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The critical part is the employer disclaimerThe critical part is the employer disclaimerPosted May 24, 2004 7:38 UTC (Mon) by MathFox (guest, #6104)In reply to: The critical part is the employer disclaimer by mbp Parent article: Linus on documenting patch provenance
I was a little surprised that Linus didn't ask people to certify that the contribution is free of patent problems to the best of their knowledge.Don't forget that Linus is an European and that software patents are still unenforcable there. For him patents weren't a problem, he could make and distribute the first versions of Linux without a risk of running into patent problems. This also indicates that a declaration "I am unaware of patent problems" doesn't tell you a lot: For which countries is that declaration valid? How serious was the patent research? The only thing an "I'm unaware" declaration says with certainly is "I won't sue you for my own contribution". And the GPL implies that allready.
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The critical part is the employer disclaimer Posted May 24, 2004 11:31 UTC (Mon) by clugstj (subscriber, #4020) [Link] An "I am unaware of patent problems" declaration is not worth spit in ANYcountry. Also, if you don't believe in software patents, making them appear important is not a good idea.
The critical part is the employer disclaimer Posted May 24, 2004 20:22 UTC (Mon) by erwbgy (subscriber, #4104) [Link] I love this quote from Linus (in this month's Linux User and Developer):"I do not look up any patents on principle, because (a) it's a horrible waste of time and (b) I don't want to know. The fact is, technical people are better off not looking at patents. If you don't know what they cover and where they are, you won't be knowingly infringing on them. If somebody sues you, you change the algorithm or you just hire a hitman to whack the stupid git." He later noted that this "may not be legally tenable advice" :-)
The critical part is the employer disclaimer Posted May 25, 2004 0:27 UTC (Tue) by mbp (subscriber, #2737) [Link] Linus may have been born in Europe but he lives and works in California.
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