> Colour me funny, but wouldn't staying out of the courts in the first > place not be the best option? Yes, however some people feel that given the way the patent office is spewing huge quantities of patents, many on old well-known techniques, and the the absurd difficulty of reading patent claims, and the deliberately vague language used in the hope of broadening the scope later, that it is actually not possible to keep track of them, therefore not possible to avoid infringement with any certainty. So, better to fall back to the 2nd-best position... It's a difficult question to answer because there are 0 good answers. -- Scott Ribe scott_ribe@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx http://www.killerbytes.com/ (303) 722-0567 voice