9 Dec
2003
9 Dec
'03
5:20 p.m.
On Tue, 9 Dec 2003, Vizzini wrote:
On Mon, 2003-12-08 at 19:17, Rick Parrish wrote:
In any case the law is already broken.
Waldo Alvarez wrote:
In the United States, liability for patent infringement exists whether
or not you've been notified by the patent holder of such infringement.
In other words, if you accidentally step on someone else's IP, they will
be able to sue you for royalties whether or not it was your "fault".
It's a pure liability - no fault is required.
Let's keep with NTFS and FAT and with time design a new patent free
filesystem. If M$ complaints then we take away the drivers and ppl will be able to get
them from previous releases. The FSF did that with XMMS and patents with MP3s.
Works for me. Sort of like limping along on MP3s and GIFs until
patent/license free OGG and PNG support is ready. Furthermore, courts have a history of stiffer
penalites (i.e. higher
royalty payments) for infringers who *knew* they were infringing.
That's why you see "patent pending" on lots of manufactured items.
Bad. That means distributing NTFS and FAT in another release is asking for
more trouble.
Finally, as I said before, both developers and end
users are liable for
patent infringement.
With these points in mind, I think we need an official policy of
avoiding patents as much as we possibly can while retaining Windows
system compatibility. If this means (for example) defaulting to a
non-FAT, non-NTFS filesystem, that's what we have to do.
True. You are totally right!
I was thinking this yesterday. What about using an NTFS a little bit
modified. In a way you can reuse the code written for the drivers already
written and make the conversion easier. It won't be NTFS. I don't like
too much this but could be a solution.
The other choice I was thinking. What about finding some company that
already have the license to use the patents and put them in charge of the
drivers in exchange for some advising in ROS. They will not have to spend
a cent for it (except for the lawyer maybe) and will not have to write a
single line of code. I'm sure many will like the deal, even if there is
trouble in the future because getting in trouble could give them more money.
I prefer this choice as there will be not need to invent yet another
filesystem, ReactOS will be more compatible and everything can continue
the way it is.
The question is, How legal would it be?
Best Regards
Waldo Alvarez
-Vizzini
_______________________________________________
ros-general mailing list
ros-general(a)reactos.com
http://reactos.com/mailman/listinfo/ros-general