Big Linux users pay cash to Microsoft, claims bloke

CUSTOMERS USING Linux are paying a kind of "protection money" to Microsoft to prevent them being sued over Volish code which is allegedly under the bonnet, a guy has alleged.

Jeremy Allison, who penned the majority of the Samba code, told Linux World that large IT customers have been paying Microsoft for patent licensing to cover their use of Linux, Samba and other free software projects.

He alleges that Linux users had come up to him and, off the record, admitted that they had been threatened by Microsoft. They had dealt with it by taking out a licence for Microsoft patents on the free software that they were using, which they then couldn't redistribute, Allison claimed.

He said that Microsoft was not telling anyone about it and was doing it off the record. Allison quit Novell over its recent cuddle up with Microsoft. Allison claims that the deal gave Microsoft a public admission from a Linux distributor that it thinks that the operating system violates Microsoft patents.

The only difference between this and the other deals that Vole had negotiated with frightened companies was that this one was public, Allison said. More here. µ