Patents: Wonder why MS is just now starting to monetize^W’liberalise’ its patent portfolio, starting with a VFAT royalty fee for digital cameras?
Here’s a possible reason why — they’ve hired Marshall Phelps, from IBM, the executive who began IBM’s aggressive patent-based revenue program in 1985.
Microsoft has reached a point, (Eben Moglen) says, where the company can no longer enjoy the same annual revenue growth that it did in the 1990s. Like IBM in the eighties, it’s now looking for ‘creative’ ways to keep the shareholders happy.
CDWow: Anti-IRMA, pro-CDWow leaflet to print out and post somewhere (link via Donncha).
