Verizon hit with GPL copyright lawsuit over router software, Dec 10, 2007

Open-source software is very attractive for companies looking to expand their services or quickly get new offerings to market, in part because it's free. Unfortunately, some companies tend to overlook the software license commonly attached to open-source software, the GPL. Verizon is the latest company to do so, and its use of an OSS package in a wireless router has led to a copyright infringement lawsuit from the Software Freedom Law Center.

In the wake of last week's ruling that Novell, and not SCO, controls the copyrights covering UNIX, Novell is reassuring Unix users that it has no plans to follow in SCO's footsteps. Given that the company is no longer in the business of selling UNIX, it has no reason to pursue any copyright claims.

Lenovo and Novell have announced that the popular laptops will begin shipping with SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop 10 (SLED) preinstalled.

Perhaps more troubling to Microsoft have been recent "OSS-only" initiatives such as one in the Indian state of Kerala.

In a surprise announcement earlier today at the Open Source Business Conference, Novell and the Electronic Frontier Foundation said that Novell would be contributing to the EFF's Patent Busting project.