AOL Patent Deal Means Microsoft Now Holds Vestiges of Netscape 129
inode_buddha writes "It's part of the $1 billion AOL patent deal, and it's something that would have made many minds explode back in the 1990s. It still makes my mind explode today. Marc Andreesen points out that MS now has a significant chunk of the old Netscape. What are the ramifications for Mozilla?"
Patents shmatents. (Score:4, Insightful)
>> Marc Andreesen points out that MS now has a significant chunk of the old Netscape. What are the ramifications for Mozilla?
Not sure how much those patents would be worth to anyone, given that Netscape was unable to use them to defend against IE in the 1990s.
Re:Nothing. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:business as usual (Score:5, Insightful)
if you can't beat them, buy them
Beat them and buy them.
Re:Nothing. (Score:2, Insightful)
Bill Gate's Embrace, Extend and then Extinguish philosophy didn't include suing over patents. Under Gate's reign, they never once used patents offensively.
However, under Ballmer it has been a different story, so I don't know.
That being said, if Netscape had browser patents that AOL was sitting on that could be monetized, I'm assuming they would have done so.
Re:Nothing, if Microsoft is smart. (Score:2, Insightful)
Translation: I am a happy Apple customer. I do not want and never would want anything non-approved from outside my walled garden. By definition, anything non-approved is bad, and not only do I not want it, nobody else should want it or have any means of getting it.
Well done, you are a *good* consumer and will get a gold star (cost $0.99, has been billed to your account).
Re:Nothing. (Score:2, Insightful)
AOL *created* the Mozilla Foundation, so why would they sue them? It's a safe bet that Mozilla has a license to any relevant patent.
Why Software Patents Won't Go Away (Score:5, Insightful)