Microsoft and Kyocera Mita Enter Broad Patent Cross-Licensing Agreemen
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| Agreement will cover intellectual property contained in hardware and software
| products, including certain Linux-based technologies.
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http://www.microsoft.com/Presspass/press/2007/nov07/11-13MSKyoceraMitaPR.mspx
Related:
When Patents Threaten Science
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| Patents should not be used to protect laws of nature, products of
| nature, or mathematical formulas.
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http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/summary/314/5804/1395
EU tells open source to start paying MS patent tax
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| EU Commissioner Kroes' deal with Microsoft creates real dangers to Europe's
| growing open source economy, warns the FFII. Using patent licenses that
| exclude businesses, the software monopolist has turned the EU competition
| ruling into a victory, and now gets implicit support from the Commission to
| proceed aggressively against its competitors.
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http://press.ffii.org/Press_releases/EU_tells_open_source_to_start_paying_MS_patent_tax
Opinion: behind the Acacia suit
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| It's a neat structure. Pump money into Acacia so it can attack Red Hat, and
| at the same time prove to the world how strong the Microsoft patent shield
| really is against those naughty, naughty trolls.
|
| If this works with Acacia, perhaps we can expect a scaled-up attack by
| Intellectual Ventures on Linux users like Google and IBM.
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http://www.digitalmajority.org/forum/t-24106/opinion:behind-the-acacia-suit
Let's Make a Deal - The MS-EU Settlement
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| The patent part is terrible. Worse than terrible. They are not blocked from
| offering patent deals, only constrained as to how much to charge for a
| license, which is not and never was the issue. So they'll beef up those
| initiatives, I'm sure. However, the good part is that they were compelled to
| separate the patent license offer out and make it optional. Thanks, but no
| thanks.
|
| [...]
|
| I'm guessing Microsoft lawyers are high fiving each other, having snatched an
| important victory from utter and total defeat. The rest is excellent, of
| course, and in no way do I mean to detract from the hard work and persistence
| that the EU Commission has shown. However, I don't think they understand how
| seriously broken the US patent system is currently, and how easy it is to
| abuse it, or they don't feel it's their job to fix the US problems, or how
| central patents are to Microsoft's current strategy against FOSS.
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http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20071022114731199
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