- From: Theo de Raadt <deraadt@cvs.openbsd.org>
- Date: Sun, 30 Sep 2001 13:56:57 -0600
- To: www-patentpolicy-comment@w3.org
I am disgusted. This is exactly the type of hastles that has resulted in free operating systems being prevented from implementing the VRRP virtual router redundancy protocol. It is very clear where this will go. Once there are web protocols that are protected in this way, free browsers will not be able to have support for them. note that many of us consider the "free" in a term such as "free software" to also mean you can sell it also, if you choose, most such licensing terms in the future therefore will not permit sale of such free products, thus locking us out from competing with the few who are pushing for RAND. I know how we can fight such W3C ideas. The minute they come up with a patented version of a protocol, write a free one that is different. Dilute the perfection of their idea. Simply remove the patented parts from it, and make an imcompatible but at the same time maximally conflicting version, that appears to be the same thing, but has differences. Make their strict definitions irrelevant, since their goal with this patent is to make strictly compliant versions impossible without payment. Anyone at W3C who supports this, wants there to be fewer implementations of browsers.
Received on Sunday, 30 September 2001 15:53:32 UTC