[diskussion] Microsoft sues TomTom over FAT patents

[Kenneth Ekdahl]

Ett alternativ är ju att gå över till Minix eller liknande filsystem som
tar väldigt lite kod och resurser. En bra idé då kan vara att skriva en
driver till Windows för Minix också som man kan installera tillsammans
med de andra sakerna man installerar till hårdvaran, då kan övergången
bli smidig. Man slipper då bryta mot GPL och kan räcka långfingret åt
Mircosoft.

On Mon, Mar 16, 2009 at 01:33:27PM +0100, Daniel Stenberg wrote:
> On Mon, 16 Mar 2009, Jonas Islander wrote:
> 
> >> "[,,,] Make no mistake, this is intended to force Tom Tom to violate the 
> >> GPL, or change to Microsoft embedded software."
> >
> > That's interesting. Could you elaborate? How would Tom Tom be forced to 
> > violate the GPL?
> 
> GPLv2 paragraph 7 forbids companies to do "secret patent payments" for 
> software that are then distributed as GPLv2.
> 
> Alas: If they pay, they violate GPLv2. If they don't pay, MS strikes down on 
> them.
> 
> According to said Mr Allison, the reason Microsoft sues now and not before 
> (the VFAT patent is after all 11 years old!), is that all other companies have 
> paid these secret fees to Microsoft. (according to a quote tributed to him on 
> the wikipedia page for this). Personally I wonder how mr Allison can now about 
> how all companies have done...
> 
> Groklaw, as always, is a fine reasource:
> 
>  	http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20090305203031867
> -- 
> 
>   / daniel.haxx.se
> 
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-- 
  Kenneth Ekdahl (sensei at sensei.nu)
  http://sensei.nu http://blog.sensei.nu