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List: fedora-devel-list
Subject: Re: OpenSSL and ECC patents (was Re: Mesa in F37- vaapi support disabled for h264/h265/vc1)
From: Simon Farnsworth via devel <devel () lists ! fedoraproject ! org>
Date: 2022-09-30 13:05:48
Message-ID: AD3D24A6-BBA7-45C6-8710-14CF9B9F7EF3 () farnz ! org ! uk
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> On 29 Sep 2022, at 21:37, drago01 <drago01@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
>
> On Wednesday, September 28, 2022, Clemens Lang <cllang@redhat.com \
> <mailto:cllang@redhat.com>> wrote: Hi,
>
> Michael J Gruber <mjg@fedoraproject.org <mailto:mjg@fedoraproject.org>> wrote:
>
> Understanding is helped greatly by communication, though. Legal answers
> such as "We can not" do not further this understanding, and "We can not
> and we can not tell you why" is not much better, but these are the typical
> answer we get, not even with a "sorry, but we can't". Obviously, these
> legal questions are difficult to explain, but it can't be true that each
> such case is under a "gag order".
>
> A lawyer at a previous employer told me that explanations of such decisions
> can be used against you in court. Presumably, this also applies here.
>
> That's sounds overlay paranoid. How can an explanation on why you are *not* doing \
> something be used against you in court? I can get why "we don't think that patent \
> XYZ applies so this is fine to ship" is problematic, but the other way around just \
> doesn't make sense.
It's related to additional damages for wilful infringement; if I say "I will not ship \
foo because I cannot get a suitable licence for patent US abc123455", and the owner \
of that patent then claims I infringe because I ship bar, which they claim infringes \
patent US abc123455, they can also claim that my infringement of patent US abc123455 \
by shipping bar was wilful, because I clearly knew of the patent, I had analysed it \
to determine what it might apply to, and I'd decided to ship *bar* anyway, even \
though I knew or should reasonably have known (based on my analysis of why I couldn't \
ship foo) that bar would put me into infringement.
Unfortunately, this is the flip side of well-meant legislation around wilful \
infringement - it's simplest for a big US entity like Red Hat to simply say "no, and \
we're not telling you why" to packages, because then there's nothing to build a claim \
of wilful infringement around. —
Simon Farnsworth
[Attachment #5 (unknown)]
<html><head><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; \
charset=utf-8"></head><body style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; \
line-break: after-white-space;" class=""><br class=""><div><blockquote type="cite" \
class=""><div class="">On 29 Sep 2022, at 21:37, drago01 <<a \
href="mailto:drago01@gmail.com" class="">drago01@gmail.com</a>> wrote:</div><br \
class="Apple-interchange-newline"><div class=""><br class=""><br class="">On \
Wednesday, September 28, 2022, Clemens Lang <<a href="mailto:cllang@redhat.com" \
class="">cllang@redhat.com</a>> wrote:<br class=""><blockquote class="gmail_quote" \
style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex">Hi,<br \
class=""> <br class="">
Michael J Gruber <<a href="mailto:mjg@fedoraproject.org" target="_blank" \
class="">mjg@fedoraproject.org</a>> wrote:<br class=""> <br class="">
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc \
solid;padding-left:1ex"> Understanding is helped greatly by communication, though. \
Legal answers<br class=""> such as "We can not" do not further this understanding, \
and "We can not<br class=""> and we can not tell you why" is not much better, but \
these are the typical<br class=""> answer we get, not even with a "sorry, but we \
can't". Obviously, these<br class=""> legal questions are difficult to explain, but \
it can't be true that each<br class=""> such case is under a "gag order".<br \
class=""> </blockquote>
<br class="">
A lawyer at a previous employer told me that explanations of such decisions<br \
class=""> can be used against you in court. Presumably, this also applies \
here.</blockquote><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">That's sounds \
overlay paranoid. How can an explanation on why you are *not* doing something be used \
against you in court? I can get why "we don't think that patent XYZ applies so this \
is fine to ship" is problematic, but the other way around just doesn't make \
sense. </div></div></blockquote><br class=""></div><div>It's related to \
additional damages for wilful infringement; if I say "I will not ship foo because I \
cannot get a suitable licence for patent US abc123455", and the owner of that patent \
then claims I infringe because I ship bar, which they claim infringes patent US \
abc123455, they can also claim that my infringement of patent US abc123455 by \
shipping bar was wilful, because I clearly knew of the patent, I had analysed it to \
determine what it might apply to, and I'd decided to ship *bar* anyway, even though I \
knew or should reasonably have known (based on my analysis of why I couldn't ship \
foo) that bar would put me into infringement.</div><div><br \
class=""></div><div>Unfortunately, this is the flip side of well-meant legislation \
around wilful infringement - it's simplest for a big US entity like Red Hat to simply \
say "no, and we're not telling you why" to packages, because then there's nothing to \
build a claim of wilful infringement around.</div><div>— </div><div>Simon \
Farnsworth</div></body></html>
[Attachment #6 (text/plain)]
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