episode iv

Sometimes, it's not too good to get out of bed in the morning. Sometimes it's even worse to get out just to read something like this.
In short: There's a company that holds patents to a technology which directly affects your web browsing experience and now tries to enforce the rights they claim.
Now Microsoft are changing their browser to avoid paying probably quite large sums in licensing fees by working around a specific wording in the patent. So basically, before playing a Flash game in your browser, you'll first have to click it, before playing video in your browser - you guessed it, you'll first have to click it.
Now, I'm asking you: Who's the bonehead in this equation? Eolas for patenting something that shouts "Prior Art" so loud that even the guys at a British petroleum company will hear it, spinning in their graves? Microsoft for finding a loophole - again - and avoiding it by pushing everything to the users and developers? The jurisdiction for allowing such amazing things to happen? The users for accepting that?
I don't know. I really don't know.
- Dennis