MICROSOFT UK held a contest for the best film on "intellectual property theft"; finalists had to sign away "all intellectual property rights" on "terms acceptable to Microsoft."

There has to be some reanalysis on the perpose of intellectual property rights. The whole concept was origionally about giving someone a limitied advantage so as to promote innovation. That's great and should be supported. But as copyright's started to expire the laws were changed to extend the copyright. At some point the process squelches and prevents innovation rather than promoting it.

Guillaume said:

MICROSOFT UK held a contest for the best film on "intellectual property theft"; finalists had to sign away "all intellectual property rights" on "terms acceptable to Microsoft."

Now that's a workable definition of 'irony'.