'The List': Open Source Advocates Unleash Fury at Microsoft


by Keith Ward

May 22, 2007

"The List" is nearly 500 names long, and growing rapidly. It might have started out as a light-hearted jab, but it has quickly become a flashpoint of the building fury in the open source software community toward Microsoft and its recent claim of patent infringements.

The list was started by Digital Tipping Point, an online Web site dedicated to the open source movement. It blogs about open source and is producing a number of films about how open source "will empower average people to create an immense wave of new literature, art, and science," according to the Web site.

Just after midnight on May 20, a post went up on the wiki, or informational, page of the Web site. The author, Christian Einfeldt, is also the producer of the video project. He started the list, he stated, "to be a place where people would like to join together to invite a Microsoft patent infringement lawsuit." The page's title is "Sue me first, Microsoft." Readers are encouraged to add their names to the list, along with their e-mail address, the version of Linux they are using and why they are using that particular distribution.

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