So earlier this week, Microsoft dropped the a couple of Fat Boys on open source software companies saying that they are violating 235 of their patents. If they decide to detonate that nuke by actually suing someone, then the effects could be far reaching. IBM is the 40,000 pound gorilla in the patent world, so it begs the question. If Microsoft throws the first volley, does IBM fire back? I would bet good money the Microsoft is violating at least a few of Big Blue’s patents.

Regardless of that issue, Microsoft’s patent party raises a bigger question…are software patents really the best thing for software? I read an article in my Games for Windows magazine the other day. They were interviewing John Carmack (creator of Doom) and he was talking a bit on patents. He said that not too far back he was working on an algorithm (now known as Carmack’s Reverse) and a little before he published it another company swept in and patented the same process. Now the two companies went about solving it in completely different ways, but the fact that the “other guy” finished first meant that Mr. Carmack had to either stop work altogether or license their patent (they ended up “working it out”). Does that seem right? Its not as if Mr. Carmack was stealing the other company’s process. He made his own without any knowledge of how the other company did theirs.

The point is when two entities come up with two solutions to the same problem, it seems odd that one gets to go to market, and the other doesn’t. What is patentable: the final result or how they got there? In my opinion it should be “how they got there”. As I learned in calculus, the answer isn’t what is important…its how you got there that is graded. The same should be for software patents.

So back to the original subject. Is Microsoft losing money because of open source software? Yes.

Should Microsoft sue? Well that depends on how the open source community is infringing. Did a former Microsoft employee take some code and plug it into the Linux kernel, or did a an Open Office ninja break into the Redmond building and steal it, or did the programmers of Linux develop their own way of doing the same thing? If it is one of the first two, then, I believe, Microsoft has every right to sue (and the ninjas need to be prosecuted…if you can find them). However, in the much more likely third scenario…I don’t think MS has a leg to stand on.

(Side note: What I find most interesting about the whole thing is that the biggest software company in the world is so scared of open source that they are resorting to their legal guns rather than standard business practices)

Heck, in today’s world everything is patented. I wouldn’t be surprised if I am violating some patent by typing on my keyboard right now. And I am sure someone somewhere owns the patent to the “textbox”. They are just biding their time until they can cause every website in the world to pay them royalties. Where does it end?

If everyone who owns software patents begins to sue anyone with a similar idea, then the end result is gonna be a lot less creative software, and that just isn’t good for anyone.

What do y’all think? Where do you see this going long term? Will MS sue? If they do, what do you think the long term affects will me?