On Tue, 2004-08-10 at 09:54, Thom Paine wrote:
Isn't this GMail's claim to fame? So MS owns Google now?
On Tue, 2004-08-10 at 09:48, Rui Miguel Seabra wrote:
Searches will extend across all data like e-mail, photos, Word. "We're creating things," he says.
You forgot, Microsoft is laying the ground work to patent all of these ideas. So in 2007 when the patent is granted they can come back and extort all those companies that have implemented and been using the concepts for all these years.
It's all about prior art. Now Microsoft can point to that memo and
claim prior art.
Maybe this is the time to look into a linux patent site that uses Creative Commons or Groklaw or some combination of services to patent Linux innovation under a common umbrella. It could be a service or site where the common person could put forward ideas that are then patented under a GPL group.
As the US is starting to force other countries to follow their laws about patents, it may be time to do this.
I was thinking about this on the weekend after reading about Australia being forced to bring in DMCA type laws for part of a trade agreement with the US.
Here is a link to a project to bust patents. <http://www.eff.org/patent/>
It would be fun to turn the tides on Microsoft with a Linux Patent.
If this isn't an issue, look at Munich stopping it's move to Linux under suspicion of legal hassles.
I hate to say it but it is time that Linux advocates started using the patent system as a defense as well. It is time for developers to make a index or library of prior work to protect their principles.
-- Robin Laing
