When a small Canadian company, i4i, recently won a $290 million judgment against Microsoft, much was made of the accompanying decree that Microsoft had 60 days to stop selling Microsoft Word in its current version. At issue were Custom XML-related patents that i4i defended. Microsoft has been very critical of the court's decision in the case, claiming that blocking the sale of Microsoft Word will also obstruct the sales of Microsoft Office, threatening industry. Microsoft is also set to appeal the court's decision on September 23rd.
Some in the open source community have interpreted the brouhaha as a big opportunity for open source software suites such as OpenOffice, and open standards such as Open Document Format (ODF). I'm in agreement with Andy Updegrove, though, who argues that the whole confrontation may be a tempest in a teapot.
