[plug] M$ to patent FAT and charge for it

[Bernd Felsche]

On Fri, Dec 05, 2003 at 04:03:30PM +0800, Steve Boak wrote:
> This sounds trivial, as in we just stop using FAT, right?

> Unfortunately not - as I understand, being a long time digital
> camera user,  almost all digital cameras and associated card
> readers etc use the FAT file system. Trying to change to another
> file system when there is currently literally hundreds of millions
> of devices out there based on FAT already is not going to be easy.

> M$ has a captive market.

No they don't. In order to obtain a Patent, one must have an
*inventive* step in the _device_. 

  a) FAT is not a device.
    (Just like an integer!)
and
  b) there's no inventive step.
     (Technology was natural development of prior art)

-- 
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