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Computer Associates Pledges to Open Source Patents

Posted by Zonk on from the don't-fear-the-penguin dept.

DigitumDei writes "Systems management vendor Computer Associates International has confirmed that it intends to pledge a number of its patents to the open source community. This is a move by CA to make it clear that they do not intend to use their patents against Linux. They have, however, ruled out any further large scale donation of CA software code to the open source community as they just released the Ingres database management system under an open source license last year."

32 of 132 comments (clear)

  1. This is commendable.. by MasterOfUniverse · · Score: 4, Informative

    Let me be the first to say..well done CA!

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    1. Re:This is commendable.. by iminplaya · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Don't fall for this. These people, like IBM and Sun, etc. Are only doing this to appear friendly towards F/OSS and its real purpose is to reduce the groundswell of the anti IP movement which rising fast amid all the abuse that's finally coming to light. Their actions may appear commendable, but their motives are anything but. Just wait for the other shoe to drop.

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  2. Patents by ElDuderino44137 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I'm not sure which "Patents" they're talking about ...

    However ...
    Doesn't it give their other "patents" more credibility ... if we get all excited about this pledge?

    Cheers,
    -- The Dude

  3. Open source is not exclusive to Linux by cobray · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Open source runs on Windows too. stop equating open source with Linux (as in dont-fear-the-penguin)

  4. Excellent by ravenspear · · Score: 3, Insightful

    The only way the current patent wars are going to end is for more companies to take actions like this.

    They need to realize that having open source as an ally will be more beneficial in the long run than persisting in a petty patent grabbing scheme and trying to crush their competitors with the resulting lawsuits.

    1. Re:Excellent by jim_v2000 · · Score: 2, Insightful

      But is this an attempt by them to be nice, or is it just a PR move?

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    2. Re:Excellent by grasshoppa · · Score: 3, Insightful

      There comes a point where you have to say, "Who cares"?

      Seriously, the results are the same regardless of their motives.

      To put in another light: I give you 100 bucks with no strings attached. Am I doing it to be nice, or to show off? Who cares? You have a 100 extra bucks.

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    3. Re:Excellent by Dogers · · Score: 2, Interesting

      But I then come along demanding royalties because I own the patents to bucks

      How do we know all these donated patents are actually valid and unique? Has anyone checked before using them?

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    4. Re:Excellent by iminplaya · · Score: 5, Insightful

      I highly doubt that there are no strings attached. The only sure way to do that would be to put it into public domain. As long as they own the IP rights, there's a pretty big rope attached actually. We are going to get sucked into using patented software. Very dangerous indeed. If you want to be lulled to sleep by this, please be sure to sleep with one eye open. We are letting Linux get pulled into a legal quagmire. I urge all of you to watch carefully.

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    5. Re:Excellent by ravenspear · · Score: 2, Insightful

      I'm referring to software. Money is not the primary driving force in open source, software is. I think companies that work with the open source community stand to gain more from future development on open source projects than those that alienate open source developers with threats of patent lawsuits.

  5. what kind of license? by ecklesweb · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I presume that to "pledge" a patent to the open source community, one could do one of two things: either contribute the patent to the public domain, or license it in some way. I would be surprised if they put it in the public domain, because then competitors could use it for closed source projects.

    The question then becomes, what does the license look like that pledges patents to the "open source community" as opposed to the community at large? What kind of restrictions will be placed on the use of the patent under the license?

    1. Re:what kind of license? by jim_v2000 · · Score: 2, Interesting

      I would be surprised if they put it in the public domain, because then competitors could use it for closed source projects. It depends on what they are releasing. They probably aren't going to release anything that would give another company an edge over them. I doubt they're that dumb. It'll more likely be some non-importnat pieces of code for users to poke around with.

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    2. Re:what kind of license? by i23098 · · Score: 2, Informative

      one could do one of two things: either contribute the patent to the public domain, or license it in some way


      They can give free patents licences to every program licenced under a free license. Every other application (closed source) must buy a license...

  6. And Symantec takes the low road... by mattspammail · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Symantec should follow suit. Not that viruses are the central focus they once were.

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  7. Ingres by tcopeland · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Speaking of which, anyone using that? The user's email list looks a little quiet...

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  8. GPL patent anyone? by coolcold · · Score: 3, Insightful

    the GPL patent can only used with other GPL patented product. In this case, commercial product with patent in would not be able to use it :)

    when would microsoft open up their patent?

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    1. Re:GPL patent anyone? by A.K.A_Magnet · · Score: 2, Interesting

      the GPL patent can only used with other GPL patented product. In this case, commercial product with patent in would not be able to use it :)

      I guess you mean "closed" software, since a software being licensed under GPL has nothing to do with it being commercial or not.

      Thus said, the goal of a patent is first and foremost to make money to justify innovation (that shouldn't apply to softwares but it does at least in the US and in Japan). Therefore, I think CA and IBM have done quite good with their patent opening to the free software community. They can still get money from licensing their patent and suing proprietary software companies for infringing their patent, and still the OSI approved licensed projects are safe from attack.

      Nevertheless, they're only opening *SOME* of their patents, and I really think they should make bigs efforts to be clear on WHICH patents they are opening.

      Anyway, that's a small consolation for having software patents. Go European Parliament :)

  9. Re:What does that... by StateOfTheUnion · · Score: 3, Informative
    No its probably not terminating the right to the patents . . . I'm not even sure that they could do that. They are probably granting the open source community a license to these patents to use them in open source software for the term of the patent.

    As the patent holder, they could even license these patents to open source projects only and ban the patents from any non-open source project (e.g. not let Microsoft incorporate these patents into their closed source software).

