MSFT Goes SCO On Us

From Fortune magazine...

Microsoft is pulling no punches: It wants royalties. If the company gets its way, free software won't be free anymore...

Microsoft General Counsel Brad Smith and licensing chief Horacio Gutierrez sat down with Fortune recently to map out their strategy for getting FOSS users to pay royalties. Revealing the precise figure for the first time, they state that FOSS infringes on no fewer than 235 Microsoft patents.

It's a breathtaking number.

I guess they are ready to start their war of attrition and tangle some folks up in the courts for a while. I'm betting they'll "lose", not SCO-like since they have a ton of money and a big, ol'revenue stream. But still, they're now firing direct shots at their biggest competitors, not to mention many of their customers.

Of course they have lost already, and this is just the next big milepost of that path. Now it is about how much trouble they can cause as they struggle to find what they should become.

Tim Bray wishfully thinks... Litigate or shut up.

Of course the strategy is to drag out the FUD as long as possible while also racking up legal fees all around. The last thing MSFT wants is to settle or in any way resolve. They know they've lost. There is nothing to do but gum up the works.

The sooner people and organizations wean themselves from MSFT the sooner this will end. Nothing else will be as effective.