Words I never thought I’d say.

IBM has relinquished a significant portion of its patent portfolio to open source projects.

Not only that, they were smart about it:

There is an exception to the grant of access to the technology: it is closed to anyone taking legal action to block further interoperability. IBM will not extend the access to anyone who is suing someone else over patents necessary for interoperability in the standards to which this technology relates.

This is one serious $%#@ you to Microsoft.