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Novell has issued an open letter to the free software community. Interestingly, the letter claims that Novell is receiving such a large payment from Microsoft because of its patent portfolio. Does someone more knowledgeable than me know if Microsoft might violate Novell’s patents? A key sentence in the letter states, “When we entered the patent cooperation agreement with Microsoft, Novell did not agree or admit that Linux or any other Novell offering violates Microsoft patents.” Ron Hovsepian, CEO of Novell, goes on to remind us of Novell’s committment to free software and action it has taken in support of it.

The letter ends with this paragraph:

“In closing, we wish to be extremely clear that Novell is committed to protecting, preserving and promoting freedom for free and open source software. We recognize that the community of open source developers is essential to all our activities in Linux, and we welcome dialog with the community as to how we can continue to work together toward these common goals.”

This is a positive first step. Novell is now on record stating that Linux does not violate Microsoft’s patents. It is good to see a reaffirmation of their commitment to free software. The community loses if we alienate Novell. They have made a mistake, but they may have done us a service. Microsoft has finally come out and publicly threatened free software. A lot more of us are awake to the dangers of the United States’ lousy patent system and hopefully doing something about it.

The Open Invention Network also released a statement regarding the Novell/Microsoft deal. It points out that it is great that Linux is being recognized as the world class operating system that it is. They key paragraph is this:

“Unfortunately, embedded in Microsoft’s recent endorsement of Linux are claims regarding customers’ needing protection from patent attack. Those claims are baseless. In fact, there have been no patent suits against Linux. While patent disputes are not unheard of between and among software developers and distributors, they are almost always resolved between these commercial entities – not by dragging in end-user customers. Isn’t the real issue the fact that Microsoft is making such a threat against its own customers?”

I haven’t seen much made of that threat in everything I have read. It is a good point and one we should be sure to get out there. The Open Invention Blog has a post talking about collaboration and innovation, quite different than Microsoft’s take. IBM has commented that they have never seen any need for patent protection for Linux, and do not see a need for it now. That is good to hear.
2007 will be an interesting year. The SCO debacle may end up looking like small potatoes. Novell really went to bat against SCO, it is too bad that they have damaged themselves by apparently not thinking this deal through, or underestimating the reaction from the community. It is clearer and clearer that software patents are a real problem. We need to take action to effectively deal with them. Signing Bruce Peren’s petition to Novell. What else do you think we can do?

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