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> if you want to sue FB for patent infringement, you would be very unwise to continue using React. If you want to sue any company for patent infringement, you

> if you want to sue FB for patent infringement, you would be very unwise to continue using React. If you want to sue any company for patent infringement, you would be very unwise to continue using their software under most common licenses. The most-touted alternatives to React are plain MIT license with no patent grant at all, creating exactly the same risk. Why does the license that prevents you from being sued first get all the condemnation?

solomatov 9y ago
> The most-touted alternatives to React are plain MIT license with no patent grant at all IANAL, but as far as I understand, MIT license contains implicit patent grant.
- singron 9y ago
  If these projects are covered by Facebook patents, it doesn't matter if their license has a patent grant since they don't own rights to the Facebook patents.
  - kjsthree 9y ago
    Exactly! I have yet to see a solid walkthrough of how my situation is made worse because of an explicit patent grant. I believe the fear of a grant revocation also revoking the BSD copyright license has been thoroughly settled. If that were the case that would be an issue but FB themselves have put in writing that that is not the case.
- monocasa 9y ago
  That's never been tested in court, and requires some rather large leaps of thought.
  - solomatov 9y ago
    IANAL. There's case law in copyright law concerning implicit grants. We can assume that it's at least partially applicable to patents (See here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Implied_license https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Implied_license).
btown 9y ago
IANAL, but this commenter, whose profile claims he is a lawyer, says BSD carries an implicit grant which is broader in theory than Facebook's explicit one, but still has some untested characteristics: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9113515 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9113515
- notacoward 9y ago
  It's not just some characteristics that are unsettled. The same people braying about the legal risks of relying on an explicit but revocable patent license should be even more wary of anything implicit or assumed. Any lawyer pretending otherwise in a professional context would be flirting with malpractice.

solomatov 9y ago

> The most-touted alternatives to React are plain MIT license with no patent grant at all IANAL, but as far as I understand, MIT license contains implicit patent grant.

singron 9y ago
If these projects are covered by Facebook patents, it doesn't matter if their license has a patent grant since they don't own rights to the Facebook patents.
- kjsthree 9y ago
  Exactly! I have yet to see a solid walkthrough of how my situation is made worse because of an explicit patent grant. I believe the fear of a grant revocation also revoking the BSD copyright license has been thoroughly settled. If that were the case that would be an issue but FB themselves have put in writing that that is not the case.
monocasa 9y ago
That's never been tested in court, and requires some rather large leaps of thought.
- solomatov 9y ago
  IANAL. There's case law in copyright law concerning implicit grants. We can assume that it's at least partially applicable to patents (See here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Implied_license https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Implied_license).

btown 9y ago

IANAL, but this commenter, whose profile claims he is a lawyer, says BSD carries an implicit grant which is broader in theory than Facebook's explicit one, but still has some untested characteristics: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9113515 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9113515

notacoward 9y ago
It's not just some characteristics that are unsettled. The same people braying about the legal risks of relying on an explicit but revocable patent license should be even more wary of anything implicit or assumed. Any lawyer pretending otherwise in a professional context would be flirting with malpractice.