DaveNet: Thursday, August 7, 1997; by Dave Winer.

Answers from De Luca

I asked several questions in yesterday's Behind the Hype.

Here are some answers from Apple VP Guerrino De Luca:

Were there side-deals? There is none I know of.

Will Office be bundled? No.

Did Microsoft get source code rights for Apple stuff like QuickTime? No. This is a patent cross-license agreement, not a technology exchange agreement or a source code access agreement.

Will Visual Basic replace AppleScript? No.

He continues

"The entire agreement originated from a patent dispute. Instead of allowing the dispute to degenerate, MS and Apple negotiated the whole set of points that were announced.

"The only undisclosed portion of the deal is the sum of money that Microsoft will pay Apple (over the coming several quarters) as a net balance of the patent cross-licensing portion of the deal. The sum is significant but non-material (legalese to say: it's a big sum but not big enough for the companies to have to disclose the amount)."

I asked another question

What was the subject of the patent dispute? Sorry Dave, I am not at liberty to disclose the subject of the patent dispute.

Dave Winer