The very building I'm sitting in was paid for by Manchester University successfully suing IBM for an infringment of our Virtual Memory patent. Ahhh, those were the days: university administrators with the cajones to take on the big fish.

Depending on jurisdiction, it looks like there might be some case law to back CSIRO's position.

To All you Americans out there

I can sell you all the 802.11a and 802.11g Kit you require

Let me know your requirements and I will happily send it

with a customs declaration of GIFT!

Can't say fairer than that can I?

I've recently noticed that our local school has removed all it's WiFi equipment and installed some CAT 5 Cabling!

<Nice Touch>

Actually I've got so much WiFi junk sitting around, I'm Thinking of dumping the lot at a Car Boot tomorrow.

£2.00 for a Router

£0.50 for a Wireless Network Adapter

All Proceeds to our local school

It would be a safer community, without all this Radio Interference, now wouldn't it?

Stupid companies trying to rip us Aussies off.

Why wont they just shut up and pay us the money they owe us?

Then CSIRO can get back to work developing awesome technology.

IMHO "awesome technology" is not a phrase that springs to mind when talking about any 802.11 wireless technology

Really! You should know better. You can either raise OR call, you can't do both!!!

Dunno about CSIRO, but surely Manchester University is funded by public funds -- and therefore, any patents it develops should belong to the taxpayers who funded it (and therefore, available to all to use for taxpayers benefit) instead of being used to exhort money from companies and therefore forcing up the price that the same people have to pay when they buy their products or use their services.

@ Anonymous Coward

Frankly, the Universities are still funded by the public fund but the trend is to reduce this part for some privates funding. Hence, what can be the part which should return to the citizens and the part which should stay in the stakeholders' hands?

Don't search: tables, chairs, bricks and mortars will stay to the public domain while the most valuable part will go to somebody else.

@Maverick: It was pretty cool in the mid 90's when CSIRO made the tech.

Now its pretty ordinary.

@Anonymous Coward: Are you a Australian tax payer? :P

CSIRO is neither a non-competitive nor educational institution. It's one the best scientitifc research and development bodies on the planet. It has multiple research streams - and good hunks of its pure science research depend on fund flows from commercialising some of its applied R&D. The ICT industry NEEDS the pure science! When the ICT industry starts belittling institutuions like CSIRO, they're pooing in their own nest.