Red Hat Vows To Stand Up To Patent Intimidation

mrcgran writes "Eweek is reporting on Red Hat's assurances that can continue to deploy Linux without fear of legal retribution from Microsoft. This, despite the increasingly vocal threats emanating from Redmond. 'In a scathing response to Ballmer's remarks, Red Hat's IP team said the reality is that the community development approach of free and open-source code represents a healthy development paradigm, which, when viewed from the perspective of pending lawsuits related to intellectual property, is at least as safe as proprietary software. "We are also aware of no patent lawsuit against Linux. Ever. Anywhere," the team said in a blog posting.'"

As a customer

[QuantumRiff]

Thank you. I look forward to purchasing more from you in the future, and less from MicroSoft.

Actionable?

[Shadow Wrought]

I'm not a lawyer, but I wonder if Ballmer's speech might be actionable in and of itself. In other words, Red Hat files suit against MS for defamation, Tortious Interference being the legalese methinks. Unless MS can prove the infringement, then they'd ahve to pay damages. Essentially forcing MS into the position that SCO put itself.

Of course if I could think of it, they surely could too, only they actually know what they're doing;-)

Re:What has to be considered

[petermgreen]

the thing is that MS must know it would be virtually impossible for it to win a patent fight against some of the heavyweights in the linux buisness. IBM in particular has lots of patents of thier own and i'm sure they could find a few that MS was somehow violating.

if they reveal publically what if anything the infringements are then unless they are really earth shattering things they will just be worked arround or prior art found weakening microsofts position further.

so for the moment it is most sensible for MS to just spread very general fud without giving anyone any real information.

Can we stop hating RedHat now?

[serviscope_minor]

Not wishing to generalize the whole of /. here, but there seems to often be a certain vocal contingent who really dislike RedHat.

Why?

They've made huge contributions to Linux, and all of their custom system tools were released as Free (both kinds) when very few other commercial distros were doing the same. Now they're standing up to all this patent nonsense.

What is there to dislike about RedHat?

Personally, I'm not a particular fan of the distribution any more since they stopped including the old skool unix/X stuff (fvwm2, gv, xfig, ...) some of which is a pain to configure and install. But I've got nothing against them.

Re:Finally

[Ilgaz]

Oh fuck, Microsoft won't do anything about this. It's FUD. Let's remember that come next year, there is likely to be a US administration less willing to ignore Microsoft's anti-competitive behavior than the last one, and the last thing Microsoft wants is a renewed DoJ campaign against them in the midst of Europe cleaning their clocks.

But this all points to one thing. Software patents are bad.

As a person using computers for a long time, I can easily say: Expect ANYTHING from Microsoft. They have no limit or ethics when it comes to their core business.

Check Amazon top selling software, OS X Leopard is currently number 4 without even being released yet, XP Home edition is somewhere at 50th or something, Vista DOES NOT EXIST on that list which has Ubuntu, the same Ubuntu which you can download for free is on list.

If it came to this point and they started to work with some struggling Linux vendors who would give up their real job to port some Flash wannabe technologies, it is the exact time to get afraid. That same vendor also speaks about patents, unpublished agreements with MSFT, their highest IT manager writes how "great" MS Office XML is...

I think it is really time to "fear".

Why are Redhat using that "IP" word?

[Anonymous Coward]

Simply using the correct terms -- "software patents" and "extortion" -- is enough to repel these lame Microsoft threats.

By using the term "intellectual property", Steve Ballmer is saying Linux infringes Microsoft copyright, trademarks and trade secrets. Perhaps he should stick to throwing chairs instead of using big words he doesn't understand.

Call Microsoft's bluff!

[christian.einfeldt]

There is a list of 1,573 people who have decided to call Microsoft's bluff by signing a list offering to be the first ones to be sued by Microsoft for supposedly "infringing" Microsoft's 235 patents. Although I am a lawyer, I don't practice Intellectual Property law, and so I am not rendering a legal opinion on this area. But as a practical matter, I can tell you that whenever I sue someone, I first send them a letter demanding payment, and then if they don't pay in short order, I do sue them. I am too busy on a day-to-day basis bluffing people, and those who think that real lawyers with real claims bluff people, they are dead wrong. Some day, someone is going to call your bluff, and maybe even sue you for falsely claiming that you have a right against them, so I advise my clients to think carefully about claiming in public that they can sue someone if, in fact, they have no true claims.

