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Microsoft's European License Dissected
An anonymous reader writes "ZDNet has published a step-by-step explanation of Microsoft's proposed server interoperability license, which was just rejected by the European Commission. The EC said the license excluded open-source vendors and charged unjustifiably high royalty fees -- all bad for business."
Can I trust that?
This is Microsoft.
The European commission has said that the royalties MS asks are 'excessive'. That means that they don't think it is unreasonable to ask for royalties at all. And asking 'per-user' or 'per-server' royalties effectively makes it impossable for free software to get such a licence.
Obviously, the rest of the licence is ridiculous -- MS getting all your code, you having to implement any DRM they choose to put into it, audit-trails, very excessive royalties -- so MS has a lot of room to get closer to what the EU wants without having to let OS benefit as well.
Jan
Because Microsoft are a monopoly, and as such, forcing secret APIs bars most competition out of the market.
That seems pretty obvious to me. In other words, whatever this licence has to say about SAMBA is moot -- since SAMBA has nothing to do with the licence in the first place.
Jan
Is it reasonable to force Microsoft to produce a license that is royalty free - or are people concerned about the cost here.
Remember that this is a punishment for a crime. It's supposed to hurt.
I believe posters are recognized by their sig. So I made one.
And it does. They have to allow people that they don't want to allow to look at some of their code. What the license is about is making sure that those people that look at their code don't go off and make a replica operating system without in some way compensating Microsoft. Now the fees are high - but it does seem reasonable that if someone builds a competing product based on the fact that they've actually seen the guts of Microsoft's product (rather than building it independently and separately) that Microsoft is in some way compensated for this. The niggling detail is how much compensation is appropriate?
So you can't write LSI applications that are under the GPL, ebcause that licence requires that source be made available, but I can't see anything in that paragraph that prohibits anyone from releasing the source code into the public domain. It's a lot easier to reverse-engineer a protocol when you have a source implementation of it
There's a difference between the implementation and the API.
If you're a convincted monopolist, many things than otherwise would be legal are considered a breach of the rules.
The creatures outside looked from Alt-Right to Antifa; but already it was impossible to say which was which.
... are just experts who sell their opinions. Any auditor chosen by Microsoft will say whatever Microsoft want them to say.
So... if my company signed up to this license agreement, they would be giving Microsoft the right to harrass and fine us arbitrarily.
Bend over and take it?
So if they're doing this for server protocol, what next, future Windows API with a license?
i.e.:
1. You build your corporate application on Windows.
2. Your company becomes dependent on it.
3. Windows XP is discontinued. The new version has a 'new' 'enhanced' slightly different API.
4. You want the documentation.
5. Microsoft says, no problem, but it will cost you.
6. Your screwed, you take the hit of shifting your people over to a new platform, or you take the hit and give Microsoft what it wants.
What's the betting that microsoft make some carefully placed "donations" to people in charge of overseeing the changes to this and suddenly very minor changes are accepted as sufficient? I really can't see them letting this get changed too much in case it actually helps open source.
The were charged with opening up interoperablity. Publishing the API is probably sufficient to do this. No one needs to look at their code. Its like publishing the pinouts to a chip... no. they do NOT need to be *compensated* for this. No one needs to see the guts.
Im not here now... Im out KILLING pepperoni
But this is rather the point of the punishment: People like the Samba team should be able to use the 'secret' APIs, thus preventing MS using them to make their desktop products interoperate better than their competitors!
Justin.
You're only jealous cos the little penguins are talking to me.
I understand you are a Microsoft apologist, but I'll explain things in simple terms for you.
/may/ be able to keep up, but if a company were developing a closed source solution, this could slow down their release time by months, if not years.
Microsoft broke the law. They've repeatedly shut out/down other competing products that do the same thing, either by changing APIs to break compatibility, or releasing their own product that forces the general market to break compatibility (in the case of Open Standards). By forcing Microsoft to release the simple documentation of the APIs, they are asking Microsoft to standarize themselves.
Look at it this way. With the APIs remaining "secret", and engineers reverse engineering them for compatibility, all Microsoft has to do to change compatibility is to change a bit, or shift a few bits around, or some other nonsensical thing. Open Source projects
Forcing Microsoft to release their API information basically puts a standard on the table for other companies/programmers to conform to. They don't lose any market dominance. They don't lose any time. They simply are forced to be compatible. And if that's unreasonable, then Microsoft has won, and Open Source is all for naught.
"Victory means exit strategy, and it's important for the President to explain to us what the exit strategy is." G.W.Bush
But that's just it. They don't have to reveil a single line of code to publish an Application Programmer's Interface. All the API is, is a guidelines of how to build your product, so that it will be compatible with their product. It's like a car company telling a company that builds transmissions how to hook their transmission up to the car company's Whizbang new V8. Normally companies see this as being a good thing, meaning their original product will sell more. But when you have a monopoly over the market, publishing interoperability information is the very LAST thing you'd want to do. It's like the old saying "Give a man a fish, he knows where to go for fish. Teach a man to fish, you give up your monopoly on fisheries".
"Victory means exit strategy, and it's important for the President to explain to us what the exit strategy is." G.W.Bush
If they wrote it, shouldn't they have the right to decide whether it is open or not?
At the point where they were convicted of breaking the law, they lost that right to decide. This is a punishment. It is intended to increase competition at the expense of Microsoft. It's supposed to hurt!
If you're a convincted monopolist, many things than otherwise would be legal are considered a breach of the rules.
