Why The U.S. Surrendered To Microsoft

hoggardb writes: "The Nation has an excellent column by Eben Moglen, general counsel of the FSF, on why the U.S. has surrendered to Microsoft: because the big campaign contributors like Hollywood and PC manufacturers now want Microsoft to stay a monopoly." Not everyone will agree about the PC makers, but the Hollywood argument is harder to sidestep. The free-marketeer in me especially likes the last paragraph -- Moglen didn't get to be general counsel of the FSF for nothing.

Comments

Re:Hollywood?

[1010011010]

It's ok for them to use it in render farms, but when was the last time you saw them being happy about people playing DVDs on Linux?

They want maximum revenue with minimum cost, and they don't really care about the ethics of getting there.

"One for us, none for you; two for us, none for you..."

Why M$ won't desapear any time soon ...

[jamirocake]

"Thanks to the venality of politics in America, Microsoft is riding high right now, but it is headed for the boneyard after all."
They say at the end of the article. The truth however, and saddly, is diferent. While it is true that MS is maybe at one of its more important moments, they are doing very well and none of the threats to its monoply will stop them, they will continue. Why? Because of the perception of the avareage american computer user.
If any of us see in what the marketing is focused on any computer related thing we will find one common denominator: Ease of use.
What does this mean? That the public does not want to spend time thinking or learning, thus the people won't assimilate a product that is differnet from what is mainstream, the companies , on the other hand, can - and do- tell the "people" what they want, ans that is what MS has always done, in Linux is the otherway around: people think of what they want. It is sad, but that does not mean that Linux will disapear or become weak because there are people who read slashdot and actualy enjoy thinking. If the whole effort from corporations to make everybody's life 'easier' by taking away the efforrt you put in thinking companies like MS will always exist. And the minority, who is against the conventions of 'mainstream' will keep on using Linux.

That's why Linux as a social tool is far more important than Linux as a technological tool.

Re:Why M$ won't desapear any time soon ...

[TeknoHog]

..the companies , on the other hand, can - and do- tell the "people" what they want, ans that is what MS has always done, in Linux is the otherway around: people think of what they want.
...
... And the minority, who is against the conventions of 'mainstream' will keep on using Linux.

The really sad thing is, that only the minority are thinking. In a democracy, the majority decides, and that's how you get a country where thinking is outlawed.

Really free?

[terri rolle]

From the article:

The best software in the world continues to be free. Free as in free speech: free to use, free to copy, free to modify.

Yes, free so long as you don't create any software that might be in violation of the DMCA and you end up in jail. This seems like bit of overly optimistic cheerleading rather than a realistic assessment of the situation. Whatever happens to Microsoft, it hardly makes a difference if Hollywood, the RIAA, etc. are working to restrict our freedoms through the legislatures and the courts.

Smoking crack?

[dimator]

Thanks to the venality of politics in America, Microsoft is riding high right now, but it is headed for the boneyard after all.


Ummm... no. While linux companies crumble and fall apart, dying to figure out a way to make a buck off of something free, Microsoft continues to do well. (Have they ever even had a "round of layoffs" in their history?)

I agree with the author's points about why the gubment is doing what it's doing, and why all the companies that wanted a piece of microsoft are now backing it. But I think he's deluded if he thinks anything is going to change for the better, in terms of software choice for the consumer.

PS: If anyone has any MP3's (or any other un-hindered audio format) on their disk in ~10 years, I'll change my name.

Re:Smoking crack?

[Fred Ferrigno]

PS: If anyone has any MP3's (or any other un-hindered audio format) on their disk in ~10 years, I'll change my name.

I'm going to make it a point to save at least one MP3, just so I can you on that.

Where Government Interests Lie

[erroneus]

Is there no more obvious problem with the system of government than this? It is obvious that money interests have an unfair and unjust influence over government in practice.

