On 11/18/2006 11:32 AM, Chris Bonner wrote:

<mailto:susedevel@torchlighttech.com>> wrote:

OpenSuSE has no such third party software nor does it have corporate support. If you have problems you have to check out the forums. It'd be REALLY hard for Microsoft to force their patents on OpenSuse mainly because it's open source. Also, do you think the community will allow that. None of us are going to give MS the money for patents. As long as we remain open source, microsoft will be really limited. We are a community and can do what we want w or w/o microsoft. Even if Novell wanted them to, as a maintainer, they must heed to the GPL. Being such a large company, if they don't, everyone will know.

I completely agree.

That's why it's so creepy that Microsoft mentioned OpenSuse so specifically in "Microsoft’s Patent Pledge for Individual Contributors to openSUSE.org" How can this be legally binding? Did openSUSE.org sign some kind of agreement with Microsoft? Is Novell allowed to enter into legal agreements on openSUSE.org's behalf? Or is this all just smoke and hot air? Saill --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

On 11/18/2006 04:06 PM, Peter Flodin wrote:

So I would say, yes Novell can enter in to agreements in regard to openSUSE.org

Got it. I guess. So this is not true then: On 11/18/2006 10:02 AM, susedevel@torchlighttech.com wrote:

OpenSuSE has no such third party software nor does it have corporate support. If you have problems you have to check out the forums. It'd be REALLY hard for Microsoft to force their patents on OpenSuse mainly because it's open source.

The preamble to "Microsoft’s Patent Pledge for Individual Contributors to openSUSE.org" states:

From time to time, individual developers wish to contribute their authored code to openSUSE.org projects. It is Microsoft’s intent that this pledge be legally binding and enforceable as to such individual contributors according to the terms below. I agree that "openSUSE.org" doesn't sound like a legal entity. Is Microsoft talking about people who send electronically transmit code to the IP address that hosts openSUSE.org? What about people who instead submit code to the slightly different Novell IP address that hosts forge.novell.com. Geez, you'd think with all those lawyers they'd be a little more thorough.

Finally the only legal agreement I can find between Novell and independent contributors to OpenSUSE and NovellForge is as follows:

User Submissions

Any material, information or other communication You transmit or post to this web site (including, but not limited to, ideas, suggestions, feedback, bug identification, content, code, copyrighted materials or materials protected by other intellectual property laws) will be considered non-confidential and non-proprietary communications. Novell will have no obligations with respect to the communications. Novell and its designees will be free to copy, disclose, distribute, incorporate and otherwise use the communications and all data, images, sounds, text and other things embodied therein for any and all commercial or non-commercial purposes.

So anything that anyone sends to OpenSUSE or NovellForge immediately becomes the property of Novell. Novell itself has no special legal relationship with it's contributors. Therefore, I don't understand how Microsoft can purport to have such a relationship through an agreement reached with Novell. Seems like Novell's giving away something that doesn't belong to them. By the way, I'm not interested in fighting, quite the opposite. The way I see it, Novell has left Suse in a dark dead-end alley with a mean bully. I'm looking for unlocked doors to escape through.

Pflodo Peter Flodin

Saill --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org