Roy Schestowitz wrote:
>
>
> ,----[ Quote ]
> | "Q: Novell claims to have not acknowledged any patent infringements by
> | Linux. But Novell is now paying a tax to Microsoft on the Linux
> | distributions it ships. What, exactly, is Novell paying for?
> |
> | Nat Friedman: We're paying for the promise that Microsoft made to our
> | customers not to sue them.
> |
> |
> | Q: Not to sue them for *what*? For problems you don't acknowledge exist?
> |
> | Nat Friedman: We put together an agreement with Microsoft to make Linux
> | and Windows work better together. Now, as everyone knows, Microsoft has
> | spent the last 10 years saying negative things about Linux, including
> | implying that there are IP issues in Linux. It didn't make sense for us
> | to do a partnersihp with Microsoft on interoperability issues and still
> | have this patent cloud hanging around for our customers, so Microsoft
> | asked us to put together a patent agreement as well. And so we promise
> | Microsoft's customers that we won't sue them and they promise the same
> | thing to our customers. They pay us for our promise and we pay them for
> | their promise. It doesn't matter if the allegations from MSFT are true
> | or not. People can sue each other anyway, and a patent lawsuit is very
> | expensive to defend against. "
> `----
>
> http://www.linux.com/article.pl?sid=06/11/27/2113210
Ok Nat, I for one acknowledge that one or more working agreements with MS
are necessary. Remember that MS needs to work with UNIX/Linux just as much
as we need to work with MS. There are current issues that need both parties
around the table, it is great that Novell has a working agreement with MS
and so can bring Linux's case to the table for us.
But don't mingle that with the IP agreement, the two are seperate and should
have been kept seperate.
What we in the trenches are saying is that we would have held off on the IP
agreement and called MS's bluff.
They were never going to sue us, we do not believe that MS have a case.
Certainly not in Europe, probably not in Asia and they might not even have
a case in America.
But even if they did have a case in one of those, who are they going to sue?
Me? No, no point sueing each end user. Redhat? That would be a big blow if
a name like Redhat was dragged to the ground by a cleverly extended law
case that was really designed to take them to bankrupsy, but that would not
destroy Linux, Lunux would carry on. Debian? Probably a bigger blow, but
still not the end of Linux. So even if MS did have a case, and many of us
do not believe that they do, then they have no one to sue. There isn't one
name in Linux you can pick out and say 'If we bring Them down then we have
destroyed Linux'. MS were always onto a loser with this.
Novell signing the agreement has effectively taken away our fight, we would
have fought it and it seems that the majority of us in UNIX and Linux
firmly believe we would have kicked MS's arse.
But still, the agreement is made now, no point carrying on moaning about it,
lets see what we can get for Linux out of this.
What I personally would like to see is a list of what MS has given Novell as
a result of this agreement, I have no doubt that MS will benefit from
Novell's areas of expertise, but what do we get back? Has MS's input into
various projects been worth the agreement:-
perhaps MS have their .Net team working directly on Mono along side Novell's
sponsered developers? I know that Mono is coming good and it does seem to
have gotten a spurt on since the agreement. But how much of that is due to
working together and how much from simply not being inhibited by MS? Are MS
helping you to make a Mono call work in the same way as a .Net call for
example, so that developers do not need to worry about which hosts they
use?
kernel debuggers, did MS come along and say 'Hey our lads are quite good at
debuggers, let us help you with yours'?
Have MS added anything to Banshee? That's MS's main area going by the
adverts, so have they shared their *cough* expertise, their file formats,
anything else relevant?
The list of Novell sponsored areas is huge, but how much input and
collaboration is going on with MS?
There might be a lot, I have no idea, but I do think that what collaboration
there is ought to be public. Mainly so that those who have become
anti-Novell can see that some good is coming out of this. There isn't
anything we can do about the agreement you made, but Linux could and should
benefit from the collaboration side, I mean All Linux.
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