"Ralph W. Hyre" <rhyre@cinoss1.att.com> (05/18/91)
[followups to comp.org.eff.talk, for lack of an intellectual property group.] In article <telecom11.355.1@eecs.nwu.edu> henry@ads.com writes: X-Telecom-Digest: Volume 11, Issue 355, Message 1 of 9 > Seng-Poh Lee, Speedy" <splee@gnu.ai.mit.edu> wrote: >> Interesting how Hayes goes after the smaller ... >> manufacturers. IBM and AT&T both also make and sell AT modems. > The chances are excellent that both IBM and AT&T license this > technology from Hayes ... neither outfit is known for taking risks > with this sort of stuff; they want their intellectual property > respected, and behave in kind. Unless you believe Paul Heckel, in the new edition of "Elements of Friendly Software Design". (Sybex, ISBN 0-89588-768-1) He's currently trying to get IBM to license his Zoomracks card and stack metaphor patent. (Aside: I don't know how you patent a metaphor; on the surface it would seem to be even harder than patenting an algorithm.) Apple licensed the ZoomRacks technology after being sued over their Hypercard product. Asymetrix' Toolbook is a clone of Hypercard for the Windows environment for the PC, and IBM and Zenith bundle it with some of their configurations. The conclusion seems to be that IBM will deal with you if they perceive you as a threat.