So...can't demand royalties from Linux companies because the GPL forbids them from paying them.....but can't sue the customers because they're all Microsoft customers. That's a sticky situation!

Companies and governments are also abandoning MS Office in large numbers, as they mandate the use of the Open Document Format.

We used to say it in Cheshire and we also say it in Kent. So it's now patented and if those 4 letters turn up anywhere at all, me and Steve .... erm, old 6598, will come round your house and play at being monkeys.

You have been warned.

As it's another thread about Microsoft saying, we know you have violated some 235 pixie patents, it's merged into the big ol' thread in News.

oH mY g0dz! l1NuX 1nfR1ng3S on mS p4t3Nts!!! LETS USE VISTA!!!!!!

... not.

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LOL... Exactly.

I switched to Linux because I hated Windows.

I hated Windows because it never worked properly.

I loathe Micropatch because of their business practices.

Do they think they can scare me into switching back??

ROFLMAO at their IGNORANCE!!

Linux couldn't possibly contain MS code because it works.
So keep lying, Baldmer. You're more full of BS than Gates!

I concur. Let me just write that down one more time....

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(so sue me!)

2c from me, no charge

given a couple of things:

1. courts rule and uphold the M$ patents (which from what I've read is pretty unlikely)
2. the real big dogs (industry that relies on linux for infrastructure) doesn't sway some greasy politician/judge to put the M$ suit on its @ss

how exactly are they going to prove origination?

there is more required than holding a patent to enforce IP. fundamentally IP laws exist to protect _invention_ and I think it would be pretty damn difficult for MS to prove they created anything _before_ it was available in the open source world.

then, if they get all that working, and indeed try and impose a royalty on linux (OS/kernel whatever) how long before a real antitrust suit is successful against MS? we're not talking about web browsing and media playing anymore.

well, as if I needed another reason to hate microsoft.

It's about time we got another long rambling ROTFL post from Steve...er, old6598. Bet that's his password to get into The Bunker at Redmond where they plan their futile war against GNU/Linux.

I just cant wait to Ballmer call me at home and ask me to pay the royalty for using slackware....

Micro$oft should not go down, we need some example of what not to do with computers . But i sure hope they get some pain for what their doing.

I think we should donate some money so that Ballmer can get a woman and let the steam off...

Can we be sued if Ballmer has a collapse because of Linux??

9 pages of interesting reading.

hyakutake

Even good old Billy Goat Gates doesn't have the money to sue us all. And, not only us, but every distribution of *nix.

What they are essentially saying is that: I gave you a book I bought somewhere, and the book store sues you because its "not supposed to be free".

you can continue to get educated by me at this thread:

http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...d.php?t=553281

Ballmer wrote XENIX in the late 1970s and early 1980s, hence UNIX is all Microsoft code, hence everyone should be paying MS at least 50 dollars for their use of UNIX. So lets bring this up to another level:

that would be 50 dollars times 5 billion users (world population) = 250 billion extra dollars. So start contributing....

Haha...

Ballmer couldn't write his own name unless his Mom sharpened the Crayolas first.

Microsoft didn't write Xenix. They purchased it from AT&T in 1979.

So if they purchased it, UNIX is all theirs. So start paying up folks before ballmer changes his mind and asks for 100 dollars, so bringing it up to another level that would make an extra 500 billion dollars. Thank you......

Heh. Marijuana must be really cheap in your part of the world.

Microsoft transferred ownership of Xenix to SCO in 1987.