The problem is that we can offer no incentive, as individuals, for the government not to listen! Even if we elected the least corrupted politican at each election, that doesn't prevent the next one from being influenced in the same way as the previous. All the emails, all the letters, all the faxes and phone calls do not carry the weight of a casual million dollars from a money interest group. The law does say, after all, that at some point, the politician can keep the money once out of office so where is the motivation not to listen to the money?

But now we are in a position of asking the very people who profit from this system of government to stop profiting from it. I'm a very imaginitive guy, but I cannot begin to imagine how we can persuade against this. They "vote themselves raises." Who wouldn't vote himself a raise?

Is it possible, then, that we can sue the government through the court system to stop taking PAC and other money? I'm sorry if that means campaigns will not be as flashy as they have been in the past... there are other ways to get advertising out anyway. (If a PAC 'really' believes in the candidate, then it would buy the advertising directly so that we can see conclusively that campaign funds go to the campaigns.) In a government of checks and balances, is it even possible that we could ask the court system to make illegal this obviously corrupting process?

Re:Where Government Interests Lie

[erroneus]

Who needs evidence of human nature? Unless you're not human, it should be already obvious. I don't have faith in human nature except in my expectations of its own corruption.

I am not pointing out that there is a causation-correlation problem. I am pointing out that there is a problem with motivation.

We have politicians accepting "campaign money" that is later available to them as personal money. That's a fact. Who can deny it? Show it to me that it's not. That is motivation. It is inappropriate motivation. And even if NO politician has ever bowed to that motivation, it's still there and needs to be eradicated. If no politician has even been on the take, there would be no problem in closing this hole. Can someone offer up a reason for NOT reforming the laws and rules regulating this practice? I've made my argument for reform, what is the argument against it? Lack of statistical evidence? There are lies, damned lies and statistics.

Influence should never be bought or even seemlingly bought. To the further benefit of the interest of the people over the PACs and to restore the faith of the people in the government, the practice should be removed.

Again, I am calling to attention the problems of the motivation. And as I said before, they can keep the money left over in their campaign funds after they are out of office. So where once the motivation is to represent the people to remain in office, now it's not so bad to be voted out because there is a nice little pot of gold as a consolation prize in the loser's circle. More than anything, that is motivation not to care if a decision is unpopular or even unjust. Why do we need statistics to measure something as obviously wrong as this?

Microsoft is not stupid.

[Neck_of_the_Woods]

If anything Microsoft is not stupid. They are never going to make a piece of software that is a "all in one fix". Then they would only sell one thing. They are never going to make something that they can't improve, that would be killing there money stream. As long as there is something to fix, add, or tweak they have a reason to create a "new" os.

Lets make something crystal clear when you put Microsoft vs Open Sorce. They have different goals. Microsoft is to claim the market share and reap the rewards of profit. Open Source is to share, improve, and make better to finish something. Microsoft will never "finish", and I hate to put it to you they make things easy, and in this world that is enough. When the open source movement sees that it is not the features but "ease of use" is when the tides will start to turn. The world does not care about if it can control the software, the OS, or the kernal. They care about sending and e-mail, making a spread sheet, and buying a DVD online without having to learn perl, or reading a book.

Make it easy, and hide the hard stuff. That is how you win, and Microsoft knows it. We as open source, praise the hard stuff. We love it, we bask in it as if it was holly water, and it is our downfall.

George Bush and the M$ case

[BWJones]

So, I wonder what impact Bush's decision to drop the case against Microsoft will have on national defense? We all know about security flaws in NT, and with certain government organizations pushing for more adoption of WinNT and its derivatives to lessen their dependance on network administrators for UNIX systems (among other reasons) we will probably have more stories like the USS Yorktown which when NT entered one of its known failure modes crashed the entire system leaving the ship dead in the water. In fact, the Yorktown has been towed in to port several times because of "Smart Ship system failures".

The Navy's plan to move from UNIX to NT (IT-21) is shortsigted, and possibly dangerous given that control of their command and communication systems is going to be NT based. One could easily imagine entire task groups being disabled without a single shot being fired by inserting viral or worm based attacks. Granted NT has TRUSTED versions, but many of the security holes and failure modes are still present. Relying on a corporation whose model for the dissemination of products is deadline based rather than product based ensures that their software will always be "not quite done or ready for release" as their goal is making money, not ensuring quality software with good engineering and tight security.

