Microsoft prohibits GPLed work via licensing of CIFS standards

[Alex Hudson]

On Sat, 2002-04-06 at 12:10, Xavi Drudis Ferran wrote:
> > > Can someone tell me whether we should expect this tactic against any Free
> > > Software .net implementations?  Thanks, MJR.
>
> And, to Alex, RAND is incompatible with free software, and if it wasn't we should check 
> the exact terms of the ECMA policy (is M$ forced to diclose/license all patents, 
> or can they claim later they didn't realise they had a patent that blocks 
> the standard?). 

I wasn't suggesting it was acceptable. The question was, can a
patent/licence combination stop Free Software developers from developing
a .net implementation. The answer is no - Microsoft currently do not
have the aggressive patents needed to make it work. What patents they
might have are more like annoyances, than actual road-blocks.

Cheers,

Alex.
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