Re: BOCU patent

From: Michael D'Errico (mike-list@pobox.com)
Date: Fri Dec 18 2009 - 10:51:39 CST

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    Doug Ewell wrote:
    >
    > ... So suppose I want to implement BOCU-1 from scratch, possibly in
    > an attempt to speed up encoding or decoding? Can't do it without asking
    > IBM for a license. (Note that I haven't actually looked at the ICU code
    > to see if it is already optimally fast. You get the point.)

    They wouldn't give you a license anyway.

    I did implement a BOCU-1 encoder and decoder around May 2006 and sent a
    fax to IBM requesting a license. They asked for clarification as to what
    company I worked for so they could grant the license to the company. When
    I told them that it was for me personally, they stopped corresponding.

    I related my experience to this mailing list in January 2007, and it caught
    the attention of some people high up in the UTC. They tried to help me
    acquire a license from IBM, but the person I was dealing with at IBM once
    again just stopped corresponding with me.

    The UTC tried to get me to work with yet two more IBM people, and I said
    to just forget it. Clearly they don't want to give out licenses as they
    had stated they would.

    Mike



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