Microsoft Offers to License the Internet

NW writes "According to an eWeek story Microsoft is beginning to assert IP rights over 130 protocols including many basic Internet protocols including TCP/IP, DNS, etc. The story originates with a mailing list post to the IETF's IPR list."

Comments

Before the M$ Bashing Begins

[OverlordQ]

I think this follow-up to the post in the NG fits nicely:

Keep in mind that even though the core protocols haven't changed that
much, actual TCP/IP deployments have drastically changed since the
early 80s. Efficient packet forwarding algorithms (which are
necessary in Gigabit networks and beyond) are certainly subject to
patents today.

Re:Before the M$ Bashing Begins

[Guy Harris]

Keep in mind that even though the core protocols haven't changed that much, actual TCP/IP deployments have drastically changed since the early 80s. Efficient packet forwarding algorithms (which are necessary in Gigabit networks and beyond) are certainly subject to patents today.

As might efficient packet discarding algorithms, as per their listing the Discard Protocol as one of the protocols you can license from them.

That strongly suggests to me, at least, that they just enumerated protocols Microsoft implements but didn't invent solely by themselves (or didn't invent at all), and threw them into the list, perhaps on the theory that it's better that other organizations and individuals spend time figuring out what stuff might be covered by patents owned by Microsoft than that they spend time figuring out what public protocols actually are covered, in part or in whole, by some Microsoft patent.

QOS

[kinzillah]

Maybe they will be patenting their idea of setting the QOS on all packets to realtime, thereby making the whole damn thing useless.

Re:How can I pay?

[metlin]

You think you are scared?

You're not scared enough -- MS has _tonnes_ of patents in the WIMP area, which several Operating Systems use.

MSR has been filing patents left right and center, in various areas such as Graphics, AI and what not. They even have people working on areas of Information Theory in Quantum Computing and what not.

A search on Delphion shows that about 7,542 patents have been registered in almost every conceivable area of computer science.

I was hoping that MS would not take this stance, but I guess this was inevitable.

Re:How can I pay?

[mfearby]

What scares me is that Australia will probably end up with copyright and patent laws the same as the United States (which is part of our "free trade" agreement). I guess I can always renounce technology and go back to reading books and using pen and paper, but then, I'm sure Amazon has a patent on "a mechanism for the immediate and periodic loan of printed material from a central repository" (meaning I can't borrow library books, unless it takes more than one step :-)

Fuck, Someone's going to be pissed

[theolein]

I sit here using my Mac, open the MS page listing all the protocols that MS wants you to sign a licence agreement for, and lo and behold I see that Apple File Protocol is the first on that list. I think Apple might have some fun with it's lawyers on this one.

I also wonder just how arrogant, dumb and just plainly disconnected from reality you have to be to start licencing protocols that Microsoft had absolutely nothing to do with, such as DNS, DHCP, TCP/IP etc.

And the microsofties on this board wonder why people refer to MS as M$ or slam the company constantly.

MS is a bunch of criminal bastards. Fuck them and may they burn in fucking hell.

Re:insane

[Harassed]

Doing what? If you actually GO AWAY AND READ THE ARTICLE you will notice that it's one guys conjecture based on something he found on Microsoft's website. Nowhere does it say that Microsoft are claiming the entirety of these protocols for themselves (and I doubt they would). There is a good chance that Microsoft do own some algorithms for something related to these protocols. As an example, while it is unlikely that MS can claim DNS as their own "invention", they may well have some patents relating to Dynamic DNS and its integration with their Active Directory stuff.

FUD

[anonymous cowherd (m]

This FAQ entry referenced by TFA makes it pretty clear that MSFT is not claiming ownership of anything with this:

Published Protocols And Royalty-Free License FAQ Q. When I sign a royalty-free agreement for these protocols, what am I licensing? A. The list of protocols under this license includes protocols for which documentation has been published, and that Microsoft has implemented in Windows client operating systems to interoperate with Windows server operating systems (up to and including Windows Server 2003). However, just because a protocol appears on the list does not mean that Microsoft is the owner or sole owner of rights in that protocol or its documentation. What the royalty-free license does is ensure that a license is available from Microsoft under whatever rights it may have in the published documentation and/or protocols on the list.

MSFT is not, as TFA summary indicates, "licencing the internet," in any meaningful way. That would imply that MSFT owns or controls what it is licencing. Further, TFA itself states that "a significant number of protocols date from the early 1980's," so, "here is no reason to suspect that Microsoft has any patent rights to these early protocols (such as the TCP/IP v4 core protocols). Further, in the unlikely event that applicable patents may be discovered, they would have likely expired at this point."

