Google’s Open Patent Non-Assertion (OPN) Pledge, in which Google promises “not to sue any user, distributor, or developer of open-source software on specified patents, unless first ‘attacked”, sounds good. Indeed, it is good. But this is far from the first time that Google has made such a pledge. Indeed, open-source companies have long banded together to protect themselves and their patents from outside attackers.

Google, business, and open-source patent protection. More >