On 9/9/2010 11:11 AM, Garrett D'Amore wrote:
On Thu, 2010-09-09 at 12:58 -0500, Bob Friesenhahn wrote:
On Thu, 9 Sep 2010, Erik Trimble wrote:
Yes, it's welcome to get it over with.
I do get to bitch about one aspect here of the US civil legal system, though.
If you've gone so far as to burn our (the public's) time and money to file a
lawsuit, you shouldn't be able to seal up the court transcript, or have a
non-public settlement. Call it the price you pay for wasting our time (i.e.
the court system's time).
Unfortunately, this may just be a case of Oracle's patents vs NetApp's
patents. Oracle obviously holds a lot of patents and could
counter-sue using one of its own patents. Oracle's handshake
agreement with NetApp does not in any way shield other zfs commercial
users from a patent lawsuit from NetApp.
True. But, I wonder if the settlement sets a precedent?
Certainly the lack of a successful lawsuit has *failed* to set any
precedent conclusively indicating that NetApp has enforceable patents
where ZFS is concerned.
IANAL, but it seems like if Oracle and NetApp were to reach some kind of
licensing arrangement, then it might be construed to be anticompetitive
if NetApp were to fail to offer similar licensing arrangements to
downstream consumers? Does anyone know if there is any basis for such a
theory, or are these just my idle imaginings?
As far as I know, Nexenta has not been approached by NetApp. I'd like
to see what happens with Coraid ... but ultimately those conversations
are between Coraid and NetApp.
- Garrett
This is *exactly* the reason I advocate forced public settlement
agreements. If you've availed yourself of the court system, you should
be obligated to put into the public record any agreement reached, just
as if you had gotten a verdict. It would help prevent a lot of the
cross-licensing discrimination due to secrecy.
Oh well.
--
Erik Trimble
Java System Support
Mailstop: usca22-123
Phone: x17195
Santa Clara, CA
Timezone: US/Pacific (GMT-0800)
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