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Five Linux Companies Buy Software Patents

Posted by CowboyNeal on from the giving-back dept.

An anonymous reader writes "In order to protect themselves against patent grabbing 'trolls,' major Linux companies are buying software patents through a nonprofit company called Open Invention Network. This nonprofit company will then offer royalty-free licenses to companies and individuals that agreed not to assert their own patents."

4 of 89 comments (clear)

  1. I knew I recognised this by myspys · · Score: 4, Informative

    Fresh from yesterday/a

  2. Patents are not a defence by Gopal.V · · Score: 4, Insightful
    Mutually assured destruction with patents work when the other company you are dealing with is a technology company shipping real software which could violate one of your own. It just doesn't work when you are dealing with the modern lawyer companies which hold patents merely to sue the pants off the big/little/ guy who comes under their sights

    IBM, Sony, Phillips and Novell aren't really Linux companies - they know that Free/Open/Libre software is the only way they are going to utilize the vastly under-utilized creative urges of the hackers of the world to fight their own enemies. GNU/Linux is just a primary weapon in their arsenal and they just want to keep it sharp.

    Even more sadly, the more we use patents to fight patents, the less backing the fight against software patents is going to get. To quote:
    They who would give up an essential liberty for temporary security, deserve neither.
    --
    Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum videtur
  3. In other news by Rogerborg · · Score: 5, Funny

    King Aethelred of Wessex announced that he had purchased protection from the Viking raiders that have plagued our shores. "It was really easy," announced Aethelred, "all I had to do was pay money to another bunch of pirates to protect us from the first bunch. Now the problem is solved for ever, and I can't see any potential downsides." On the news, shares in PlunderCorp rose 35% in anticipation of a rich and ongoing new revenue stream.

    --
    If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
  4. USTPO never wanted to grant software paten by MECC · · Score: 4, Informative

    The patent office never wanted to grant patents for software. They were forced to do so by the supreme court in the 1981 Diamond v. Diehr.[bitlaw.com]

    --
    "We are all geniuses when we dream"
    - E.M. Cioran