*BSD News Article 2981


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Newsgroups: comp.unix.bsd
Path: sserve!manuel!munnari.oz.au!mips!mips!sdd.hp.com!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!usc!news.bbn.com!mips2!mips2!drg
From: drg@bubba.ma30.bull.com (Daniel R Guilderson)
Subject: Re: UNIGRAM's article on the USL-BSDI suit
Organization: Bull World Wide Information Systems, Billerica MA USA
Date: 3 Aug 92 09:59:31
Message-ID: <DRG.92Aug3095931@bubba.ma30.bull.com>
Lines: 37
In-Reply-To: bzs@ussr.std.com's message of 1 Aug 92 22:28:16 GMT
References: <1992Aug1.042344.23428@pasteur.Berkeley.EDU> <l7k5fqINNgc9@neuro.usc.edu>
	<l7k6maINNgeg@neuro.usc.edu> <l7k72rINNgfn@neuro.usc.edu>
	<leb.712651912@Hypatia> <BZS.92Aug1172816@ussr.std.com>
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In article <BZS.92Aug1172816@ussr.std.com> bzs@ussr.std.com (Barry Shein) writes:

   The fastest and most economical way to resolve this:

   Several major research universities form a consortium, each chips in a
   few dozen millions and just buys USL.

I have problems with this.  How many universities would be able to
meet this challenge.  Assume that "a few dozen millions" means at
least $36 million.  That's an incredibly large amount of cash for any
educational institution to be investing in non-educational projects.
It may not be without precedent (I don't know) but it seems misguided
to me.  I'm sure there are many better focused investments that could
be made with that kind of money.

   Their investment could be recouped and made profitable by legitimate
   licensing and technology interests, and their intellectual property
   ranging from X-Windows to NET-2 etc would be protected to the extent
   that any adverse precedent could be used in the future to make claims
   against those properties.

Once they have purchased USL, what incentive is there to change
tactics?  Consider that there would then be a small cabal of "major
research" companies who control UNIX.  Why would they want other
universities to compete for their CS students?  If the consortium were
really to happen, I believe that it would be no more generous than USL
is now.

   If those same universities can sink similar amounts of monies into
   bio-technology companies (Genentech, Seragen, etc) and other ventures
   of much higher risk (after all Unix seems fairly well established) I
   think they would do well to seriously consider this proposal.

I don't think huge multi-national educational conglomerates would be a
panacea for the problems we face in the intellectual property arena.
;-) Sorry, I couldn't resist carrying your idea to its logical
conclusion. ;-)