IBM gets it

Hat tip to Slashdot for the link to this story: bq. I.B.M. to Give Free Access to 500 Patents I.B.M. plans to announce today that it is making 500 of its software patents freely available to anyone working on open-source projects, like the popular Linux operating system, on which programmers collaborate and share code. bq. The new model for I.B.M., analysts say, represents a shift away from the traditional corporate approach to protecting ownership of ideas through patents, copyrights, trademark and trade-secret laws. The conventional practice is to amass as many patents as possible and then charge anyone who wants access to them. I.B.M. has long been the champion of that formula. The company, analysts estimate, collected $1 billion or more last year from licensing its inventions. bq. The move comes after a lengthy internal review by I.B.M., the world's largest patent holder, of its strategy toward intellectual property. I.B.M. executives said the patent donation today would be the first of several such steps. The article does point out that this is a drop in the bucket: bq. I.B.M. may be redefining its intellectual property strategy, but it apparently has no intention of slowing the pace of its patent activity. I.B.M. was granted 3,248 patents in 2004, far more than any other company, according to the United States Patent and Trademark Office. The patent office is announcing today its yearly ranking of the top 10 private-sector patent recipients. Still, this is a wonderful development and a boon for the open source movement... At my previous employer, I ran the Postfix email system. This is an open source project developed by a staff member of the I.B.M. T.J. Watson Research Center. Excellent stuff!