Google Partners With OIN For Linux

lymeca writes "Groklaw reports that Google has become the Open Invention Network's first end-user licensee. The OIN was established by companies such as IBM, Red Hat, and somewhat ironically Novell to accumulate patents and license them royalty-free to any company promising not to leverage their own patent portfolio against key applications available on GNU/Linux, including many GNU projects as well as Linux itself. Google's support bolsters the OIN's effectiveness as a shield against patent attacks against GNU/Linux and many popular applications that run on it."

Comments

All-out attack on my cynicism?

[Control Group]

OK, I've been thinking about this setup for at least five minutes now, and I admit, it seems like a genuinely good idea (the OIN bit, not just the Google going for it bit). Companies using their patent portfolios to shut down patent trolling is this =>= close to giving me a warm fuzzy right under the cockles of my heart.

So what's the catch? What am I missing, here, that turns this from an actual Good Thing for the software community (with concomitant benefits to the involved organizations, of course) into an attempt to rape the commons for short-term profit? Or is my cynicism, for possibly the first time ever, completely unwarranted?

Re:All-out attack on my cynicism?

[tgatliff]

The main purpose, in my opinion, for the OIN is to help insure the successful transition of the industry from software sales based to services based... These companies are broken up into two categories..

The first group are companies are the ones that already offer just services, meaning that the software they use is insignificant to their mode of business, so having software that is free to use is important. Also, getting sued is a significant risk for these companies business models. Google would be a great example for this type of company. If google had to pay for every OS, database, and file system on every server they have, I question if their business model would even be possible or viable...

The second group is companies that still work in the business of writing/distrib. software, but are not the top players in the industry. IBM would be a great example of this type of company. These types of companies are realizing, though, that business of "selling" software is slowing going away. The future of software is to sell the services that follow the software. This type of income not only provides a better revenue stream, but also is considerably more profitable..

So who is OIN truely targetting Simple.. To strike after companies that are still are based on just selling software and have the most to loose in the transition to software services... M$ comes to mind.. :-)

Re:All-out attack on my cynicism?

[Billly Gates]

As much as I despise software patents I think this is for the following situation. WHen a software company sues someone that other someone brings their armory of patents to the table and they make a licensing deal on who pays what.

Whoever has the most software patents wins and gets the money or more of it,

So we have a war where companies are trying to patent everything under the sun to protect themselves in case they get sued. Its just defense to prevent them for being sued as they can sue back.

Meanwhile free software developers dont want to pay $5k or whatever it costs to patent a concept or mathmatical algorithm so they are screwed if they are sued. They have no battle chest to defend themselves on.

There is one company that has everyone scared called Intellectual Ventures formed by a former MS scientist who only has laywers on staff. Basically his business model is to sue everyone and since they do not make anything you can not sue back. Kind of scary but good if it will make the industry think twice about protective patents. They have not gone after Linux yet because they have no money but guess who owns stock in the company and who has incredible influence as the CEO was a friend of both Balmer and Gates? You guessed it Microsoft.

I have a feeling they may go after Linux if pressured but we will see.

Re:All-out attack on my cynicism?

[kebes]

Such cynicism is usually warranted. Big companies are out to make money, regardless of who they trample over in the process. So, whenever there is a big move by a big company, we must ask "who is getting trampled?"

The fact is, however, that OIN is a good thing. I think it's important to realize the significance of this: We have huge, powerful companies (IBM, Google, etc.) voluntarily participating in a project that protects FOSS and encourages the free distribution of innovative ideas and Free software. The answer to the obvious "why would these companies do something seemingly benevolent?" is that the FOSS community has done a good job of engineering the landscape that way.

Basically, the years of work by the FOSS community has created an environment where coming together and preventing patent threats against Free software is in the best interests of those big companies! The community (via legal things like the GPL, and less tangible things like "public outcry," boycotts, and "community spirit") have made it clear that business will only continue to benefit from the power and flexibility of FOSS if they play by certain rules. (Keep code open, keep software patents at bay.) The business sector has stepped up to the plate and is enforcing those FOSS requirements... not because they are benevolent, but because they recognize that the payback from the community will be "worth it."

