Andy Green wrote:
That's a valid point, but in the US anyone can sue anyone else over
just about anything and it's not over till the appeals are used up.
How can you be sure that someone won't claim ownership of some obscure
parts of Linux and sue over that - again?
What is your point here? Because on any given car journey you might get
rear-ended you should just revv it up and drive it into a wall?
My point is that the mp3 patent suit against Microsoft is an oddball
case, not really settled yet, and not relevant to the real issue which
is how to legally obtain the components you need to use together.
If MSFT have a secret stock of attack patents that can't be helped. A
Meteorite could land on our heads any time. But for sure MP3 will get
someone like Redhat attacked at the moment seeing as Microsoft are
attacked successfully.
Exactly, so the question for any potential user is, how do they get a
complete, legal system that does everything they need and are willing to
meet the licensing requirement for. In the mp3 case I'm perfectly
willing to spend some small amount towards licensing and in fact have
(probably like most of us) done so as a part of the cost of several
devices and OS's. I'm not particularly interested in arranging my own
licensing with some vast number of individual copyright/patent holders
though, so what is the appropriate way to do this and deliver it
together with GPL'd content?
--
Les Mikesell
lesmikesell@xxxxxxxxx
