Well, Lord Bill is just rattling cages once more. Nothing new here.
On 15 May 2007 21:11:20 +0100, Ciaran O'Riordan <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
"Orlando Andico" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > Large corporate Linux > backers (like my employer.. and IBM..) aren't going to buckle down to > Microsoft on this. Microsoft are not trying to scare other large software companies, they're trying to scare non-software companies that are thinking of moving from MS software to free software. Those non-software companies don't have software patents that could be used for a counter-attack. In general, the companies that have a lot of software patents cannot use those patents against each other. They have already signed cross-licensing agreements. You're right that this will not cause a problem for people who use GNU/Linux only in non-commercial ways, but it will cause a problem for public administration, educational institutes, and most businesses. The freedoms of free software are important there too. The best way to respond in the Philippines, IMO, would be to verify that the Philippine patent office is not approving software patents, and, if necessary, ask the government for a very clear statement in Philippine patent legislation saying that software ideas/functionality are not patentable. (I haven't read the Philippine legislation on what is patentable.) Then no one in the Philippines will ever have to worry about Microsoft's software patents. -- Ciarán O'Riordan __________________ \ http://fsfeurope.org/projects/gplv3 http://ciaran.compsoc.com/ _________ \ GPLv3 and other work supported by http://fsfe.org/fellows/ciaran/weblog \ Fellowship: http://www.fsfe.org _________________________________________________ Philippine Linux Users' Group (PLUG) Mailing List [email protected] (#PLUG @ irc.free.net.ph) Read the Guidelines: http://linux.org.ph/lists Searchable Archives: http://archives.free.net.ph
_________________________________________________ Philippine Linux Users' Group (PLUG) Mailing List [email protected] (#PLUG @ irc.free.net.ph) Read the Guidelines: http://linux.org.ph/lists Searchable Archives: http://archives.free.net.ph
