Torvalds attacks Microsoft: show us the 235 Linux patent violations
By John Pospisil
Well, the Linux community might not have the money and legal fire power of Microsoft, but it’s not going to take Microsoft’s recent accusations that Linux violates patents lying down.
Linus Torvalds, the man behind Linux, has come out fighting, telling Microsoft that it’s more likely that Windows violates patents, and that if Microsoft is going to accuse Linux of violating patents, it should put or shut up.
Earlier in the week Microsoft claimed that Linux violated 235 of its patents. According to Microsoft, the Linux kernel violates 42 patents, the Linux interface violates 65, OpenOffice violates 45, email clients in Linux breach 15, and other assorted programs total out to another 68 violations.
Torvalds told Information Week that if that Microsoft’s proprietary Windows operating system was subjected to the same scrutiny as his open source operating system, it would be more likely that Windows would be found to be violating patents held by other companies.
Torvalds pointed out that basic operating system theory was more or less set by the late 1960s.
“IBM probably owned thousands of really ‘fundamental’ patents,” he explained. ”The fundamental stuff was done about half a century ago and has long, long since lost any patent protection.”
Torvalds has a simple solution. Microsoft should put or shut up. Microsoft should list the patents it claims Linux violates, so that the open source community can either rewrite the offending code or test the legitimacy of Microsoft’s claims in court.
“So the whole, ‘We have a list and we’re not telling you,’ itself should tell you something. Don’t you think that if Microsoft actually had some really foolproof patent, they’d just tell us and go, ‘nyaah, nyaah, nyaah!’,” said Torvalds.
Well said Linus.
While Microsoft now says that it won’t litigate, its attacks on Linux are just poor form. If anything Microsoft should be grateful to the open source community for creating real competition for its otherwise monopolistic business (not forgetting of course that Apple also provides competition).
Related:
Entry was posted
on Wednesday, May 16th, 2007 at 12:19 pm
under
Read more entries by John Pospisil.
Stumble It!
May 16th, 2007
i have been saying the same thing for a long time, microsoft should consider how many patents it violates before they start throwing rocks, i’m sure the court can have them ordered to open their source for investigation to check what patents they violate
this whole thing may have been carefully planned for a long time, but they have forgotten some very important things, like the people, do they seriously think that any linux user is going to start using windows because they have a list? even if they do win a court battle, i won’t use the crap they sell
May 17th, 2007
Subject: MSPatentClaims[RICO Act(MS&BestBuy){EU vs. MS[Mario Monti]}]
MS OS source code which uses my compiler without paying me could never receive a patent.
The Delaware laws I took in my code calc before I founded the patented Microsoft system.
The copyright protection is what secures but Microsoft is interested in organized crime.
With kind regards.
May 30th, 2007
“we have a list”
Anybody heard of a Senator named McCarthy?
The booz did him in.
July 11th, 2007
Really, has anyone seen any of the conferences by Mac where they interrogated Vista? There’s a LOT of similarities between the two aesthetically. Besides this people use Linux for a reason.. Windows sucks. And if anything happened no one would use Windows. Just hop over on a mac or get some new OS would pop up.
January 4th, 2008
Linux is here to stay!
The one that is hell-bent on greed will be overcome by hard working unified people everywhere. When good people come together & share their ideas, ambitions are implied through unothodox ways for the common good of each other.
Most people don’t know about Linux, we are ignorant, only reason most of the time is that Windows all ways ships with a new PC & we have given the golden egg and incited that ambition to Microsoft.
We need to teach & inspire our children right!
LINUX- sends a message that most people are aware of, a positive one, unity, teaches us to share, reinforces accomplishment, gets us talking, opens our eyes, makes us all open, openness to ideas & suggestions.
We are all equal but we all have something to offer, each other.