Bonum Certa Men Certa

Trolling Community Developers of GNU/Linux Via Patent Trolls -- Part I: The Big Corporations Are Largely Culpable

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Summary: First they came for our founders and leaders; then they came for non-corporate developers; who will be left to speak for the Free/libre software community?

THEY ATTACK our leaders (the gloves have come off; hi, IBM). So say various influential podcasts. It's pretty darn obvious. So why won't they also attack our developers? "Who's next?"



Last week we pointed out that they even try to cancel news sites (independent for the most part) like Phoronix by false accusations or guilt by association, a patently false association. Check present and past employers of the trolls. The people who are doing this aren't community members but corporate shills disguised as "manners". People from companies like Google and Red Hat...

"GNU/Linux won't be a platform of software freedom until/unless we can still do something to tackle key issues."Speaking of which, Red Hat was racking up lots of software patents while IBM aggressively lobbied for software patents, even European software patents (which the EPO isn't allowed to grant). European developers are under attack right about now. Silently. These software patents besiege constributors to GNU/Linux -- people don't work for some giant corporation like IBM. People who barely enjoy a salary...

Anti-community spiderIn this series, whose length is unknown at this point (it will certainly be rather long), we are going to explore and analyse a story we've sat on for quite some time in order to better protect sources and hamper patent trolls.

We have one request to make upfront; if you are reading this and you too have been subjected to similar trolling/shake-down, please contact us discreetly (E-mail can be done securely/confidentially). We won't spill the beans without prior approval from sources. Our sole goal is to safely illuminate/elucidate what's going on and explain the situation GNU/Linux is in amid corporate takeover from all angles. GNU/Linux won't be a platform of software freedom until/unless we can still do something to tackle key issues.

Part II, which will be less vague albeit still introductory, should be published soon. We've sought clearances.

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