On Fri, 2003-10-17 at 17:36, Geoff Thorpe wrote:
On October 17, 2003 11:56 am, Mike Hearn wrote:
In future please do not raise patents on this list. What we don't know, can't hurt us (as much).
IANAL, but I beg to differ.
I'm not either, but the advice I gave is based on similar discussions on lkml, which did have lawyers involved (at least, at some point).
First, Wine should be reasonably well protected against patent infringement, because (and I mean this in the nicest way possible) it doesn't actually *do* very much that could infringe.
If only that were the case. In practice, I expect we have to implement things covered by patents, even if it is only things like DirectMusic, techniques in D3D - hell, if MS can get a patent on NTFS they can get a patent on anything.
Secondly, in any rare instance where Wine itself *might* infringe on patents, the best course of action is to force the worms out of the intestines.
We probably cannot do that. If Microsoft implement a technology, so must we, it is inevitable. The reasoning is simple: the penalties for patent infringements are much higher if it can be shown you knew about the patent but ignored it.
Patent holders, for better or worse, must enforce their IP for it to remain valid.
I think you're thinking of trademarks. You do not need to enforce patents to keep them.
thanks -mike