Slashdot Mirror
Microsoft Stoking the IP Fire
gokulpod writes to tell us the Financial Express is reporting that Microsoft is heating up the IP battle once again with warnings about IP indemnifications issues. From the article: "Analysts believe that the core issue at stake is whether open source software increases litigation risks. Open source advocates are quick to point out the IP litigation faced by Microsoft itself. Ubuntu founder and leader Mark Shuttleworth says, 'Linux is growing fast and whenever there is a new way of doing things, people will raise all kind of issues.'"
Surely this just opens up a new market for a "insurance" style product. You pay a premium from a company
that has a list of open source software etc that it will protect.
If you ever have a problem, then come in spinner.....
-- Cheer, Cheer, The Red and the White.
When you license software normally, i.e. not Open Source, you don't run the risk of infringement because you are only the user of the software and have no rights to distribute it. On the other hand, if you somehow become a distributor of some software through the GPL or other Open Source license, then wouldn't you be liable? Though you aren't the creator of the work, you are essentially distributing it to others as your own work (in fact, it is your derivative work which you are distributing).
What if it were Microsoft incorporating Linux code into Windows? Wouldn't you want them to be held accountable? Aside from the obvious double standard, why would you think that OSS projects and distributors not be held liable as well?
It's a little disingenuous for Microsoft to claim that as a benefit, though. It's only because they don't grant you any rights that you have that protection.
From the article:
Microsoft claims to provide "uncapped protection for legal costs associated with a patent, copyright, trademark or trade secret claim alleging infringement by their product". Open source majors like Red Hat also provide assurance programmes to protect their customers.
What has the world of patents and copyrights come to? We have product manufacturers offering to protect their customers from being sued for using their products!!! This is a feature?
Imagine Honda offering "uncapped protection" for their car users against being sued for driving them? Or Adidas offering the same for their shoes(they were recently sued by Nike for violating some "Air" patents)
I think I miss the vapourware days. Even if the features were imaginary, they at least sounded useful.
Ok, and how is this a Microsoft vs Linux Issue?
I'm sure the article meant this in more of an illustrative measure, but this is a very bad way to present the issue.
Sure companies are going to protect users from legal issues, this is a part of business. It is also a measure of success with a lot of companies, as some do include protections for their customers and are willing to front any legal blows.
Now if Joe Blow compiles Linux and straps on some tools and you use it in your business and you get sued over stuff it contains, what else would expect to happen?
But this is true of any piece of software or OS, why make this a MS vs Linux specific issue? Buzz, get Slashdot attention, make Microsoft out to be something they are not (good or bad)?
If RedHat is offering or trying to offer a level of abstract between their users and lawsuits as Microsoft is, how could this be Linux vs Microsoft? The last I looked Redhat pretty much only shipped Linux.
This is a common business concept and sure there are reasons when you have a lot at stake to go with the better protection. You could also buy insurance to protect your company as well.
Is this not news to just me?
Microsoft is full of it when they claim they'll provide indemnification. They roll over and pass along the expenses to end customers like a lot of other companies.
Indemnification is advertising speak for "we're as screwed by the patent system as anyone, but our PR people figured out how to put a positive spin on it."
I do not fail; I succeed at finding out what does not work.
The above post really spells out what this is all about. It is exceptionally unlikely that there is signifiant risk to a "normal" business from being sued over software patent infringmet. What Microsoft are trying to do is stem the tide of OSS adoption by creating Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt. Unthinking company directors will read the headline, become concerned and stick with MS, however small the real risk.
Most organisations I have worked for have, at some point, permitted the priacy of software, or encouraged it, or even used it as a normal way of running the business. They may express concern about such practices publically but do little about preventing it in reality. This must open the business up to substantially greater risk than that of being sued over patents issues, but often see turning a blind eye to piracy as cost effective.
Art is the mathematics of emotion
I was talking to a sales rep yesterday about an 'exciting new product' that involves hardware plus software tools. I asked if the software tools were going to be made available for Linux. The response I got was blistering. Not only were they never going anywhere near anything open source but they were removing all their cross-platform functionality. No more Java either. The guy was absolutely rabid. He was also totally ignorant about open source.
So, will Microsoft's IP (patent in this case) FUD work? Absolutely. There are lots of people out there who need only the slightest excuse to stick with Microsoft because they are deathly afraid of open source.
Between Microsoft and all the Linux distros combined, only one company or group has been found guilty in a court of law of IP violations. That's right, Microsoft...repeatedly.
/says/ you are using legally dubious software, and yet neither Red Hat, nor Novell, nor Canonical, nor Mandriva, nor any major Linux distributor has been proved to violate any IP-rights in any court anywhere. The closest they came to such a thing was the SCO issue, which has been universally panned as a bogus suit that will come to no good end for SCO.
/should/ be providing you with legal indemnity? The answer is easy.
This is a red herring. Microsoft wants us to beleive that they are "going the extra mile" to protect us from something that is really unlikely, but in truth, if you are using Microsoft products, you are already using work that has taken IP-protected material from other sources without permission or right. And several courts have already said so. But Microsoft doesn't want you to hear that.
If you are using Linux, Microsoft
So, between Microsoft and Linux, who
-Tom
1) How many of us would have wished for big G to be the gravitational force around which tech revolved over M$ four years ago?
2) I bet Ubuntu would not be too dissapointed in this, for the same reason that Duracell touts they they are the 'only battery trusted by some reandom adventurers'.
3) This is a financial website. Let's not forget that your typical /.'er isn't a typical computer user, let alone even close to being a normal human being. They do awknoledge Linux as a viable alternative to Microsoft, and states Ubuntu is the flavor Google is using. I would give that a big thumbs up for a financial paper.
If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be.-TJ
The difference though is that Microsoft has multiple cash cows, which makes all the difference in the world.
Just as freedom of the press was once said to be for people who could own one, justice is now the exclusive privilege of those who can spend the most on lawyers. You don't cut off your legal competition's air supply, you let the cost of litigating drain their lifeblood.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
IP is a broad term which I think covers both copyright and software method patents and I think Microsoft is trying to say it covers function as well.
If Microsoft imatated a function from Open Source, I would consider it an act of flattery. If they copied the code, the labor of coders who chose the GPL license, then Microsoft would be sued accordingly.
Open source doesn't "Copy" code from Microsoft. We imitate function in different ways.
Microsoft is certianly not offering the Patent protection that they said they were going to. The recent case against them resulted in a changed version of Microsoft Office. Now certian features which used to work will not work any more. You cannot install office and register it and use those functions any more. If your business depended on those functions you now have to find a way to do things differently. They call this protection from IP infringements. I think Microsoft is charging this discussion precicely because they have shown that they are no better able to protect users from IP claims than anybody else.
The law needs to be changed to only protect copyright protection to software source code. The law should not protect file formats, should not shield users from accessing the data they created/licensed/purchased (DMCA).