[plug] Sun favours patents; shoots self in foot

[Alex Nordstrom]

Here's another one on the topic of software patents, which I thought 
people might find interesting. I guess we've all heard about Kodak 
essentially claiming the rights to Java.

http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20041003041632172

Here is one of the patents in question (they're all pretty much alike):

http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?d=PALL&p=1&u=/netahtml/srchnum.htm&r=1&f=G&l=50&s1='5206951'.WKU.&OS=PN/5206951&RS=PN/5206951

(The USPTO also needs to patent `method for needlessly obfuscating 
URLs'.)

I just happened to stumble across the following in the blog of Jonathan 
Schwartz, President and COO of Sun Microsystems, written less than a 
week ago:

    ``Now, a few weeks ago, the CEO of one of the more popular open 
    source companies called and asked me to support their stance on the
    invalidation of software patents. /.../ He was looking for
    broadscale support for invalidation of software patents - not
    spurious patents, not the kind that are acquired for litigation [is
    there any other kind?], but the whole concept of software patents.

    And so I asked - `I'm not sure why you're asking my support to
    invalidate what Sun's stockholders have invested tens of billions of
    dollars to create, when you'd cringe if I told you to give away your
    largest asset, your copyright and brand.' His answer, `You just
    don't understand.' He was right, I didn't and don't."

http://blogs.sun.com/roller/page/jonathan/20040930

Maybe--just maybe--now he does.

-- 
Alex Nordstrom
http://lx.n3.net/
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