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Comment by jaredklewis | Hacker News Reader

It seems like people never get tired of not reading the PATENTS file. “Wildly aggressive?” Please. The agreement explicitly forbids Facebook from revoking your patent grant if they are the aggressor. Without the agreement (i.e. just BSD) Facebook is free to sue you for patent infringement. They add a file that says they can’t do that unless you sue them first and suddenly people are out for blood. Salem 2.0.

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Only over the React patents. They could, however, sue you over your VR system or something but leave you little recourse due to not wanting to lose your React/other FB patent grants.

Nope. The PATENTS file specifically says that if Facebook initiates patent litigation (related or unrelated to React) you can counter sue Facebook AND keep your React patent grant.

"...if Facebook or any of its subsidiaries or corporate affiliates files a lawsuit alleging patent infringement against you in the first instance, and you respond by filing a patent infringement counterclaim in that lawsuit against that party that is unrelated to the Software, the license granted hereunder will not terminate under section (i) of this paragraph due to such counterclaim."

The only legitimate criticism I've heard of the FB patent grant is that FB could intentionally infringe your patents and the you couldn't sue them for infringement without losing your React patent grant. It's such a narrow case though that I seriously doubt it's a legitimate concern for most of the people complaining about it.

And you can stop using React, then sue. Even if they also stop using your patent, they were in violation when they used it. They can't retroactively put you in violation with their revocation.

Moreover, nothing is preventing you from informing them of your patent and asking that they stop using it. If they continue to, it's clearly willful infringement.

What React patents are there? And it seems to me that using Preact/Vue/etc would not be any better than using React if in fact there are patented technologies in React.

Is there _any_ technology that isn't covered by some patent? I would imagine virtually every library we use unknowingly infringes on dozens of patents.

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