[Fsfe-ie] Swpat: possible players

[Ian Clarke]

James Heald wrote:

> I've been looking through websites, trying to identify more potential 
> players.
> 
> One thing which is very important to think about is that any contacts 
> with the powers-that-be will be have far more impact if they can be 
> firmly established as a joint Free Software/SME initiative, rather than 
> just  "free-love, open-standard, freeware fanatics" as one UK lawyer 
> tried to marginalise Open Sourcers.

Absolutely, one of the greatest dangers of highlighting the threat 
software patents are to free software is that it obscures the fact that 
they are just as great a threat to more conventional revenue generating, 
voter employing commercial software companies.

Framing the argument in ethical terms is only valuable when preaching to 
the converted, although I suspect I am preaching to the converted in 
pointing that out :-)

Ian.