• Fortune, Tuesday, May 15, 2007 10:16 AM

Microsoft Corp. on Monday mounted an all-out attack on free software, using a Fortune interview as its mouthpiece. The software giant claims that makers of free, open-source software (FOSS), which includes Linux, have benefited from the infringement of no less than 235 software patents belonging to Microsoft. That means the company believes everyone from individual writers of code to the scores of Fortune 500 companies running on Linux should pay royalty and licensing fees to keep operating.

Conversely, FOSS pioneer Richard Stallman about 20 years ago implemented a strict set of legally enforceable rules under which all open-source code writers would have to adhere. That is, free software could guarantee those freedoms denied by proprietary software as long as contributors to the so-called "GNU" movement (read the article) assigned their copyrights to the Stallman-controlled Free Software Foundation. Everything that falls under those copyrights has to abide by that organization's license.

Microsoft, meanwhile, has been urging Fortune 500 companies using Linux to enter into a pact that would protect them from a Microsoft patent suit. However, Stallman's lawyer Eben Moglen claims that because Microsoft is selling Linux coupons for Novell, its newest partner, the software giant is subject to FOSS rules--so its code has to be opened to the public. Since then, Moglen and co. also plugged the loophole that made the Novell deal possible, to deny any future Linux partnerships. Get ready for a long, long fight.

Read the whole story at Fortune »