No April Fool's: Sun and Microsoft Settle
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If the wide-ranging legal/patent agreement between archrivals Sun and Microsoft had an April 1 date on it, I never would have believed it. But it's real. Sun and Microsoft have settled all outstanding litigation (with Microsoft paying Sun $700 million to settle its antitrust suit and $900 million to resolve patent issues). Sun has signed a Microsoft communications-protocol license and Microsoft has agreed to license Sun's Java. Here's the most interesting nugget, in my opinion: "Sun is also satisfied that the agreements announced today satisfy the objectives it was pursuing in the EU actions pending against Microsoft." In short, this is the end of the world, as we know it. |

