Microsoft says the sky will fall if it cannot sell Word
- Posted by: JP Smith | August 24, 2009
- Filed Under: Microsoft, Software, Law and Order
If you're Microsoft, the rules that govern other simply don't apply to you. At least that appears to be their thinking. Recently, a judge ruled that Microsoft had to stop selling Word within 60 days and keep it out of circulation until it removed some offending code that was apparently used without consent, much less, with any licensing.
So, faced with the fact that they've been caught red-handed what does Microsoft do? They complain about what how this judgment will negatively impact their bottom line and their relationships with customers? Umm...okay? That would be like me robbing a bank and telling the judge that I can't go to jail because it will disrupt my work schedule and the people at my church would think badly of me. The judge would likely tell me that I should have thought about that before I robbed the bank. So, to Microsoft, I hope judge will tell them that they should have thought about this before they used a technology that they had no right using, particularly in one of their flagship products.
Just to recap, the technology in question allows Word to create custom XML documents. This technology was patented by a company called i4i but, was used in Word 2003, Word 2007 and Word for Mac 2008 without i4i's consent. Internal memos that came out during the discovery phase of this trial indicated that Microsoft was aware of i4i's technology, which they boasted to be making obselete with a technology they were developing. Apparently, they were never able to get their own version developed or, at least, working properly and used i4i's solution. Microsoft is now arguing that i4i's patent is "invalid".
To me, this appears to be another case of Microsoft being caught red-handed and infringing on another company's technology or intellectual property. Granted, I see the Word issue as huge but, shouldn't it be? How else do you deal with these issues in an way that teaches MS and others that you can't just take from people because you're considered "too big to fail". So, I, for one, hope that this ruling stands.
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