[lug] Microsoft charging fee for each digicam made

[Ferdinand Schmid]

I would expect them to also enforce a patent fee for Linux since it can
read
and write fat.  FreeDOS, BSD, oter OSs use it also.  So we either all
need to
pay a MS patent fee for the OS or for the product (each floppy disk,
Flash
memory, ...).  

It appears that this could be very far reaching - much beyond the
digicams.

Ferdinand

--On Saturday, December 06, 2003 06:55:45 PM -0700 "Timothy C. Klein"
<teece at silverklein.net> wrote:

<snip>
> I don't.  They make plenty of revenue without patents.  They don't
> file for them to protect a product -- their monopoly does that for
> them better than anything else could.  The patents are gravy -- wait
> until FAT is so widespread that people who had been using it for free
> can't imagine switching.  THEN decide to enforce the patent and
> require licensing. Just to add a little more gravy to the revenue
> stream, and also as an anti-competitive cudgel.
> 
> Tim
> --
> ==============================================
> == Timothy Klein || teece at silverklein.net   ==
> == ---------------------------------------- ==
> == Hello_World.c: 17 Errors, 31 Warnings... ==
> ==============================================
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--
Ferdinand Schmid
Architectural Energy Corporation
Celebrating over 20 Years of Improving Building Energy Performance
http://www.archenergy.com