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Microsoft has filed complaints against TomTom in both the U.S. District Court in Seattle and with the International Trade Commission, alleging that the GPS gadget maker has infringed eight of its patents. Is this another day, another tech patent suit story? If it were any other plaintiff, perhaps. Microsoft is usually at the receiving end of IP lawsuits, so this case is a definite deviation from the norm. Because three of the patents in question are based on Linux technology, the action has raised hackles in the open source community.
Microsoft has been able to register many questionable patents only because the US patent office is not up to the task of dealing with the nature or volume of applications. No mathematical formula may be patented according to statute. Programming is mathematics. Boolean algebra. Relational theory. The fundamentals of computer science.
Microsoft's only interest in challenging ownership over, for example, the fat16 file system (as opposed to file systems in general) is to discourage the interoperability of hardware and software to limit competition in the market place. File systems were pioneered long before Gates got going. Microsoft should be paying royalties to the developer of the first file system (never mind the first fat16). Fat-16 is nothing more than a standard used on open technology, it is not a technology in itself. Microsoft did not invent the "Winchester Disk" did they?
Nuisance legal actions, as a tool of commerce, against innocent bystanders like TomTom should be opposed vigorously by the entire FOSS community. Microsoft has a history of shabby dealing in the industry and it deserves to be slapped down smartly! Microsoft is asking distributors and users of Linux to pay royalties for up to 235 of its junk 'patents', in order to spread fear, uncertainty and doubt and make people hesitant to use open source. This method of conducting business is bad for everyone.
Microsoft is trying to enforce imaginative IP patents through litigation in order to herd-in users. They should try offering competive software that people will buy on value. Microsoft should be charged and heavily fined for its continual bad-faith actions.
I assert that everything Microsoft has developed that stems from GPL is now, ipso facto, GPL. Since Microsoft C is just an 'extension' of ANSI C...Microsoft C is now a GPL product. Microsoft C++ is an 'extension fo ANSI C++...Microsoft C++ is now a GPL product. Sun Microsystems aptly defended Java, Microsoft J++ is toasty. Continuing along this line, everything that has been developed by Microsoft, subsequent to Microsoft C is GPL {cf. The C Programming Language, Prentice-Hall, Englewood Cliffs, N.J. 1978}.
Microsoft's foray into VOIP will no doubt see them try to patent voice-to-ip technology, which amounts to little more than old-fashioned analogue-to-digital conversion using open hardware (sory, that is Verison v Vonage, but same idea). VOIP originated in 1974 with Department of Defence engineers who were developing the Arpanet (pre Internet)! The first VOIP call was made from the back of a computer laden government van parked San Francisco. That patent (if there ever was one) ran out back in 2004!
TomTom should not worry; Anaximander owns the patent to maps ~ and if 'Anax' says nothing, Thomas T is so home-free, eh?
Microsoft's only interest in challenging ownership over, for example, the fat16 file system (as opposed to file systems in general) is to discourage the interoperability of hardware and software to limit competition in the market place. File systems were pioneered long before Gates got going. Microsoft should be paying royalties to the developer of the first file system (never mind the first fat16). Fat-16 is nothing more than a standard used on open technology, it is not a technology in itself. Microsoft did not invent the "Winchester Disk" did they?
Nuisance legal actions, as a tool of commerce, against innocent bystanders like TomTom should be opposed vigorously by the entire FOSS community. Microsoft has a history of shabby dealing in the industry and it deserves to be slapped down smartly! Microsoft is asking distributors and users of Linux to pay royalties for up to 235 of its junk 'patents', in order to spread fear, uncertainty and doubt and make people hesitant to use open source. This method of conducting business is bad for everyone.
Microsoft is trying to enforce imaginative IP patents through litigation in order to herd-in users. They should try offering competive software that people will buy on value. Microsoft should be charged and heavily fined for its continual bad-faith actions.
I assert that everything Microsoft has developed that stems from GPL is now, ipso facto, GPL. Since Microsoft C is just an 'extension' of ANSI C...Microsoft C is now a GPL product. Microsoft C++ is an 'extension fo ANSI C++...Microsoft C++ is now a GPL product. Sun Microsystems aptly defended Java, Microsoft J++ is toasty. Continuing along this line, everything that has been developed by Microsoft, subsequent to Microsoft C is GPL {cf. The C Programming Language, Prentice-Hall, Englewood Cliffs, N.J. 1978}.
Microsoft's foray into VOIP will no doubt see them try to patent voice-to-ip technology, which amounts to little more than old-fashioned analogue-to-digital conversion using open hardware (sory, that is Verison v Vonage, but same idea). VOIP originated in 1974 with Department of Defence engineers who were developing the Arpanet (pre Internet)! The first VOIP call was made from the back of a computer laden government van parked San Francisco. That patent (if there ever was one) ran out back in 2004!
TomTom should not worry; Anaximander owns the patent to maps ~ and if 'Anax' says nothing, Thomas T is so home-free, eh?
