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> By joining the Open Invention Network, Microsoft is offering its entire patent portfolio -- with the legacy exception of its Windows and desktop application c
by lukeschlather 8y ago
> By joining the Open Invention Network, Microsoft is offering its entire patent portfolio -- with the legacy exception of its Windows and desktop application code -- to all of the open-source patent consortium's members.
Is this sentence a meaningless tautology (application code is not the same thing as patents) or are there some older patents that Microsoft isn't donating? For example the VFAT patents?
- CrankyBear 8y agoIf a MSFT patent has any relevant to open-source programs, such as VFAT, they're now open to other OIN members.
- cyphar 8y agoWhat if someone writes some free software code to intentionally use one of their patents so it can be liberated?
- intern4tional 8y agoI think that's kind of the entire idea. Microsoft is expecting people to use the IP in the patents to write code for Linux now without fear of being sued. When they donated the IP to OIN, for all intensive purposes the patents were liberated given OIN's wide coverage.
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- zaarn 8y agoThat's not quite how patent licenses work. Even if you got a license for a patent for yourself and wrote free software for it, if someone else gets it they might need a patent license too, regardless of your project being free software. Your FOSS/FLOSS license might include a patent clause but that means you'd first need the right to issue licenses for the patent, in case you don't, the clause is void.
- cyphar 8y agoIf the OIN patent agreemnent doesn't allow licensing patents to downstream users (Apache or GPLv3 style) then it would be completely useless wouldn't it? RedHat's users could still be sued even though RedHat is a member of the OIN.
- zaarn 8y agoAFAICT the OIN patent agreement does allow sublicensing, but you shouldn't assume that because a free implementation exists, the patent is now "liberated".
- danarmak 8y agoThis sentence seems to have been inserted by the ZDNet editor. The GlobeNewsWire article (to which this post has been redirected), and the original OIN PR (https://www.openinventionnetwork.com/pressrelease_details/?id=89 https://www.openinventionnetwork.com/pressrelease_details/?i...), don't have anything like it. It's not in the ZDNet article body either, just in the small lede under the header. The body instead says, > You see, Microsoft, with the major legacy exception of its Windows desktop and desktop application code, is an open-source company. It seems like an editing mistake or a badly worded statement.
- kemitchell 8y agoThat's some close reading! Good catch.