It's bad enough running across the BSOD in my research, but I for one would not want to be seeing the BSOD in the middle of a fight. "Hang on Commander, we need to reboot before we can engage incoming targets." Screw that noise.

Re:George Bush and the M$ case

[erroneus]

As a former enlisted sailor and Desert Storm veteran, this issue concerns me greatly.

Could you be so kind as to follow-up with your sources for the information given above? I do not doubt the creditibility of the statements above, but if I am to fear something in our future, I certainly want to understand what it is I'm afraid of.

Selling your product for profit is an acceptable motivation in business, but selling-out your country's safety is yet another issue entirely. The notion of NT running a ship's nervous system scares the crap out of me.

I was aboard the U.S.S. Eisenhower (CVN-69) during the Desert Shield/Desert Storm conflict. The state of the Navy was, at that time, pretty ideal. There were no women on combatant vessels, and "the big picture" was being run on some really nice *NIX systems. I was partly involved with the installation of the upgrades implemented on that ship at that time.

Microsoft can't be so stupid as to think that their OS is stable enough for combat can they? Obviously they are... at least I hope they are. Otherwise, there are other conclusions about Microsoft I would be forced to draw... things like "Microsoft values its profit over national security." How about THAT for an insane conclusion?

What total FUD.

[Telek]

If you're a linux zealot that hates microsoft then don't bother reading and just moderate away as Troll, save yourself a few minutes.

The article looked reasonable until I read this:

He can do this by releasing a new operating system even more bloated, slow and enormous than his current excrescences, thus requiring a general round of expensive and pointless consumer hardware upgrading-pointless for the consumers

What type of bull-ass-shit FUD is that? Excuse me, Mr Eben Moglen, but what information do you have to base this claim on? This is hardly surprising that this would up on /. with a classic gem like that in there. For-your-information I am using XP now as I type, and there is quite a lot of innovation that went into this product. Quite a lot, I might add, that customers have been bitching about for years and years. For starters, they finally got rid of the hideous Win3.11/Win9X codebase, which BTW they have been trying to do since Windows95 came out. Windows 98 was supposed to be based on the NT kernel, but there was far too much resistance from the consumer base who was claiming that their legacy applications would not run, thus MS had to release another version off their 3.11 base. Windows98SE was supposed to be an indication that they wanted to stop yet again, and WinME was supposed to be called Win98TE (third edition) but marketing thought that it would be a very bad idea to do that again.

In any case, they have finally released a product that is, IMO, much more user friendly, finally away from the Win3.1/9x codebase, which is what people have been asking for for years. Sure, it does take a bit more processing power, however I noticed that on a fresh install, NOT ONLY does it boot in less time than linux does (30s from POWER ON to completely logged in. It's insanely fast), but it also takes LESS memory on boot than W2K did. MS did extensive user testing on their new modifications to their interface to make it much more friendly for Mom&Pop and the traditional Win9X user base, and included the options to turn this off so that you can go back to the W2K style interface. They have also abstracted the user interface layer sufficiently so that it is possible to create your own user interface entirely, as these people have done to give you whatever type of interface you want. They have made the system much more robust and fault tolerant, indeed even more than W2K. They've added driver rollback, system restore and numerous other features to save people from their own mistakes, they've implemented a much more rigerous testing plan to ensure that drivers can't cause a system problem, they've implemented a system where drivers that are known to cause system problems will have the user warned prior to installing (and before you scream foul here, you can not only disable this, but you can edit the list yourself. It will not prohibit you from installing anything that you are determined to install). They have made it very simple to use webcams and cameras and scanners and other devices with very very little effort at all, they have given simple file sharing and networking and firewall and routing capabilities for home networks, and countless other features designed to be nice to the users. Indeed this is one of the largest changes that has happened for the average user since the Windows 95 release.

