The story of Microsoft’s empty threats against Linux is probably one of the most ridiculous we’ve ever had the “pleasure” of dealing with. Ballmer and Microsoft has repeatedly uttered threats against Linux, saying that Linux is infringing on more than 200 different Microsoft patents. The ridiculous part is that Microsoft has presented no evidence what-so-ever to back these claims up. Yet it keeps repeating them in some sort of fashion that if you say it enough times it becomes true.
Somehow though, Microsoft has managed to convince more than a few that Linux is indeed infringing on Microsoft Immaterial/intellectual Property. Novell, for once, caved quite fast, while LG, Samsung and a few others followed. We’re expecting more to do the same, not because they are actually infringing but because of Microsoft’s bullying.
However some have remained strong and refused to give in to Microsoft’s empty threats and among these we have both Ubuntu and now Mandriva that have both said that they are not going to negotiate with Microsoft over empty threats. Several other have made similar statements, but these are the two biggest so far.
Even if Microsoft set out to scare as many as possible in to signing “licensing agreement,” the perhaps more longterm goal was to divide the Linux developers into two camps. One siding with Microsoft and one who is not.
Linux already has a problem in that there are already so many flavors of it, and they are all far from perfectly compatible, that normal people are having difficulties getting a grasp of Linux at all. So no matter if the various distributions decide to sign up for a Microsoft approval or not, Microsoft has till managed to divide Linux even further, which I for once didn’t even think was possible a while back.
