Big Blue is singing the blues a little bit less when it comes to the open source community. IBM has offered 500 company patents for free access by individuals and groups who develop open source software, and various reports indicate IBM is also trying to sell its own clients on using open source programs instead of Microsoft programs.
Not that IBM is being entirely altruistic, depending on which analysis you take to heart. Some observers remind people that, while IBM's willingness to offer patents to open source developers is a positive step, there's also a tacit understanding that businesses using open source applications will likely need outside professional help to manage such applications – help like that from IBM itself, for example.
"This is not a one-time event," IBM senior vice president for technology and intellectual property John E. Kelly said in a January 11 statement announcing the offering. "[T]hrough measures such as today's pledge, we will increasingly use patents to encourage and protect global innovation and interoperability through open standards, and we urge others to do so as well."
In fact, the IBM patent access offering is getting mixed reviews at this writing. "We certainly welcome the declaration of about 500 patents with open arms," Open Source Initiative co-founder Bruce Perens told ComputerWorld.com, "but we still have questions. One of the biggest questions is, despite this overture, is software patenting really good for the industry in general, and is it going to still be a very big problem for open-source?"
The Boston Herald called IBM's move nothing less than "tweaking the nose of… Microsoft," while Open Source Technology Group vice president of editorial operations Jeff Bates called the move "a canny move" helping Big Blue try to score points with, among others, the European Union – which is pondering a crackdown on voluminous software patent issuing.
IBM in 2004 received over three thousand new software patents, the most awarded to any one high-tech company during the year.
Kelly said the open source access share is part of IBM's continuing "strategic use" of its intellectual property. "[O]ur pledge today is the beginning of a new era in how IBM will manage intellectual property to benefit our partners and clients," his statement continued. "Unlike the preceding Industrial Economy, the Innovation Economy requires that intellectual property be deployed for more than just providing the owner with freedom of action and income generation."