In addition, the hardware requirements are negligably higher than that of W2K. The memory has been doubled under the "Recommended" arena from 64MB to 128MB, but at $20USD for 128MB who cares? I'm glad they did this too because the memory management algorithms in W2K were far too old and based upon the premise of never having enough memory so swapping was agressive.

My system is much faster now than it was running Windows 2000.

They've added in many new support features like (Essentially) a built in high efficiency PCAnywhere/VNC based on the terminal server system that is fast, and designed in this case to allow other users to connect to your desktop to interface with you and help you out to configure that printer that you just bought and can't figure out how to setup. There's numerous other enchancements that I won't bother to go.

So how do the users respond? Actually most of them like it, but there's always the super-linux-rulez-MS-sucks crowd that is impossible to please and screams foul when MS does what they've been asked to. There is no winning no matter what they do.

Re:What total FUD.

[blakestah]

MS doesn't make any hardware. Why would they bloat the system on purpose?

The vast vast majority of Microsoft's money comes from OEM installations of Office and operating systems.

If no one buys new computers, no one buys Microsoft products. So far so good.

Now the tough part. Microsoft has to CONVINCE consumers that they NEED the new operating system. They achieve this is a few ways. First, they discontinue support and patches for old products. They say "That is an old product - please upgrade to Windows and Office XP". Secondly, they only support new hardware in the new operating system. Thus, if you get a new computer, you HAVE to have the new OS. Third, they make it very easy for users of the new Office software to make documents that are not backward compatible. About a third of all people who need a new version of Office will just buy a new computer to get it pre-installed.

The plan is multi-faceted, but has proven to work in the past. The easiest solution for most people is to buy a new computer. And if they buy a new computer, they will only have the pre-install option of getting Office XP. Then they get onto licensing terms, which get worse every year, until all of your dollars are belong to Billy G.

And you still end up with an OS that provides the same basic functionality to 99% of all computer users that Windows 3.1 did.

Re:What total FUD.

[blakestah]

The vast vast majority of Microsoft's money comes from OEM installations of Office and operating systems


OEM revenue was $4.72 billion in 1998, $6.40 billion in 1999, and $7.01 billion in 2000.

Since the revenue was $15.2bil in 1998, $19.7bil in 1999 and $23.0bil in 2000, that's hardly the "vast majority".

Sorry. I meant PROFIT when I said MONEY. Not gross revenue.

In the case of computers, most users are not like gamers. They do not want or need the latest and greatest. If you surveyed most people, you would find that their business needs are completely met by Windows 95. They do not need another OS that requires 4 times more RAM to provide them the same user interface, the same office suite, and a few new bells and whistles that were mostly non-functional from the business point of view.

Indeed, this is Microsoft's entire motivation for getting people into XP. People are buying computers less frequently now. Microsoft sees this as a direct hit in the wallet. In a licensing scheme, however, they can stop the loss. XP is all about licensing software instead of buying it. In a licensing scheme, people pay Microsoft yearly whether they NEED it or not. They have no choice.

Break-up would have been nicer to Microsoft

[Ded Bob]

In 1996, several of the developers at a company I worked and myself discussed the possibility of a Microsoft break-up. The conclusion: the break-up might help Microsoft in the long run.

If we take AT&T as an example, we will all notice that the Baby Bell's and AT&T may be competing, but they are also quite easily squishing out the competition around them. Since none truly have a monopoly (at least outside of their respective regions), regulations have been harder to make against them. Just think about what we call them: Baby Bells. They may be very fat babies, but the citizens think of them as babies.

Microsoft's size is also a deterrent for growth. Sometimes it is easier to dominate from a smaller position. It is much easier to organize and grow. If we keep Microsoft as one large corporation with shakles, we will probably do the country a greater service than breaking it apart and waiting for them to get us later.

Personally, I was worried that the Justice Department was going to just slice Microsoft apart and not really force the law on this slippery snake. With the only punishment the government wants to get being financial and restrictive, they are more likely to get it. I don't see this as favoritism but wisdom.

