Eolas patent and market pressure

With the recent court rulings against Microsoft regarding the Eolas patent.  It looks like Microsoft is again going ahead with plans to alter their browser to stop it from infringing the patent.  Here's an article on it at CNET.  When all is said and done, Eolas may indeed make some money off of Microsoft.  The sad part is that there doesn't seem to be any leeway from Eolas as it seems they will insist on continued royalty payments for browsers that infringe on their patent and Microsoft is refusing to pay any continued royalties by changing the way their browser works.

If you can't tell, I'm on Microsoft's side.  I personally believe there was enough prior art to invalidate the Eolas patent and think it is a really stupid patent.

What we are forgetting is pure and unadulterated market pressure.  The pressure I'm talking about is in the form of causing Eolas to place the patent in the public domain or force them relax any restrictions on it's use.   Eolas is getting a nice fat check from Microsoft, but based on the way Microsoft is proceeding, they will not be getting any more from Microsoft.  what we can do as a public force is make Eolas satisfied enough with that check and not keep asking for more in the form of continued royalties.

Though the data is a couple of years old, NUA reports as of 2002 there were over 605 million INTERNET users.  I could have looked around for more recent data, but the numbers provided will illustrate the point I'm trying to make.  While Internet Explorer's market share is slipping to just under 90%, that's still over 500 million Internet Explorer users. 

Imagine the sheer power that size of a user base could wield if directed at a singular goal, such as an email campaign as well as a letter writing campaign to Eolas.  The sheer influx of that many emails and regular mail would surely sway their decision.

Here's some contacts where you can send your letter of protest:

licensing@eolas.com.

invest@eolas.com

And while I'm not completely sure what their current address is, since Eolas has it removed from their website, the INTERNET archive lists their P.O. box  as

Eolas Technologies Inc.
P.O. Box 5069
Wheaton, IL 60189-5069

and Anywho lists their address as

Eolas Technologies
330 South Naperville Road
Wheaton, IL  60187