Patent ruling forces Office upgrades (ZDNet)

[Posted January 31, 2006 by corbet]

ZDNet UK reports that, as the result of a software patent ruling, Microsoft is forcing Office users to upgrade to a new, non-infringing version. "The question for companies, though, is if they are exposing themselves to potential legal liability if they don't quickly move to the new software. Microsoft promises to indemnify customers from third-party patent claims, but [Gartner analyst Michael] Silver said the license terms also require customers to 'immediately' move to any new noninfringing version that Microsoft releases."

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Posted Feb 2, 2006 22:07 UTC (Thu) by fergal (subscriber, #602) [Link]

I argued about patents with the owner of my previous company and used the Eolas vs MS case as an example. He said that MS would protect it's customers from any negative effects. I'm gonna have to dig out his email address and send him this :)