Red Hat CEO Says He Talked Patents with Microsoft (Reuters)

[Tom Lane]

Bruno Wolff III <bruno at wolff.to> writes:
>>>> In an interview with Reuters, Szulik declined to say whether his
>>>> company is now in negotiations with Microsoft over signing such a
>>>> patent agreement.
>>>>
>>>> "I can't answer the question," he said.
>> 
>> I don't see how this is on topic in this. At any rate Red Hat has 
>> already clarified it's position on both the interoperability and patent 
>> fronts several times now.

> The article seemed to be pretty slanted as well.

What I noticed was that it did not give the exact wording of the
question that Matthew declined to answer.

I've been around Red Hat for five years now, and as far as I've seen
Matthew Szulik is as straight a shooter as you'll find in a CEO.
If he refused to answer a question, I suppose it's because there was
some aspect of it that he wished he could clear with Red Hat's legal
department; and there was nothing in that article to suggest what
it was that raised his hackles.

As for Red Hat making a separate peace with Microsoft, the OP clearly
has no clue how ridiculous an idea that is.  Matthew would never do it,
and the entire engineering department would resign tomorrow if he did.

			regards, tom lane