This is clearly, yet again, a story that is more about MSFT bashing than about anything real.

Re:FUD

[mike2R]

TFA itself states that "a significant number of protocols date from the early 1980's," so, "here is no reason to suspect that Microsoft has any patent rights to these early protocols (such as the TCP/IP v4 core protocols). Further, in the unlikely event that applicable patents may be discovered, they would have likely expired at this point."

This is clearly, yet again, a story that is more about MSFT bashing than about anything real.

However a follow up to TFA states:

Keep in mind that even though the core protocols haven't changed that much, actual TCP/IP deployments have drastically changed since the early 80s. Efficient packet forwarding algorithms (which are necessary in Gigabit networks and beyond) are certainly subject to patents today.

Re:FUD

[radtea]

TCP/IP is included on the list of licensed protocols.

"So what?", you may say.

Well...

The Recitals (which is the part of a license agreement that amongst other things lays out what property the licenser owns and is willing to license) declares that the licensee wants to license these protocols "under any applicable intellectual property rights that Microsoft may have"

But...

There is no conceivable scenario in which Microsoft could have any rights to TCP/IP whatsoever.

So why is it included in the agreement?

This would be like my company, whose products use XML parsers, licensing the XML standard to our users. It would be bizzare on the face of it, and such a contract would be in my view very poorly written. Good contracts contain just what they need to contain, and nothing more. Microsoft's lawyers probably know this.

So why exactly did they invest the effort into creating such an extensive list?

This story is not about Microsoft bashing. It is about a very strange license from a very powerful company, which should give us all pause.

--Tom

Re:FUD

[orangesquid]

Simple. They have a habit of "embracing and extending," which usually means breaking compatibility with non-Windows implementations.

Signing your soul (well, protocol-soul) over is probably the only supported way to get your software to work with Microsoft's.

This might be another fear-of-free-software; if they can change how all Windows developers and other commercial developers implement protocols, free software will break unless free software developers sign up with Microsoft (and, I haven't read the whole license, but it's quite likely that the license is designed to be non-GPL-compatible in some way).

Hold your hourses!

[danalien]

just read the 1st line

• Is Microsoft Ready to Assert IP Rights over the Internet?
  November 5, 2004

  Has Microsoft been trying to retroactively claim IP (intellectual property) rights over many of the Internet's basic protocols? Larry J. Blunk, senior engineer for networking research and development at Merit Network Inc., believes that might be the case.

  [...]

I am not found of M$ like the next slashdotter, but, before 'we' start bashing M$ ... lets do it after we know the _facts_ :)

I mean,

Microsoft Offers to License the Internet

• vs

Is Microsoft Ready to Assert IP Rights over the Internet?

is a big difference, that awards 'caution, biased story alert'.

One stop indemnification?

[Anonymous Coward]

I for one will welcome the day we can read a story about how Slashdot editors have finally decided to read the text of the submissions, and at least scan the contents of the offered links.

Re:Closer look

[ctid]

There. They are acknowledging that you can use the protocols anyway without signing this license agreement.

Well, that's very big of them, but some of these protocols don't belong to Microsoft. For example, TCP/IP was developed before Microsoft existed. You might reasonably call this "stupid". I would also call it "evil", just as I would call a burglar evil if I caught him trying to sell (sorry, "licence") property that belonged to me. I think "strange" is understating the case.

Re:Part of DOJ settlement (confusing)

[KontinMonet]

..a license is available from Microsoft under whatever rights it may have...

Of what use is this license to the ordinary Joe? If MS terminates the license after 30 days, then what? Does Joe have to re-license the use of all 130 protocols elsewhere? And is Joe aware that there may be rights that are no longer valid making him have only partial rights to documentation and protocols? And, under the terms of the license, no improvement to the protocols is allowed either even if MS has no rights in that particular protocol.

Perhaps MS should have named it a ...royalty free but (perhaps partially) restricting and confusing license...

TCP/IP?

[Anonymous Coward]

This may be the big one folks. There is so much prior art for this that its not even funny. Not only that, this is the backbone of the world's economy and its rigorous enforcement may well wake up the world to the problem of broad software patents and bring about quick change to the patent system. May it be rigorously enforced for the good of humanity.

Terminate your licence to use Appletalk?

