Intellectual property Toolkit
Story: Linux users could face European patent threat
No threat at all then really
If Microsoft actually thought they could gain anything from suing Linux users or suppliers then they would do it. No they won't even divulge which patents are supposedly infringed upon because they know there are thousands of people world wide involved in open source who would simply destroy their patent claims by discovering prior art or simply engineer out the infringements. No all Microsoft can do is make hollow claims about how they are so generous not to pursue patent infringements, and how they are open sources friend because of it. Lets face it the last company that attempted to mess with Linux ended up with such bad publicity and ill feeling towards it that its just filed for bankruptcy. Microsoft know that any attack against open source would create such bad publicity for itself that they dare not try. After all they haven't been having a good time of it recently with the EU ruling against them and failing to railroad OOXML through the ISO voting process. Maybe if they rethink their ways they may be able to benefit from cooperation with open source communities the way IBM and SUN does rather than threatening everyone all the time and gaining nothing.
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