On a related note, I have a question for all of those hating Bush without reason when it comes to the decision (made be Ashcroft, not Bush) concerning not breaking-up Microsoft. What would be the ideal punishment? Would it make a difference if the restrictions placed around Microsoft's neck were instead around two companies?

If the restrictions are good enough, I would not care how many companies the Microsoft monopoly had in it. I just keep seeing them getting off easier if they are broken up. The judge might think they have been punished enough by a break-up and forego any thing further.

Re:Disagreement regarding FS = Flame me :)

[timothy]

"Why would any developer worth their salt work on free software when they can get paid?"

Well ... those things aren't in opposition :)

Most programmers in the country (around 90% is the number I've heard, I cannot back it up and would love to see contrary or supporting numbers) work on custom software for companies, doing things like tying together accounting systems with company email systems, or designing custom commerce systems. They can use Free software all they want, and get paid what they can get away with ;)

They can also modify the code they work with -- and If they're not publishing the results, that's the end of it. Game over, they used free software and made money. If they modifying the code *and publishing* the result, the only restrictions they accept (under the GPL at least) is to provide the original source code they were provided (sounds fair) and the source code to their modified version (again, sounds fair to me) along with a copy of the license, which says others are similarly constrained in their republication, etc etc.

Under the BSD license, also considered Free by the Free Software Foundation, things don't even go that far -- the developer can say "Hey! This is a nify little solution I've worked out from freely availble tools licensed such that I can proprietize the whole thing and sell it for one ... billion .. dollars." More power to 'em. If the price is past a certain threshold, others will put together a similar combo and either sell or give it away. Churn.

"Therefore, the best developers will naturally be working on the developments that make the most $, and that != free source."

Premise flawed, conclusion does not follow :)

timothy

the RIAA has said as much

[mj6798]

The RIAA has said as much. I'm paraphrasing from memory from one of their press releases: "We will be working with operating system providers like Microsoft to ensure that their systems contain binary-only systems that are difficult to reverse engineer for protecting our rights". The RIAA (and probably the MPAA) have swallowed fully the idea of security through obscurity and binary-only distribution. The DMCA provides further protection to them, allowing them to go after people even if someone reverse engineers the information. Obviously, there is no room in that world for open source operating systems or open source multimedia formats; in fact, such open efforts may well end up being considered "circumvention devices" in this new world.

I wouldn't mind that much if Hollywood tried to lock up its junk tightly, but the problem is that in such a world of DRM and controlled platforms, independent content producers end up having to go to the software publishers for the privilege of publishing. That's not because the software publishers provide any useful service, or because the software publishers have any particularly great technology, but because they hold the keys that independent publishers need to get access to the multimedia clients and document readers. This gives Microsoft and places like that an unacceptable level of control.

PS: I would try to dig up this information on the RIAA site, but when I try to connect to it, I get the message "ODBC Error Code = 08004 (Data source rejected establishment of connection) [Microsoft][ODBC SQL Server Driver][SQL Server]Unable to connect."

No mention of Macs and lots of slashdot baiting

[gad_zuki!]

I like the Nation but even they get it wrong:

There are now two kinds of computers in the world: Windows computers... and free software computers

Macs anyone? Are Apple's numbers so insignificant next to Linux that they don't deserve a mention?

Best software in the world free? That's more arguable opinion than fact. Both sides have their winners and losers.

Lets make it clear

[aralin]

I will make it clear for Hollywood. I rented 4 DVDs a week as long as I lived with my roommate who has DVD player. And I would buy about one a week also when I would have it myself. Now I moved, I don't have TV or DVD player, but I have my computer with DVD drive. I would most likely continue in my habit, if I could play the DVDs without hassle. I cannot so .. this means that for last 2 months I didn't rent single one and I didn't buy any. Maybe its unrelated, but I was not in the movie theatre either and I use to get every other week.

So as I am concerned they are losing money. 'nuff said.