[dbIII]

The licence does state plainly that MS can terminate it, and states plainly that Appletalk is covered by the licence.

It is not within Microsofts power to do that - so why is this document not considered fraud?

Also, MS offers no form of warranty and accepts no liability, so this licence is completely worthless in any case.

Re:Like most other IP battles...

[Just Another Perl Ha]

Your logic fails in that one should never assume that anything Microsoft does is above board... especially when their behavior seems a little odd. They have proven time and again that their view of right and wrong is very different from the rest of humanity (save for perhaps the confused yet powerful few from the Project for a New American Century who feel compelled to impose their twisted version of American values on the rest of the world).

Microsoft would never do anything like this unless they firmly believed that they had an ace up their sleeve that they could later use to crush anyone who got in the way of their grand vision of One World, One Operating System, One Vendor.

Finally... if you actually believe that you can win in a court of law against Microsoft just because you're right... you've got another thing coming. Justice is a myth. Most court battles are won by the party who outspends their opponent... and Microsoft can outspend just about everybody.

not so liberal

[geg81]

If you actually execute the license agreement, you will be under all sorts of legal obligations to Microsoft that you weren't under before; for example, you need to put a notice into your software and you may be restricted in how you can sublicense it. And you get nothing from them in return because they don't actually own any of the protocols. This is not a "liberal" license, it's a license for suckers.

License is not benign.

[PolR]

RTF, yes M$ does not claimn ownership of the protocol. But they won't tell they don't own it either. If you have signed the licensed, would your lawyer advise that you can take the chance?

The license contains some interesting clauses. For example:

3.4 Reservation of Rights. All rights not expressly granted in this Agreement are reserved by Microsoft. No additional rights are granted by implication or estoppel or otherwise. By way of clarification, in order for a third party to distribute a Licensed Implementation as part of its third party branded products, such party must be authorized to do so by You and must also execute this license and comply with its terms.

Here we have an obligation for licensee to license their implementation of the protocol and require third parties to enforce the license as well. This obligation exists even if M$ has no right to the protocol in the first place.

Another funny clause:

3.2 Patent License. To the extent Microsoft has Necessary Claims, Microsoft hereby grants You a nonexclusive, royalty-free, non-sublicenseable, personal, worldwide license under those Necessary Claims to use the Technical Documentation for the Licensed Protocols to:

(a) make, use, import, offer to sell, sell and distribute directly or indirectly to end users, object code versions of Licensed Implementations only as incorporated into Licensed Products and solely for the purpose of conforming with the Protocol as described in the corresponding Technical Documentation, and

(b) to distribute or otherwise disclose source code copies of the Licensed Implementation(s) licensed in Section 3.2(a) only if You (i) prominently display the following notice in all copies of such source code, and (ii) distribute or disclose the source code only under a license agreement that includes the following notice as a term of such license agreement and does not include any other terms that are inconsistent with, or would prohibit, the following notice:

"This source code may incorporate intellectual property owned by Microsoft Corporation. Our provision of this source code does not include any licenses or any other rights to you under any Microsoft intellectual property. If you would like a license from Microsoft (e.g. to rebrand, redistribute), you need to contact Microsoft directly (send mail to protocol@microsoft.com)."

Yes M$ admits they might not have a patent, but they don't tell you if they have one or not. So read clause a). It says you can distribute the licensed protocol only as a Licensed Implementation. Do you take the chance and distribute an open source implementation? If M$ happens to have a patent afterall, you are in violation. You may have good chance to challenge the patent and invalidate it, but then you are up for a trial and the contract may be found enforceable for the time period before the patent is invaludated. What would the company lawyer advice? What a PHB will decide? This is called chilling effect.

Now look at clause b). As a licensee you are required to tell the world that M$ has rights to the protocol, even if it might not be the case.

Re:How is this possible?

[KD5YPT]

The answer, none. But the problem is, with the way current legal system operates, Microsoft (I'll not do the s => $ thingy, I think its childish) could just drag out the lawsuit until their opponent collapse under the legal fees. This is actually the most common tactic used by large coporation to destroy a smaller ones.

Second is that most small company would just settle and avoid the legal battle.

That's the threat. Not that Microsoft has a claim on TCP/IP protocol, but the threat that they actually have a claim.

I really wish US could adopt a IP (intellectual, not internet one) system that gives an enforcement expiration date. Basically, if you didn't enforce a patent after a period of time, the patent automatically expires (I think a country does this, not sure which).