[clue-talk] Microsoft Claims 235 Patents Violated

[dperkins at frii.com]

Until MS decides to identify which patents are being violated, I regard it
as more FUD.

I saw two comments regarding this but I don't know how valid either is. 
Eben Moglen from the FSF said that by distributing the vouchers, Microsoft
 must comply with the patent portion of the GPL.  If this is valid, MS can
no longer claim patent violation for GPLed software.

Someone else mentioned laches, which apparently means that if you are
aware of a violation and do nothing, you give up your right to complain. 
In other words, if you are aware that your patent is being violated and
you do nothing, your failure to protect your patent means you lose your
right to sue.  That might be limited to the case you know about, but if
you decide to stay quiet and let everyone use your patent so you can sue
everyone, you might not be able to sue anyone.  A lawyer could give
explain this much better.

Some of Microsoft's patents are of questionable quality.  I think they
just applied for or just received a patent for doing what sudo already
does.  Someone else applied for a patent on linked lists.  In many cases,
a patent is not truly valid until it has been tested in court.

According to the constitution, a patent must be useful and non-obvious. 
IF you have seen some of the patents over the last 200 years, I doubt that
useful has ever been used to determine a patent.  Non-obvious is a bit
harder, or should be.  What is non-obvious to a layman might be very
obvious to an expert.

Companies have sued users before for patent violations.  Ford wanted to
sell cars to the masses.  Cadillac et al. wanted to sell to the rich, and
they owned patents Ford needed.  They refused to cooperate with Ford, so
he just used the patents.  They sued Ford and the case went on for years. 
Then they decided to sue the users.  That infuriated the public, and
incidentally, the judge.  The court ruled in favor of Ford.  I don't know
the reasoning used by the judge, or if an appeal went to the Supreme
Court.