Five Linux Companies Buy Software Patents

An anonymous reader writes "In order to protect themselves against patent grabbing 'trolls,' major Linux companies are buying software patents through a nonprofit company called Open Invention Network. This nonprofit company will then offer royalty-free licenses to companies and individuals that agreed not to assert their own patents."

Do you have to have patents to join?

[RandoX]

Or can you agree not to assert future patents?

Maybe necessary

[external400kdiskette]

Whilst frivolous patent are inherently bad and shows the system doesn't work in the real world it might be a necessary defence to avoid future legal problems. So just hope they can stay non-profit :)

Patents are not a defence

[Gopal.V]

Mutually assured destruction with patents work when the other company you are dealing with is a technology company shipping real software which could violate one of your own. It just doesn't work when you are dealing with the modern lawyer companies which hold patents merely to sue the pants off the big/little/<whatever> guy who comes under their sights

IBM, Sony, Phillips and Novell aren't really Linux companies - they know that Free/Open/Libre software is the only way they are going to utilize the vastly under-utilized creative urges of the hackers of the world to fight their own enemies. GNU/Linux is just a primary weapon in their arsenal and they just want to keep it sharp.

Even more sadly, the more we use patents to fight patents, the less backing the fight against software patents is going to get. To quote:

They who would give up an essential liberty for temporary security, deserve neither.

Not an effective counter to threat of swpats

[Sanity]

What about all the non-linux open source projects, or the small companies that create innovative closed-source software?

Additionally, patent trolls are immune to this kind of patent pool since they tend not to create any software themselves and are therefore not vulnerable to software patents.

The real fix here is to wrestle the patent system back from the "intellectual property maximalists" and get rid of patents on software which do not motivate innovation (just try to name one useful innovation in software we wouldn't have were it not for software patents - they are occasionally a by-product of innovation, but never a motivator for it).

Re:So much for -- IT'S FOR DEFENSE

[Anonymous Coward]

This is for DEFENSE. It's like having an agressive neighboring country that wants your land and spends a lot on weapons. If you don't defend yourself, you might get overrun (many, many examples throughout history).

If the current business climate includes tons and tons of dubious patents which can threaten your livelihood, your best defense is to get as many of your own as you can so when they come after you, you go after them -- a kind of MAD (Mutually Assured Destruction). IBM has been doing this for years and most companies (except for SCO) seem to not try to assert IP issues with IBM.

I think the real reason for software patents was the LEA -- Lawyer Enrichment Act. (Attorneys are the main ones getting rich of of these BS patents.)

Re:Patents are not a defence

[xigxag]

^ True, but this may accomplish two things:

1) Keep the alliance members in bed with one other, similar to the way that royal families throughout time have used marriage bonds to create extended relationships and maintain peace among kingdoms.

2) Dissuade Microsoft from exercising its "nuclear option" in a desperate measure to fend off the rise of Linux.

Re:So much for -- IT'S FOR DEFENSE

[Anonymous Coward]

I bet if Microsoft was the subject of discussion, you wouldn't be saying that.