That may be true (aside from some wording issues), but I wasn't aware that trying to run a business and make money without providing valuable gifts to your direct competitors was one of them.
Valuable gift? This isn't a cheese wheel and some bologna we're talking about here. This is a Monopolistic company, deemed guilty, who won't give up the specifications on how to build a compatible product. This is like a car company, not only welding the hood shut, but bolting on the tires with a patented bolt head (only unscrewable by paying the licencing fees), and making the engine run on a special formulation of fuel (a mixture of shit and octane..), that is non-reproducable except from direct sample and duplication. This allows Microsoft to change the Fuel-to-Shit ratio as they please, making your car undriveable on Alternative pumpgas.
Face it. This is a last ditch effort for a brute of a company to stay alive in the business they've dominated for too long. The European Union is only doing what their public ask of them, and their public has been crying out for far too long about Microsoft's shenanigans.
"Victory means exit strategy, and it's important for the President to explain to us what the exit strategy is." G.W.Bush
Do you have to pay royalties for accessing a Web server?
Does the Firefox team have to pay royalties to Microsoft because the browser could access an IIS server?
Do you have to pay royalties for creating an e-mail client that collects via POP3 from Microsoft Exchange?
No.
So why should anybody be expected to pay in order to develop an application that accesses a file/print server?
I believe that it's in the best interest of the end-user that such servers should have open protocols and APIs.
This would certainly help prevent illegal monopolies from maintaining their anti-competitive actions.
Linux/Open Source/Anti Microsoft News
> In a free market,
Stop right there. The U.S. is *not* a free market, it's a regulated market that is somewhat free.
To be a free market, the U.S. would need to get rid of:
* Greenspan and the FED
* All federal regulations
* All intellectual property laws (copyright, trademarks, patents)
* corporate law (Corporations no longer have special status over fly-by-night lone vendors or individuals. There would be no limitted liability for companies either.)
Do you *really* want a free market? I sure don't. Given that the U.S. market is not a free market, such regulations are perfectly justified.
Ironically, if you read Adam Smith, you'd realize that he was in favour of regulating Monopolies precisely because when monopolies become big enough: they essentially become their own governments able to make their own laws (contra the free market) and charge their own taxes against competitors (contra the free market) to shut them out.
In essense, an unregulated free market inevitably leads to Oligarchy, which is contra-free market. However, there is a sweet spot where regulated free markets are sustainable, and this, in Adam Smith's words, is what we should be striving for.
Personally, I'd say it's the other way around: if it weren't for Microsoft Office, I don't think Windows would ever have taken off. The early Windows versions of Word and Excel were good products, with genuine advantages over their rivals. MS had plenty of competition back then, and it didn't die off by magic. Without those major office applications as drivers, I can't imagine Windows developing the kind of momentum it did in the mid-90s.
That said, IMHO, the problems with Microsoft didn't start with either Windows or Office, both of which competed on their own merits with real competition until they'd established themselves as the dominant players in their respective markets. The problems began when Microsoft started throwing in other toys (IE, Media Player, etc.) on the back of Windows and/or Office, at the expense of competitors those toys couldn't beat in their own right. IME, the court cases have been aiming at the right target on this one.
If you disagree, post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like.
If they had not broken the law, yes. However, they did break the law, so things change.
i dont think you understand. Microsoft got to where they are by illegal practices.
They keep their apis closed in order to keep their competitors from competing.
a comparison ive seen is a company which owns 95% of the car market making their cars only work with a particular kind of gas, which is secret.
microsoft arent being asked to open any code, just enough information to make other software products work with their software.
While I agree that Microsoft has broken the law, they don't play fair, and that they should either publish a set of API's or conform to some standards - I have to admit that they're doing this the smart way. They throw out a piece of trash like the one discussed and let the EU get up in arms about it - they don't care, what's $5 Million a day to them? But, then they later come to the table - most likely before any deadline with injunctions - and submit an amended agreement. Because Microsoft has made the new agreement more fair than their initial one, it's more likely to be accepted. AND - they'll probably get an extension on coming up with a new agreement if that one is rejected. This is heavyweight bargaining IMHO... And Microsoft has proven they're good at it - sounds a lot like a certain anti-trust case in the US...
The EU should just mandate that government-owned systems must use protocols and file formats whose specifications are publicly available royalty-free. Any other arrangement allows a vendor (be it Microsoft or anybody) to hold your data hostage.
All of your agruments you have made so far have been as if MS is just some good-ole-company that has just been trying to compete fairly. That is not the case. MS has leveraged their monopoly illegaly for a long time now and have been convicted of that in two separate nations. Now it is time for MS to pay the penalty. The main point of the punishment, IMO, is not what is best for MS (that wouldn't be much of a punishment), but to ask what is best for the industry/society. IMO, the best thing would be to force MS to disclose their "secret" OS API's so that the whole industry can leverage those on an equal footing instead of having all MS software have the leg-up because MS controls the OS.
Your arguments sound as if you believe that MS cannot compete on a level playing field. That if their competitors also have access to the same server API's, then MS will no longer be able to deliver a better product. Is MS really that bad at developing programs that if they are not the _only_ ones to have access to "secret" API's than their non-OS products will fail?
If Tyranny and Oppression come to this land,
it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign enemy. -James Madison
"... Except that MS is not socialist...."
They might be. How about Corporate Socialism. That is, MS wants to supply you with all your computer needs. You don't need to look at anyone else for solutions and there is no need for competition in this field. MS will do it all and you *only* buy from them. You keep pumping them the money like taxes and they will take care of you.