This is Steve Balmer, not some third-string assistant to the VP of Fringe Accounts for South Africa -- for those of you who still buy into his all-American dream, not that you'll care, but here is yet another example of the sort of unfounded fear mongering your precious CEO spreads ...

Microsoft's Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Steve Ballmer, speaking in Singapore at Microsoft's Asian Government Leaders Forum, warned that governments using the Linux operating system are in risk of violating patent laws. Linux, Ballmer claimed, infringes on more than 228 patents. Ballmer did not elaborate on specific alleged violations.

Balmer is, of course, simply reframing to his advantage the argument against patents given by RMS earlier, where his point was not that these patents form a clear and present danger to the users of the software so much as the abject unenforceability of these claims illustrate the lunacy of software patenting in the first place.

[ via Governments using Linux risk violating law, says Microsoft's CEO - Wikinews Demo ]