David Crossley wrote: > Heads up. An alarm bell was triggered by the > word "OASIS". Please ensure that ASF ideals are met.
Hi David, I found this in the list. Is this good enough for us? > To various lists: > > In a welcome move toward open software standards in OASIS, Sun Microsystems > has covenanted not to enforce its patents against implementations of the > Open Document Format for Office Applications (OpenDocument) specification. > [See http://www.oasis-open.org/committees/office/ipr.php.] > > This is a good thing because it allows the development of free and open > source implementations of office applications without fear of patent > infringement claims by Sun. > > Most important, because this is from Sun, a company that plays an important > leadership role in many standards organizations, this is an example for > other OASIS member companies to follow. It proves once and for all that > patent holders in OASIS working groups can find reasonable ways to allow > their patents to be implemented for software standards without demanding > royalties or imposing burdens of license execution and restrictions on > sublicensing. > > I hope that other patent holders will do the same for the OASIS standards to > which they contribute. > > If they follow this lead, we will no longer have the spectres of patent > infringement lawsuits and RAND-type licensing for software applications that > implement OASIS standards. Both open source and proprietary software can > thrive in that environment. > > /Larry Rosen > > Lawrence Rosen > Rosenlaw & Einschlag, technology law offices (www.rosenlaw.com) > 3001 King Ranch Road, Ukiah, CA 95482 > 707-485-1242 * fax: 707-485-1243 > Author of "Open Source Licensing: Software Freedom and > Intellectual Property Law" (Prentice Hall 2004) > [Available also at www.rosenlaw.com/oslbook.htm] > -- Ferdinand Soethe