How Open Source failed Hollywood.

[small_dick]

Open Source failed Hollywood, and all media creators, by claiming those creators could no longer sell there product for $20, one that costs a quarter to make, and must now give it away for free.

Remember all the horrid stories about Metallica and Napster here on slashdot? And most everyone saying it was unfair to sell those CDs at such a huge markup? After all, they've been doing it for twenty years now.

There are a lot of very rich people staying rich, with elegant homes on prime real estate, with bowls of cocaine on the tables and teenage girlies all around the pool. And you think a bunch of programmers can take that lifestyle away? Get real.
The government? Five percent of America controls the government, as long as unemployment stays under 10%. Did someone say McDonalds? Or was that WalMart?
The new laws on the way say three important things:

1) The NSF shall be funded by the dotGOV to create a workable DRM infrastucture. This will allow people with the right-to-use to actually use the binary object in question.

2) If the NSF cannot perform the task in a reasonable amount of time, a corporation will be given the green light, and will be exempt from anti-trust laws (who could that be?)

3) It will be illegal to sell or transfer a device (hw or sw) that does not protect the IP rights holder.

Never mind that all the people who once stole on Napster are now stealing on BearShare. Never mind that nearly all the people, in either case, were/are running Microsoft products.

So, someone has convinced the powers-that-be that middleware, with a certified OS (no Root access/no binary tools) is the holy grail. That way, you can validate the object chain -- guaranteed.

I think that is a bunch of crap. We need to focus on doing the right thing--reasonable protection for IP, reasonable non-interference with personal behavior--if a musician wants to give something away, or an author wants to give away a book, they should be able to "mark it" free.

Just like we do with books, we should be able to trade IP -- give it away, loan it out, buy or sell it.

All that is needed is some type of client-server infrastucture, complete with (I imagine) a one-time decryption key process. The client-server infrastucture would keep track of the current rights holder for the objects, aloowing the current holders to decypt and use the binary object.

There would be horrific penalties for cracking the rights infrastructure, or distributing the tools to do so.

Society operates this way right now. There is no need to have two policeman ride along with me to insure I am not bad--it's just a matter of my realizing that crime or violence is not a acceptable solution to life's struggles. The penalty exceeds the payoff.

Applying a similar concept to the IP situation--harsh prosecution for using cracked s/w, distributing cracking s/w, etc.--should be more than enough to satisy Hollywood and the Government, plus it's the reasonable thing to do.

The Problem with XP Won't be its Quality...

[GroundBounce]

It will be its price.

The acceptance of XP will be slow because it is relatively expensive compared to the added advantages that most users will get. Remember, right now most home users use their PCs to send email and surf the web at 56K. Even serious multimedia users are a small percentage compared to the email/web crowd at this point in time

I will agree that with XP, MS has finally produced a consumer OS that at least comes close to being worthy of the hardware it runs on, even though it attempts to bring with it multimedia format lock-in. With the retail price so high, however, and the fact that MS has made it more difficult to install one copy on multiple PCs, I suspect that only a small percentage of existing PC owners will bother to upgrade off the retail shelf, and even if they do, they may not upgrade all of their machines.

Even medium sized businesses (that don't get huge site licensing deals) will hesitate because of the cost. Our company has already decided to stick with '98 for the time being.

That leaves much of the uptake of XP to new hardware, which will of course come with XP at greatly reduced OEM prices. It will eventually gain dominace though this, and the fact that broadband and multimedia will eventually grow, but the PC market in the US is beginning to saturate as many families now have PCs capable of email and web surfing, and the growth will be slow.

*how* the U.S. surrendered...

[LinuxParanoid]

My perception is that Bush didn't really tell the DOJ what to do, it was more subtle than that. The Republicans, having taken office and putting their own people in high positions as they have the perogative to do, got rid of many of the anti-trust experts and litigators they hired for the case, put some junior people on the job who don't know much about anti-trust, and those are the people now making these (IMHO poor) decisions.

--LP