So to those who still (in this day and age!) doubt that FOSS can be relevant to businesses, or that people can "make money from Free software"--let this be an obvious message. The free market has spoken... and it has said "This stuff has value, we want more of it, and we're prepared to do what it takes to protect your continued efforts at innovation."

This crucial win-win between FOSS and business is a result of the FOSS people having uncompromising requirements, and the business people being smart enough to see a great opportunity.

So what happens when someone buys Google?

[Anonymous Coward]

Is the buyer bound by Google's promises?

For that matter, is *Google* actually legally
bound by a promise to not use patents against any
particular person/group/corporation?

I get the feeling the OIN is a feel-good thing,
and actually doesn't have any legal teeth in it.

Re:So what happens when someone buys Google?

[mhall119]

Google licensed OIN patents, it didn't (in this article) contribute any of it's own patents to OIN. Basically what this move does is gives Google the ability to use these patents from IBM, Novell and Red Hat in it's own products. It also (and more importantly) means that Google would lose that ability if it ever decided to sue Linux or any part of what OIN defines as a "Linux System". Since nobody was every really concerned about Google doing that, this is more of a PR move to bolster both Google's standing in the FOSS community, and to give corporate legitimacy to the OIN, which will hopefully spur other, possibly smaller, companies into licensing OIN patents as well, maybe even contributing some of it's own patents. OIN is to patents what FOSS is to copyright.

Re:Please Stop Using "GNU/Linux"

[Miykayl]

Although I appreciate your differences with RMS, the tendency for the FSF to divide and separate GNU and Linux goes back almost to the birth of Linus' first Linux kernel, because the FSF and Linus have important differences of opinion regarding software, and because GNU is hoped to be bigger than Linux, or at least not limited to Linux.

I have no problem with GNU and Linux shown together in the parent. It will help us understand the different players, and the different philosophies in the F/OSS arena.

Once upon a time, Linux was THE example of FOSS to me. I learned that FOSS movement and the philosophy that gave birth to it are older than Linux. Yeah, that's lame of me. But we all have to start somewhere.

I may learn a great deal, too, from replies to this post... Or I might unlearn some things I thought I knew.

Re:Please Stop Using "GNU/Linux"

[WPIDalamar]

If using the compiler is a determining factor, then I've developed on both GNU/OSX and GNU/Windows! If cross compiling counts, I've even used GNU/Palm!

Re:Please Stop Using "GNU/Linux"

[Qubit]

So, A.C., I see we meet again!

If you do in fact run the Linux kernel on your computer, why don't you take your own advice and "Please Stop Using 'GNU/Linux'" ?

I mean, if you want to just call it Linux, why don't you just rip out all of the GNU utilities that make it usable by mere mortals such as us? ...unless you think you're a Seymour Cray and can hand-toggle in disk I/O and such things, of course...

Is RMS a bit outlandish? Oh, certainly.
Is Linus also, shall we say...hmm...eccentric? Indubitably.

Of course, they're both brilliant geeks and we have both of them -- plus thousands of other people -- to thank for the sweet operating system we all know and love. At the end of the day all of us geeks know that the "Linux" operating system isn't just the work of Linus and the kernel team. But do other people know that? Maybe giving a little credit back isn't such a bad idea.

Re:Please Stop Using "GNU/Linux"

[notthe9]

It's your old friend AC, you noticed. Why feed the troll?

Anyways, there are a lot of folks to thank for the stuff making your computer go. The FSF and the Linux kernel people come to mind. The X.org people, too. The KDE people. I could go on a while.

They should all be given credit where credit was due. But that doesn't mean I should say that my computer runs GNU/Linux/X11/KDE every time I need to name my operating system. It doesn't take credit away from the X.org people to tell someone I run GNU/Linux, and it doesn't take credit away from the FSF people when I say I run Linux.

Would I be critical of someone for using the term GNU/Linux like the flamebait parent? No. It's a fair enough term, and one I sometimes use.

Does it make sense to be critical of people for calling their GNU/Linux/X11 systems Linux? I don't see why. They aren't taking away any credit from anyone, just using what has happened to become common parlance.