«

"The April agreement says that Microsoft can seek damages from Open Office
users or distributors for any copy of Open Office installed after April 1,
2004. However, users of Sun's commercial distribution of Open Office, called
StarOffice, are protected from legal liabilities under the agreement, says
Russ Castronovo, a spokesperson for Sun. Open Office includes a word
processor, spreadsheet, and presentation software based on technology Sun
acquired in its 1999 purchase of Germany's Star Division. Sun released the
code under an open-source license in 2000."


How daft can the world get..?

Karen Parker said the following on 17/09/2004 11:37:

>
>
> "The April agreement says that Microsoft can seek damages from Open Office
> users or distributors for any copy of Open Office installed after April 1,
> 2004. However, users of Sun's commercial distribution of Open Office, called
> StarOffice, are protected from legal liabilities under the agreement, says
> Russ Castronovo, a spokesperson for Sun. Open Office includes a word
> processor, spreadsheet, and presentation software based on technology Sun
> acquired in its 1999 purchase of Germany's Star Division. Sun released the
> code under an open-source license in 2000."
>
>
> How daft can the world get..?
>
>
Your post might have some value if it had an attributation or URL with
it. Other wise it is just the usual FUD

"Karen Parker" <> wrote in message
news:...
>
> "The April agreement says that Microsoft can seek damages from Open Office
> users or distributors for any copy of Open Office installed after April 1,
> 2004. However, users of Sun's commercial distribution of Open Office,
> called

This sounds really dodgy... on what grounds can they attempt to seek
damages?

Andrew

Karen Parker wrote:

>
>
> "The April agreement says that Microsoft can seek damages from Open Office
> users or distributors for any copy of Open Office installed after April 1,
> 2004. However, users of Sun's commercial distribution of Open Office, called
> StarOffice, are protected from legal liabilities under the agreement, says
> Russ Castronovo, a spokesperson for Sun. Open Office includes a word
> processor, spreadsheet, and presentation software based on technology Sun
> acquired in its 1999 purchase of Germany's Star Division. Sun released the
> code under an open-source license in 2000."
>
>
> How daft can the world get..?

"...April 1, 2004..."


Rob.
--
http://www.pbase.com/mapleglen/

On Fri, 17 Sep 2004 12:03:51 +1200, Andrew Bryson wrote:

> "Karen Parker" <> wrote in message
> news:...
>>
>> "The April agreement says that Microsoft can seek damages from Open
>> Office users or distributors for any copy of Open Office installed after
>> April 1, 2004. However, users of Sun's commercial distribution of Open
>> Office, called
>
> This sounds really dodgy... on what grounds can they attempt to seek
> damages?

Patents

Anyway the issue isn't so much:

"MS can seek damages against OO.org users"

as

"MS can seek damages against users of any competing office suite, but Sun
signed a deal to exempt Star Office customers"

Cheers
Anton

I found the story at:

http://www.computerworld.com/governm...5984p2,00.html

Hamilton
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
www.n2activeweb.co.nz
Quality low cost web hosting for New Zealand
------------------------------------------------------------------------------

"Karen Parker" <> wrote in message
news:...
>
>
>
> "The April agreement says that Microsoft can seek damages from Open Office
> users or distributors for any copy of Open Office installed after April 1,
> 2004. However, users of Sun's commercial distribution of Open Office,
> called
> StarOffice, are protected from legal liabilities under the agreement, says
> Russ Castronovo, a spokesperson for Sun. Open Office includes a word
> processor, spreadsheet, and presentation software based on technology Sun
> acquired in its 1999 purchase of Germany's Star Division. Sun released the
> code under an open-source license in 2000."
>
>
> How daft can the world get..?
>
>

Karen wrote:
>
>
> "The April agreement says that Microsoft can seek damages from Open Office
> users or distributors for any copy of Open Office installed after April 1,
> 2004. However, users of Sun's commercial distribution of Open Office, called
> StarOffice, are protected from legal liabilities under the agreement, says
> Russ Castronovo, a spokesperson for Sun. Open Office includes a word
> processor, spreadsheet, and presentation software based on technology Sun
> acquired in its 1999 purchase of Germany's Star Division. Sun released the
> code under an open-source license in 2000."
>
>
> How daft can the world get..?
>
>

s/daft/greedy

This shows up Sun amd MS on so many fronts.

