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From: "mag" <mag@bunuel.tii.matav.hu>
Subject: cases of killing competition with patents?
To: Patent forum <patents@aful.org>
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Date: 28 May 2003 07:25:46 +0200
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Hi!

When I tell the patent situation to SMEs, one of their recurring
argument is that there are still SMEs in the US. I used to answer
that patents are not enforced in every case, but mostly when the
small one grows to a size noticeable for the big player.
I used to cite the SCO issue as an example (where the beneficial
party is Microsoft, and the attacked party is the free software
community). There are some problems with this example. One: it is
provable that Microsoft benefits from the conduct of SCO, but
it isn't that the real player behind SCO _is_ Microsoft. Two: the
small player here is the free software community, and the average
IT SME does feel that is still could not happen to them. Three:
it is only one example.

Question:
Which cases can illustrate the situation where the big attacks the
small to stop competition?

--=20
GNU GPL: csak tiszta forr=E1sb=F3l