  10. Re:What does that... by squiggleslash · · Score: 3, Informative
    It is supposed to mean (but might not, we'll have to see what the details are) that the open source community will be able to use code that infringes on the patents without risking being sued. That is, if you are producing code licensed under a license approved by the OSI, you need not fear patent lawsuits from CA.

    While open source (and free software) makes up a large proportion of software, it is by no means the total of it. So this isn't terminating a patent right, because the patents will still be enforced against, for example, proprietary software.

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  11. From the press conference... by k4_pacific · · Score: 5, Funny
    CA Spokesperson: We've decided to donate a number of our patents to Open Source.

    Slashdot: And what number would that be?

    CA Spokesperson: Zero!

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  12. Correction to press release by azaris · · Score: 4, Funny

    As it happens, the press release from CA has a slight mistake in it. Instead of pledging to "open source patents", CA pledges to "patent open source". We apologize for any inconvenience caused.

    Sincerely Yours,
    John Swainson
    CEO Computer Associates International

  13. Two camps by ites · · Score: 4, Insightful

    The IT industry is really splitting into two opposing camps. OTOH we have those who believe technology should be expensive and lucrative. OTOH we have those who believe technology is sliding down the commodity curve and that the future lies in services.

    It's pretty clear which companies are on each side. With this statement, CA position themselves on the "sliders" side along with IBM, Novell, and the free/open source community.

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    1. Re:Two camps by superpulpsicle · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Wait a sec, IBM sits in both camps. They believe in expensive lucrative technology as well as a future in services.

  14. IBM, CA, whos next? by Virtual+Karma · · Score: 4, Insightful

    After IBM its CA now. This is wonderful. If all the corporates decide to open up their patents, code and other intellectual property we would be living in a better world. Eveyone benefits: 1. Corporates get great community support 2. Application get enhancements and maintainance at super speed 3. Communities get source and rights for further development 4. Consumers get great products and services Microsoft, are you listening?

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  15. Public Domain? by buckhead_buddy · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Companies which get "defensive" patents to protect themselves from a bigger, more agressive, richer company seem to be merely an altruistic charade. If the owners ever get tempted by the money, then it will be enforced.

    If a company had no desire to ever enforce the patent, then turn it over to the public domain. You'd still create the legal precedent that allows your products to exist.

    If a company holds on to the patent, it's simply to be able to pull it out of popular use at a later time (no matter who cooperative they seem now).

    If a patent becomes the shoulders for your patent or product to stand on, then you're setting yourself up for a fall no matter how solid that ground seems now.

  16. Tentative, sorta really maybe by Stanistani · · Score: 2, Insightful

    From the article:
    "It's the plan," den Hartog said. "I know he [Swainson] has worked on the preliminary work to get that done."

    Not much accomplished on this yet. This seems like a feeler.

    That said, it's only a pledge, when done.
    A promise, only.

    It would be nice to see something binding on this, or to see the end of software patents altogether.

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  17. Really a tax reduction scheme? by caesar-auf-nihil · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Part of me would like to think that CA did this for purely good reasons, but I suspect there is a practical reason behind this.
    Many companies donate patents (intellectual property) to non-profit institutions for tax cut purposes. A company can "claim" a value of $x for the patents that it knows it will never use or find a license for, and give them to a university or non-profit as a charitable donation, in effect lowering their tax bill which improves their earnings per share. This is done in the chemical industry all the time.
    So we should look at the patents being donated - are they really key patents, or extra patents that cover some niche or really should have never been issued in the first place? I'm betting that none of these patents really prevent the open source community from doing anything currently, and their release is probably a tax-cut plan for CA.

    I'd love to be wrong though.

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  18. This could cause Linux by iminplaya · · Score: 2, Interesting

    to really fork. One group will use all this patented stuff, and be vulnerable to legal attacks. The other group will(should) play it safe and stay completely patent free.

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  19. Why doesn't EFF have patents? by gremlins · · Score: 2, Interesting

    You know I was thinking about this today before I even read this story. I was wondering why the EFF doesn't just register all the possible patents that come from any open source program. I bet if they did that and then turned around made the patents "open source" (free to use) but restricted the use to anyone not one a special EFF blacklist. That way the EFF gains alot of leverage and I bet they would slowly built up enough patents on important software advances to really hurt the big companies trying to screw us over with patents. I say use thier own laws against them.

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  20. Before we praise CA too much... by Pionar · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Let's see what the patents are first. If they're patents for outdated, obsolete methods, then so what. If they're patents for useful stuff, then game on!

  21. This is why I hate the term "IP" by penix1 · · Score: 2, Insightful

    "...reduce the groundswell of the anti IP movement..."

    The term "Intellectual Property" is the most devious of terms. It implies assigned value to ideas and then further goes on to try to restrict who can "own" those ideas. It also blurs 4 distinct areas of law that should never be blurred. Patent, copyright, trademark, and trade secret. So to clarify this "anti IP movement" is really about getting rid of the notion that ideas can be thought of only by one entity and only controlled by one entity. A culture stagnates when ideas and though processes are stifled.

    B.

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  22. What do Software Patents Mean to Me? by Eric+Damron · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I guess I need a lawyer to explain exactly what software patents mean to me. Have the corporate lobbyists made it illegal for me to express myself in my own home by writing a program that may do similar things in similar ways as programs written by the monopolistic corporations that they represent?

    If it's not illegal for me to express my creative talents in my own home is it now illegal for me to share those expressions with others?

    If it is illegal for me to express my creative talents even in my own home then surly most government agencies and private businesses that do their own in-house programming are also endanger of going afoul of the software patent laws unless they hire an army of attorneys to research each and every line of code that they write to ensure that someone else doesn't have a patent covering its functionality. I know of no government agency or private business that does this.

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