First GPL Lawsuit Settling out of Court
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In what must be one of the speediest copyright-infringement cases on record, Monsoon Multimedia has admitted to violating the GNU General Public License (GPL) and is entering settlement negotiations.
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Blog: One of the many companies defending itself against a patent lawsuit filed by Visto has settled for an undisclosed amount.
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An antitrust lawsuit against the guardian of the ICANN is thrown out.
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Between the lines The Free Software Foundation (FSF) appears to be polishing up its legal sabers over possible violations of the General Public License (GPL) by Microsoft.â¦
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Microsoft last week announced antitrust settlements with Novell and the Computer and Communications Industry Association (CCIA), ending years of legal wrangling.
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The U.S. Federal Trade Commission has settled a complaint against a company that owns patents to a widely used Ethernet standard, saying the patent owner was attempting to collect huge license fees despite a prior commitment to the contrary.The settlement with Negotiated Data Solutions, or N-Data, will protect computer users from higher prices and ensure competition, the FTC said in a news release.N-Data, in 2003, had obtained two Ethernet patents from Vertical Networks, a spin-off of National Semiconductor. N-Data attempted to collect larger patent license fees than National Semiconductor had negotiated with the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), a standards body, back in 1994, the FTC said.National promised the IEEE that if the group adopted a standard based on National&#39;s NWay technology, National would offer one-time licenses of US$1,0000 per company to computer manufacturers and sellers of products using the IEEE standard. But N-Data and Vertical Networks had begun collecting license fees &quot;far in excess&quot; of $1,000 per company, according to the FTC complaint.N-Data obtained the patents knowing about National&#39;s commitment, and realizing the computer industry had become committed to the standard, the FTC said. N-Data refused to comply with National&#39;s commitment, and it began demanding royalties after it became expensive and difficult for the industry to switch to another standard, the FTC said in its complaint.The settlement bars N-Data from enforcing the patents unless it has first offered the patent license based on the terms offered in 1994.In addition to higher prices, consumers would be hurt by N-Data because the company&#39;s actions would cast doubt on the reliability of standards-setting agreements, the FTC said. &quot;The cost of ignoring this particularly pernicious problem is too high,&quot; the commission majority wrote.Vertical Networks, which ceased operations after it turned the patent over to N-Data, had estimated that more than 70 percent of the world&#39;s Ethernet port shipments used the NWay Ethernet patents. In early 2002, Vertical Networks set letters to more than 60 companies demanding additional licensing fees, according to the FTC complaint.NWay technology allows two devices at opposite ends of a LAN link to exchange information and automatically configure themselves to optimize their communication, a process sometimes called autonegotiation. Standardizing on a single autonegotiation technology allowed devices made by different manufacturers to work with one another and with different generations of Ethernet equipment.N-Data, based in Chicago, didn&#39;t immediately respond to a request for comments on the FTC settlement.The FTC voted 3-2 to approve the settlement. N-Data violated federal law by engaging in unfair methods of competition, the FTC said.FTC Chairman Deborah Platt Majoras voted against the settlement, saying the majority didn&#39;t establish an unfair method of competition. &quot;The novel use of our consumer protection authority to protect large corporate members of a standard-setting organization is insupportable,&quot; she wrote in her dissent.
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Skirmish before Microsoft battle? The Software Freedom Law Center (SFLC) has filed the first US patent infringement case to defend the General Public License (GPL) version 2. The case has been brought against Monsoon Multimedia, a specialist in video viewing and capturing devices, which has offices in Silicon Valley and in New Delhi.â¦
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Freedom is just another word for $7,000 Comment The folks looking after the general public license (GPL) are fond of portraying themselves as the humble shepherds of the free and open source software movement. Their job, among other things, is to provide an open and transparent means for protecting the freedom to review, copy, tinker with and redistribute code.â¦
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In the first case in the U.S. over alleged General Public License violations, the Software Freedom Law Center sues over copyright infringement.
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The older version better matches his vision of what a license should do. Plus, he said, "Because I have accepted code over the last 15 years by people who kind of accepted my original choice of the GPL Version 2, I'm not just, I think, ethically bound by those people's choices, I am also actually legally bound."
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The U.S. Federal Trade Commission has settled a complaint against a company that owns patents to a widely used Ethernet standard, saying the patent owner was attempting to collect huge license fees despite a prior commitment to the contrary.
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Blog: Is version 3 of the GNU General Public License asking for too much?
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One of the most important recent events in the world of free software has been the release of version 3 of the GNU GPL.  There were fierce arguments about its utility while it was being drawn up, and although the rhetoric has abated somewhat, there is still a big question mark over its eventual success.  Some evidence suggests that GPLv3 uptake is coming along nicely, while other reports indicate a reluctance to adopt it (but note also Matt Asay's neat reconciliation of these contradictory messages).  To see what's likely to happen in the long term, it's useful to look back at the past history of licence adoption.
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InfoWorld - The new GNU General Public License (GPL) version 3 is not a fit for Linux because switching would require permission from the kernel&#39;s thousands of de facto owners, a maintainer of the SCSI portion of the kernel said on Thursday. Also, Microsoft released a statement that the company has no GPLv3 obligations.
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WATERLOO, Ont. (CP) - Research In Motion Ltd. has reported a court victory in a patent-infringement case brought by European licensing company.
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Now that the final version of the GNU General Public Licence version 3 has been released, the in-depth analysis of its implications can begin.  Two of the first commentaries to be published have come from the legal world, and there are doubtless many more being prepared for purely internal use within software companies wondering whether to adopt the new licence.  But important as both the legal and commercial details are, I believe the true significance of the GPLv3 lies elsewhere.
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In what may be the first action of its kind in the U.S., the Software Freedom Law Center has filed a lawsuit to enforce an open-source license.