An additional note

Posted Oct 13, 2007 6:58 UTC (Sat) by jfj (guest, #37917)
In reply to: An additional note by dag-
Parent article: Patent Infringement Lawsuit Filed Against Red Hat and Novell - Just Like Ballmer Predicted (Groklaw)

Exactly.

Also there is a general problem that many open source people do not accept software patents. As long as developers don't care about patents the Microsoft-Novell deal is nothing.

The best way to make the MS-Novell deal real and consequently give an advantage to Novell wrt other distributions, is to show a case where open source software *is* vunerable.

First of all, they have to show that software patents
1) Exist. Not only in USA.
2) Affect OSS
3) They can destroy your business if you don't take them seriously
4) They matter, whether you think the idea of patents is absurd or not.

Obviously, even Novell will have to pay some minimal patent fees in this case. But think of the profits latter!