To help reduce the confusion for those managing software projects, the Software Freedom Law Center (SFLC) has released a freely distributable guide entitled "A Legal Issues Primer for Open Source and Free Software Projects." Although only 45 pages long -- shorter if you don't count the front matter -- the primer still manages to provide a highly structured introduction to these issues that carefully outlines options and is full of practical advice.

Every company is in the software business, which means that every company has software liability. We estimate $11.4 billion a year is spent on software patent litigation (see our resources for economists page), and not just by Microsoft and IBM—The Green Bay Packers, Kraft Foods, and Ford Motor are facing software patent infringement lawsuits for their use of the standard software necessary for running a modern business.

The head of Google's open-source programs on Monday urged international delegates to vote against certifying Office Open XML as an ISO standard, saying the Microsoft-led effort poses a risk to users who want unfettered access to documents.

It used to be that you could safely assume a work was public domain unless there was a highly visible warning printed on it, containing both the copyright owner and the date of copyright (at least in the USA). This system also ensured that, when the work’s copyright expired, you could tell from any copy that this was so—by simply adding the duration of copyright to the date printed in the work’s copyright notice. The Berne Convention, however, changed all that by replacing the assumption of freedom with the assumption of monopoly, and it now takes extensive research to be sure a work is public domain.

From February 25 to 29 in Geneva, the next step in the seemingly never-ending show-down over whether Microsoft’s Office Open XML document format should be granted ISO standard status is taking place.

As I write this entry, hundreds of people from around the world are converging on Geneva, Switzerland. 120 will meet behind closed doors to hold the final collaborative discussions that will determine whether OOXML will become an ISO/IEC standard. When their work is complete, not everyone will be pleased with the changes agreed upon, but all will acknowledge that the specification that eventually emerges will be much improved from the version that was originally submitted to Ecma two years ago.

In what may be a perceived threat to the objectivity of the Office Open XML standards process, Standards Australia will include a Microsoft developer and consultant as part of its delegation for this month's Ballot Resolution Meeting (BRM) in Geneva.

The OOXML specification has been both criticized and defended by a number of people, leading many to wonder what the big deal is. This article illustrates the basis of technical, rather than political, objections to treating OOXML as a standard.