Trolls line up

Summary: How patent trolls and FRAND, which Microsoft hired lobbyists to promote, are gradually putting GNU/Linux under more of a siege

NOW THAT Red Hat is a GNU/Linux leader (Google does well with Linux/Android) and SUSE is rapidly declining, it becomes more imperative for Microsoft to hammer hard with lawsuits on Red Hat. MOSAID and Acacia have Microsoft ties and they both took a punch at Red Hat.

Just before the weekend we found this new press release about a new lawsuit against Red Hat.

According to the lawsuit, Red Hat and Gluster have infringed the patent by making and selling infringing software products for managing data on computer networks.

Twin Peaks is represented by intellectual property attorneys Christopher Banys and Richard C. Lin from the Palo Alto, Calif., office of The Lanier Law Firm.

Not to be confused with Microsoft's troll Lanier.

In other news, another patents hoarder, RPX, will give us "More trolls!" (Microsoft is a member) because as patent folks put it: "RPX Corp revenues rose over 60% during fiscal year 2011, the defensive patent aggregator announced on Monday. GAAP net income was up by over 100% to $29.1 million, while the firm spent $99 million on patent acquisitions.

“The FFII presents a paper on the proposed recognition of ICT specifications from consortia.”
      --FFII's statement "What with the announcement of the Alcatel-Lucent deal last week and a share price that has climbed by 46% since the start of the year, it has been a pretty decent start to 2012 for RPX. Some, at least, believe the good times could be set fair for a while yet."

What does RPX make? Nothing.

Industry is having hidden taxes added to it. Some people are getting very rich at the expense of everyone else and the FFII fights back by stating: "The Consumer Committee (IMCO) within the European Parliament is considering an overhaul of the current standardisation system in Europe. The FFII presents a paper on the proposed recognition of ICT specifications from consortia."

This relates to what we wrote earlier about FRAND. The goal is to make Free software more expensive, Red Hat included. More on that in the next post... ⬆