----- Original Message ----- From: "Paul Davis" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
fear, and copycat behaviour. there is this idea (inspired by IBM and others) of building a "patent portfolio" that could be used defensively if sued by other patent holders. as in "ok, you sued me for infringing on Foo, i'll sue you for infringing on Bar". But most owners of patents Foo or Bar can't risk actually suing because their patent is stupid.
its the kind of stupid game that you'd have hoped ended when we left the school playing field.
That's nosense to me. In that case it would be easier for those companies to promote the "abolition" of software patents, forget that game and not to worry about any software patents. And the recent declarations of Mr Ballmer suggest that they are planning to play another game.
----- Original Message ----- From: "Erik de Castro Lopo" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Apart from encouraging stupid patents, the best thing you can do is ignore it completely. When and if you get a cease and desist letter you do the following:
0) Get the patent holder to provide enough information for you to figure out if you might infinge or not.
1) If you are out of jurisdiction you may want to disregard the patent anyway.
2) Get the patent documents and see if the patent can be challenged.
3) If you think it can be challenged, state so publicly in the web page for the software and tell the patent holder that you will challenge the patent validity if they try to bring it to court.
4) If it can't be overturned, say sorry to the patent holder and pull the software for the 2-3 weeks it takes to reimplement the code working around the patent.
Erik
Thats the problem with sw patents, having to worry about all these legal things, working around patents, finding prior art, etc etc I don't thinks that's any good for a programmer or a small company.
An example (fictional):
I start a new company and I invent some new method of storing or representing data (or anything) and I patent it.
Then afther some weeks or months I see IBM or MS using my method in their products.
I cannot sue them to get money for my invention because, as Paul said, they would use their patent portfolio against me. So the patent system renders useless for small companies when it's supposed to be made to promote invention.
Note that all this cases I'm talking in my mails are in the case that software patents get passed. I know that I've nothing to worry about right now but maybe in the future (since I live in EU).
Pedro
