On 11/24/2010 02:32 PM, jsa wrote:
Pam over at Groklaw has this to say:
Quote: No doubt we'll find out in time. It is being reported that what it will get is 882 patents. Blech. How many does Novell own? Is that all of them? If so, will we get to watch Son of SCO, but with patents this time? But keep in mind that the WordPerfect litigation could be in this picture, and I wonder if this could be a kind of deal to tactfully settle it out, with Microsoft paying to end it this way? $450 million isn't a lot, though, so how could it be all of the patents? Nevertheless, selling any patents to Microsoft is like selling your baby to a pedophile in the limited sense that you can reasonably predict what it will do with the acquisition.
Novell's CEO is telling "valued customers" in an email that it's a merger agreement, that Novell believes "the transaction is great news for our customers," that all contracts will be honored, and that the IP sale to Linux's sworn enemy "will not impact customers", whatever that means. Not a word about Linux and what it means for SUSE. Not a word to reassure the community. --endquote
The curiosity to me is why have all these seemingly reasonable minded people having picked up on those couple of sentences about the intellectual property aspects of the deal. It had never really crossed my mind before I saw Pascal's announcement. To me it was like seeing a fish in your bathtub. It certainly stood out. I'm not worried about opensuse, I'm more curious about "what the hell are they talking about?" -- David C. Rankin, J.D.,P.E. Rankin Law Firm, PLLC 510 Ochiltree Street Nacogdoches, Texas 75961 Telephone: (936) 715-9333 Facsimile: (936) 715-9339 www.rankinlawfirm.com -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org