Remember the deal you made with the smart kid in school where he would let you cheat off his test and you would promise not to steal his lunch money? Samsung and Microsoft's just gone and done the same thing, except in their case they both fight for the nerd spot and the bully position goes empty. The two companies agreed to a deal that lets each other have access to patents for "computers, televisions, digital video recorders and digital media players."

With Microsoft venturing into Zune and Zunephone territory, it's interesting to see what this deal will do to help speed up development of the two products this year. Since Zune 1.0 was basically cribbed off Toshiba, and since Microsoft really wants to step things up with the 2nd generation, having Samsung's experience in the phone and digital music player market will really help out their chances. – Jason Chen

Samsung, Microsoft strike patent deal [Yahoo]

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