Re: GPLv3 comedy unfolding -- Bentley: "Here We Go Again: Microsoft Inks Deal with Xandros"

[rjack]

Alexander Terekhov wrote:
> http://www.itbusinessedge.com/blogs/osb/?p=156
>
> ------
> Here We Go Again: Microsoft Inks Deal with Xandros
>
> Posted by Lora Bentley on June 4, 2007 at 4:32 pm

> Why would any company deliberately defy license terms? Because it can.

Ms. Bentley obviously loves her *own* answer to her rhetorical question.

Here's the real answer:

The patent provisions in the GPL license are a delusional fantasy of
Richard Stallman and Eben Moglen.

This from the esteemed Columbia Professor of Law:

"Licenses are not contracts: the work's user is obliged to remain within 
the bounds of the license not because she voluntarily promised, but 
because she doesn't have any right to act at all except as the license 
permits."

http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/enforcing-gpl.html

This from the Supreme Court of the United States:

"No formal granting of a license is necessary in order to give it 
effect. Any language used by the owner of the patent or any conduct on 
his part exhibited to another, from which that other may properly infer 
that the owner consents to his use of the patent in making or using it, 
or selling it, upon which the other acts, constitutes a license, and a 
defense to an action for a tort. Whether this constitutes a gratuitous 
license, or one for a reasonable compensation, must, of course, depend 
upon the circumstances; but the relation between the parties thereafter 
in respect of any suit brought must be held to be contractual, and not 
an unlawful invasion of the rights of the owner."; DE FOREST RADIO TEL. 
& TEL. CO. v. UNITED STATES, 273 U.S. 236 (1927).

In the ensuing *eighty years* not *one* Federal Court decision has ever 
successfully overuled this contractual principle -- not even *one*.
Yet as late as six months ago, Stallman and Moglen were still attempting 
to incorporate a term into the GPL3 declaring that it was not a contract.

Moglen has drafted absolutely moronic terms concerning patents into the 
text of the GPL -- *that* is why Microsoft ignores the GPL's terms.

Moglen has never attempted a principled defense to justify the blatant 
legal bullshit he has inserted into the GPL concerning patents.
He never will... Moglen utters some legal nonsense concerning patents 
and the GPL and the well oiled "free" and open source blogs who feed off 
this legal tripe instantly spring into action.

Repeat FUD often enough and it assumes a halo-like aura of truth in the 
minds of the gullible.

The socialist open source movement in the EU has beaten their breasts 
and whined about "interoperability" and Windows for years. Microsoft is 
now complying with their pleas for "interoperability" by offering mutual 
patent covenants. So why don't they just STFU and admit their goal is
Stallman's dream of abolishment of IP?. An alternative would be to 
obtain their own patents. If just 1% of their whining time was spent on
learning to apply for patents, they could disarm Microsoft. Remember 
Eolas? *That* scares the crap out of Microsoft.


rjack