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Microsoft/Samsung Ink Patent Deal

Posted by Zonk on from the so-happy-together dept.

An anonymous reader wrote with an article at ZDNet, discussing further implications of their patent cross-licensing initiative. With options already in place with Fuji Xerox, the company is now signed up with Samsung as well. From Samsung's perspective, it is simple: these deals ensure it can sell products using Linux without facing a suit from the Redmond-based corporation. "The notion that customers and businesses need Microsoft's legal go-ahead to run Linux has been controversial for some time, with the issue rising to the surface last November after Microsoft reached an accord with Linux vendor Novell. Novell has since taken issue with Microsoft's assertion that the deal represents an acknowledgment that Linux infringes on Microsoft patents."

2 of 131 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Patent Reform by $RANDOMLUSER · · Score: 4, Informative

    Software patents are the worst thing to ever come out of the patents office.
    Actually, you have the courts to thank for allowing software patents (at least in the U.S.).
    --
    No folly is more costly than the folly of intolerant idealism. - Winston Churchill
  2. summary from Groklaw by jamienk · · Score: 3, Informative

    MS's Patent Deal Covers "Certain Linux-Based Products"

    Microsoft and Samsung Electronics have agreed to a broad, cross-licensing patent agreement that apparently includes a controversial clause that protects against any legal claims Microsoft may have on technology used in Linux....

    Within the joint press release announcing the deal, however, the companies said, "Samsung and its distributors and customers may utilize Microsoft's patents in Samsung's products with proprietary software, and Samsung will also obtain coverage from Microsoft for its customers' use of certain Linux-based products ."[PJ:Emphasis added. So it isn't Linux itself, I gather, rather stuff that runs on it, perchance things like Mono, OpenOffice.org, etc.]