MS

Many have hypothised that the next big battle is MS using IP / patents
and laywers to sue OSS users. Most suspect its a waiting game for the EU
to grant IP similar to the US, and get the US elections over then if
favourable MS can start its mayhem. The only black spot for MS is the
anti-trust case and the possibilty a Democrat might get into the
Whitehouse, if Bush gets in I can see this moving ahead.

This means of course even if MS does not publically announce / go for a
legal claim this will hang over open sources office suite, spot the FUD
potential.

SCO has sued end users, MS can do the same over functionality I assume
thats why the agreement is worded as it is.

SUN

I suspect Sun hates Linux more than it hates MS, hence your enemy is my
enemy. If Sun trully was into OSS it would not have allowed this IMHO it
has, so it just shows Sun's true colours. With Linux boxes on Intel
gouging its revenue and with Wall Street threatening to junk status its
shares, Sun must be ****ed.

regards

Thing

"thing" <> wrote in message
news:ifs2d.3906$...
> Karen wrote:
>>
>>
>> "The April agreement says that Microsoft can seek damages from Open
>> Office
>> users or distributors for any copy of Open Office installed after April
>> 1,
>> 2004. However, users of Sun's commercial distribution of Open Office,
>> called
>> StarOffice, are protected from legal liabilities under the agreement,
>> says
>> Russ Castronovo, a spokesperson for Sun. Open Office includes a word
>> processor, spreadsheet, and presentation software based on technology Sun
>> acquired in its 1999 purchase of Germany's Star Division. Sun released
>> the
>> code under an open-source license in 2000."
>>
>>
>> How daft can the world get..?
>>
>>
>
> s/daft/greedy
>
> This shows up Sun amd MS on so many fronts.
>
> MS
>
> Many have hypothised that the next big battle is MS using IP / patents and
> laywers to sue OSS users. Most suspect its a waiting game for the EU to
> grant IP similar to the US, and get the US elections over then if
> favourable MS can start its mayhem. The only black spot for MS is the
> anti-trust case and the possibilty a Democrat might get into the
> Whitehouse, if Bush gets in I can see this moving ahead.
>
> This means of course even if MS does not publically announce / go for a
> legal claim this will hang over open sources office suite, spot the FUD
> potential.
>
> SCO has sued end users, MS can do the same over functionality I assume
> thats why the agreement is worded as it is.
>
> SUN
>
> I suspect Sun hates Linux more than it hates MS, hence your enemy is my
> enemy. If Sun trully was into OSS it would not have allowed this IMHO it
> has, so it just shows Sun's true colours. With Linux boxes on Intel
> gouging its revenue and with Wall Street threatening to junk status its
> shares, Sun must be ****ed.
>
> regards
>
> Thing
>

Or it could be that Sun negotiated a concession from Microsoft to explicitly
allow the use of Microsoft Office filters in StarOffice, and Microsoft is
explaining that it is reserving the rights that it always had to take action
if or when it considers it necessary to protect the proprietary formats it
has protected by patent outside this explicit agreement.

On Fri, 17 Sep 2004 11:58:52 +1200, Collector-NZ <>
wrote:

>Karen Parker said the following on 17/09/2004 11:37:
>
>>
>>
>> "The April agreement says that Microsoft can seek damages from Open Office
>> users or distributors for any copy of Open Office installed after April 1,
>> 2004. However, users of Sun's commercial distribution of Open Office, called
>> StarOffice, are protected from legal liabilities under the agreement, says
>> Russ Castronovo, a spokesperson for Sun. Open Office includes a word
>> processor, spreadsheet, and presentation software based on technology Sun
>> acquired in its 1999 purchase of Germany's Star Division. Sun released the
>> code under an open-source license in 2000."
>>
>>
>> How daft can the world get..?
>>
>>
>Your post might have some value if it had an attributation or URL with
>it. Other wise it is just the usual FUD


Go look at some Web site you lazy person..

In article <Soq2d.3373$> in nz.comp on Fri, 17
Sep 2004 12:41:22 +1200, Spidah <> says...
> p2,00.html

I wonder if this is from the MS patent that patents XML based documents.