In this particular case, mere common sense would tell most practicing attorneys that if Microsoft had valid claims, it would simply start rolling out the lawsuits and collecting money. Think of all the copies of OpenOffice.org and GNU Linux that are drifting around the world!!! If Microsoft had valid claims against those the users or their distros, dontcha think that they would file suit against a really solid test case, and then trot out that case for everyone else in the world to see? Of course they would.

Here is a link to page 13 of the list:

[digitaltippingpoint.com]http://digitaltippingpoint.com/wiki/index.php?title=SMFM_list_page_13 [digitaltippingpoint.com]

So I am not buying Microsoft's questionable claims, and I have signed up for the list. Let's put an end to this questionable puffery! Microsoft, if you have a claim against me, sue me now, or shut up! You can serve me with a lawsuit here:

Christian J. Einfeldt
Law Offices of Christian J. Einfeldt
580 California Street, Suite 1600
San Francisco, CA 94104

In your complaint, Microsoft, you will want to specify which programs I am using. I am using openSUSE GNU Linux 10.2; Edgy Kubuntu; OpenOffice.org is my only office productivity suite, and so when you file suite against me, you might really want to stick a finger in my asking for an order barring me from using OpenOffice.org to write my reply briefs, because that is the tool I use for all my court briefs. I am also using Firefox, which you have heavily borrowed from, so please be sure to throw that in.

Oh, and I have installed about 100 copies of GNU Linux, OpenOffice.org and Firefox on various different computers for a public middle school in San Francisco, and I have also given out about 16 computers with those programs installed on them. So be sure to add a couple of causes of action for that, Brad Smith.

Hey, don't forget the fact that I started the "Sue Me First, Microsoft" list, where I very publicly questioned the veracity of your claims, so you would do well to add a couple of counts of defamation, since I am publicly calling into question both the veracity of your claims and your motivation for merely making a public fuss, without proving your claims.

But of course, I have nothing to worry about, because your claims probably are defeated by 1) obviousness; 2) prior art; and 3) limitations on patenting math. After all, if Microsoft could have patented 1 + 1 = 2, you would have done so, wouldn't you?

Re:Can we stop hating RedHat now?

[QuoteMstr]

So how is that the fault of rpm? If you'd tried to compile the latest gaim (well, Pidgin) yourself, it wouldn't have even finished the configuration process. rpm did you a favor by telling you what the missing dependencies were.

It's not as if the latest Windows programs run on Windows 95.

Re:Finally

[RenderSeven]

Yeah bullshit right back atcha, baby. If republicans are business whores that makes dems no less whorish either. Lets check opensecrets.org [opensecrets.org] for a summary, shall we? For all candidates in the 2004 election cycle, Bush raised $2.9M from PACS, or about 1%. Kerry took $375k or 0% from PACS, so good for him. But for Bush it was ONLY ONE PERCENT. That's either the cheapest political buyout of all time, or its bullshit.

But PACS dont generally get involved in presidential races (probably because they fear /. will find out). So lets look at the top ten contributers since 1989 when reporting laws took effect (in order spent):

Muncipal Employees Union 98% democrat
AT&T 56% republican
Nat Assn Realtors 53% republican
Teachers Union 93% democrat
Bar Association 90% democrat
IBEW (union) 98% democrat
Goldman Sachs 62% democrat
Laborers Union 92% democrat
Service Employees union 96% democrat
Carpenters union 90% democrat

So, we have the telco's and realtors with a slight bias towards the right, and we have labor, banks and lawyers solidly behind the dems. Personally Id rather be whored out to realtors and telcos than the theiving unions and lawyers.

What about this one?

[naich]

"We are also aware of no patent lawsuit against Linux. Ever. Anywhere,"... and as he said that Microsoft released the flying monkeys...

http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20071011205044141 [groklaw.net]