. First, since Novell is a member of OIN would they be considered partial owners of these patents and thus in violation of this agreement if OIN sues MS? (I suspect not).

    Second. What are the state of OIN's current patents? From the site it looks like OIN itself owns the patents (so they shouldn't lose any defensive power) but my strong suspicion is that Novell wouldn't be allowed to transfer any new patents to OIN since they could be potentially be used to sue MS (and thus in violation of this agreement).

    Does anyone know more about these issues and how this agreement might affect OIN?

  10. Re:A Call to Action by kyknos.org · · Score: 1, Interesting · on Microsoft/Novell Deal Could Create Two-Tier Linux Market
    wHAT A BULLSHIT.
    • Novell's patents are still available for Red Hat to countersue Microsoft if necessary because of membership of both companies in the http://www.openinventionnetwork.com/ - nothing changed with that
    • Novell is still able to sue Microsoft over patents - the agreement contains a covenant not to sue each others customers - what is wrong with that? We don't like SW patents, do we? Why should customers be sued? Sue the company, if wou want to sue, not its customers.
    • Novell didn't admit any Linux code infringes any Microsoft IP. In fact, Microsoft is paying money to Novell, not vice versa.
    • ...
    • I do not see anything wrong here. Microsoft recognized importance of LInux - that's a good thing. Companies would cooperate to increase compatibility - a good thing...
    • So what is wrong here? Except irrational responses?
  11. Re:Moglen is talking out of his a$$ by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0 · on Is the Microsoft/Novell Deal a Litigation Bomb?

    Yes, but wouldn't that run the risk of starting a patent war? Linux is supported by some rather large companies with sizeable patent portfolios (Sony, IBM, et cetera). Isn't this one of the reasons that http://www.openinventionnetwork.com/about.php was setup-- to help block this from happening? There is also the possibility that Apple may even join the fray, if there was the possibility of weaking Microsoft's market share. Does microsoft fear linux enough to risk starting a chain reaction could leave a large section of the market in ruins?

  12. Re:Par for the course... by LnxAddct · · Score: 5, Informative · on Red Hat Gives up on Fedora Foundation
    Umm... Red Hat is worth about 60% more than Novell so there is no chance of Novell buying them (but Red Hat buying them has been rumore once or twice). Red Hat also isn't screwing the community, read the damn email rather than the sensationalist headline. The original intention of the Fedora Foundation was to be a patent repository, giving unlimited access to any open source project, and using them defensivley against businesses if linux, or open source in general, was threatened. Red Hat, in the e-mail, said that they realized the Open Invention Network had already made significant head way with this, and that OIN would be "the 800-lb gorilla" in this area of open source. Rather than compete and divide resources with OIN, they decided that they'd rather join forces. That right there knocked out the main and initial reason for the foundation.

    One of the other motivations behind the Fedora Foundation was for legal standing. Just like the FSF makes contributors sign over their rights so that there is one entity in control of all the copyrights, the Fedora Foundation was going to serve that purpose for Fedora. The problem being that the Fedora Documentation is released under a very liberal license, no sense on signing over there, the Core and Extra repositories are collections of projects coded by other entities (such as Red Hat, Novell, or individual contributors), so standing doesn't make sense there, and for specific Fedora projects like the Fedora Directory Server, Red Hat bought and open sourced all of that source code so Red Hat has the standing for the time being. There is no purpose for starting the Fedora Foundation to cover legal issues like "standing" because it is a non-issue for Fedora right now. Fedora has access to all of Red Hat's lawyers, but as a separate foundation, they'd need to fund their own lawyers and track many other expenses. Just because its non-profit doesn't mean those problems go away.

    And this one was the real killer, a non-profit needs to have 33% of its revenue come from public donations (thats how you prove you're benfitting the public). Red Hat dumps a ton of money into Fedora, but here is an excerpt of things they'd have to track from the email:

    * The cost of bandwidth for distributing Fedora to the world;

    * Every hour that Red Hat engineers spend working on Fedora, whether that is the actual writing of code, release engineering, testing, etc.;

    * Legal expenses of running a Foundation;

    * Administrative expenses of running a Foundation.

    As an intellectual exercise, let's ignore all of those numbers for now except for bandwidth. Back in the day, when Red Hat would release a distro, we would regularly get angry calls from network admins at big datacenters, complaining that we were eating all of their bandwidth. If you ever meet any of our IT guys over a beer, be sure to ask them about the time we melted a switch at UUNet.

    The demand for Fedora is every bit as high, and the March 20 release of Fedora Core 5 was no exception. So let's take a conservative guess and say that the bandwidth cost for distributing Fedora comes to $1.5 million a year. Yes, even though we have BitTorrent trackers and Fedora mirror sites worldwide.

    That means that a public Fedora Foundation would have to raise $750k in public funds -- remember the one-third public support test -- every single year, just to pay for *bandwidth*, assuming no growth and no other expenses.

    So what would happen, under such a scenario, if Red Hat were to decide to spend more money on Fedora? Because that's exactly what Red Hat wants to do.

    To sum it up, Red Hat wants to keep dumping more money into Fedora to make it even better, but if the Fedora Foundation was created then every dollar Red Hat put into Fedora would be another 30 cents that needs to be raised through charitable donations. Essentially, putting more money into t

  13. Troll by hritcu · · Score: 1 · on Ballmer Won't Dismiss Idea of Suits Against Linux

    the corporation has a duty to it's shareholders to enforce the patents

    I wonder who are the moderators that could mod you Insightful. I would have moderated you Troll. Do you really know what would happen if Microsoft would be stupid enough to sue Linux for patent infringement? IBM and these guys will immediatly sue them back for every patent they hold and Microsoft is using. How will this be a good thing for Microsoft's shareholders? So no, Microsoft is not planning to sue Linux. They are just trying to spread FUD to slow down the adoption of Linux and you are the only one who does not get it.

  14. Open Invention Network may counter by FecesFlingingRhesus · · Score: 5, Interesting · on Ballmer Won't Dismiss Idea of Suits Against Linux



    I suspect that the Open Invention Network was set up to defend against this very possibility. If Microsoft makes a move the alliance will use their patents to counter. Which the companies involved have a pretty comprehensive portfolio.