Dave Donovan wrote: > Think about how trivial that would be to implement in Asterisk and how > much trouble you could get into. I don't even know who would be > liable?? If I wrote the software, released it into the public domain
IANAL etc, but I believe they could go after people using the software since in the US source code is treated as free speech etc, I remember reading years ago how Edison (who among other things invented the movie camera) had a patent on the space/distance of notches in movie films used to pull/push the film through a camera was trying to sue other people making movies without paying him royalties. This is supposedly one of the reasons why Hollywood ended up on the west coast they all hid out there until the patents expired, and basically since it was hard for him for some reason to touch the movie studios, he threatened to sue (or maybe he did sue not sure) anyone going to see a movie (on the east coast). Someone wrote an article on the whole hypocrisy surrounding current file sharing lawsuits because most of the companies involved have in the past done things much more clearly illegal then any 12 yr old girl, but they have lots of money to pay people off. Sorry I can't reference the exact article, but a quick search on google came up with numerous similar articles. http://www.cobbles.com/simpp_archive/edison_trust.htm > What's really irritating is that they don't even have to develop the > software, they can just describe some process that isn't already > patented or in the public domain and it's all theirs. The patent office > has demonstrated some lack of diligence on the public domain stuff too. There ware much better examples then that, such as when IBM received a patent for the ordering of people waiting to use a toilet. They ended up putting it into public domain but they were making a point. -- Best regards, Duane http://www.cacert.org - Free Security Certificates http://www.nodedb.com - Think globally, network locally http://www.sydneywireless.com - Telecommunications Freedom http://e164.org - Because e164.arpa is a tax on VoIP "In the long run the pessimist may be proved right, but the optimist has a better time on the trip."
