Windows 7 Ribbon licensing vs Office 2007 Ribbon licensing

Question

If I recall correctly one of the limitations of the Office 2007 Ribbon UI was that you cannot use it to compete with other MS Office products like Word or Excel.

Does this same restriction apply for the Windows 7 Ribbon UI?

Thanx.

Answer 1

This is from the Windows Ribbon Development newsgroup:

Just like Windows common controls, there are no unusual licensing requirements involved when using the Windows Ribbon framework in your applications.

Here's more info on the Windows Ribbon Framework and also some UI Guidelines.