Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

The 'Hairy Guys' Vs. Microsoft

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the don't-shave-we-like-you-that-way dept.

Jeremy Allison - Sam writes "The IHT is running the best write-up I've seen on the Microsoft vs EU Anti-Trust case, featuring quotes from tridge (Creator of Samba) and Carlo Piana (the FSFE lawyer). Nicely contrasts the difference between the Microsoft legal Team and the resources the FSFE has to work with. I was the FSFE witness for the initial hearing and the first trial, and this article nicely explains what it's like to be there." From the article: "The settlements left a group of computer programmers and activists, united under the banner of the Free Software Foundation Europe, with a bigger-than-expected role in supporting the EU's goal of loosening Microsoft's grip over the software industry. Only half-joking, one observer at the court this past week called some members FSFE and allies 'the hairy guys' - in contrast to the well- groomed legal teams fielded by Microsoft."

11 of 145 comments (clear)

  1. All suit and no action by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Microsoft likes to present itself as well groomed and well mannered. It's a nice cover for their back alley tactics (which contine to this day, and will for all time). They appear like the Don polishing his favorite apple which he took from the poor lady on the street (without paying for it). "HOW DARE YOU CHARGE ME" would be his reply if she asked for compensation. He might just tip over her cart and knock her to the ground instead. Microsoft has wrung protection out of millions. Now a group from the community is banding together. The internet ties them. Microsoft and it's BSA brute squad can only kick down so many doors before a large group starts kicking down the BSA's (and Microsoft's) doors. You can call that collected community group hairy if you want to, but unlike Microsoft, they are respectable and non-crimminal.

  2. Re:Obvious by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    *OR*, have other interests than selling products through 'selling themselves'. Make no mistake, 'the hairy guys' are the people who truly love what they do. More often than not, these are also the people who give birth to new technologies. The suits just take their innovation and sell it as their own. All-time classic: 'who do you trust, me or that guy who doesn't even care about his haircut?'. The right answer is 'Never trust a suit'...

  3. Re:Obvious by B3ryllium · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Bill Gates doesn't have money for haircuts either - that doesn't stop him from cutting it himself.

  4. Hairy Guys by JPribe · · Score: 1, Insightful

    So, are we talking chest hair, back hair...I'm confused!

    --

    Why go fast when you can go anywhere? O|||||||O
  5. I won't waste a mod point on this by Flying+pig · · Score: 5, Insightful
    You don't understand the case. It is the EU's competition department that is bringing the case against Microsoft, not Tridge et al. The contention is that Microsoft has abused its monopoly.

    Well, FWIW, I know one of the "smooth suited professionals" that Microsoft employs. And his opinion? That the arguments that Microsoft wanted deployed in court were, in summary "We are so important and so essential to the IT world that you must allow us to do whatever we want." Unfortunately, judges do not take warmly to this kind of argument. Judges like John Cooke have a clue about things like Firefox (and now knows a lot more about how kernels work and that Windows Embedded means that the Microsoft kernel need not be monolithic). They are also used to academic expert witnesses, and European academics can be very unusual indeed. I don't know what the outcome will be, but it is far from clear that the FOSS movement will lose, at least in the Eurozone.

    --
    Pining for the fjords
    1. Re:I won't waste a mod point on this by gtwilliams · · Score: 5, Insightful
      MS put a media player into the OS. Big freeking deal.
      Yes and now we're stuck with the proprietary codecs for lots of Web content.
      Yet this is even MORE invasive than that. ANY bundled application could have to play by the same rules.
      No. Only the company with a monopoly is barred from bundling.
      Also where was it written that MS had to share its code with you?
      No one is asking for code. Only interface specifications.
      --
      Garry Williams
  6. Something has to come out of this by gilesjuk · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Microsoft can't be let off the hook twice, both the US and EU cases have cost US and EU tax payers a lot of money.

    The US case was largely dropped due to a change of US leadership and a short sighted attitude that it's best to have a big US IT monopoly than let things go abroad.

    The EU case could easily disappear for similar reasons, the EU commissioners aren't democratically elected and have been known to take backhanders in the past.

  7. This could have been settled a long time ago by jofi · · Score: 1, Insightful

    No one is twisting your arm to use Microsoft products..

    --
    Blame the user, not the software.
    1. Re:This could have been settled a long time ago by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

      ... if computer makers were prohibited from bundling Windows with every Intel-based PC.

      Having to pay a premium to get a box without Windows is the definition of arm-twisting.

    2. Re:This could have been settled a long time ago by Peter+Greenwood · · Score: 5, Insightful

      > No one is twisting your arm to use Microsoft products..

      Then why does it hurt? ...

      1. My kids go to school, where they run - guess what. They come home and insist they need MS Word, or Publisher, or Powerpoint, etc.. They don't say "I need to do so and so", because that isn't what they are taught. Oh, and guess who volunteered early on in the term of the present British government to provide IT training for teachers.

      2. I do Unix support, and the machine I'm given to do it with runs - guess what. My working life is spent going through Win-to-Unix kludges to get needlessly limited access to the systems.

      3. The kids come home, and want to play games. These come in versions that run on various proprietary consoles and ... you guessed it.

      --
      freedom, n. Allowing people you don't like to do things you disapprove of.
  8. Inter Process Communication by KidSock · · Score: 3, Insightful
    Microsoft's not in trouble because they've bundled software. Microsoft's in trouble because they've abused their monopoly in one area (end-user operating systems and office-program file formats) to gain monopolies in other areas (web browsers, media formats, server operating systems etc).

    Right on. The REAL issue is not bundling. That legal strategy was designed by Real, Netscape and others to yield compensation dollars. The real issue is Inter Process Communication (IPC). A file is a form of IPC. A network message is IPC. If the details of the various forms of IPC are widely available products can interoperate and that is good. I believe that a product that is completely dominant in a market the details regarding it's IPC should be made available so as to reduce the liability associated with using that product. In this particular case that liability is the unfair business practice of forcing other companies out of a market by leveraging undisclosed IPCs. Secondarily there are a number of other very good reasons for having alternative programs that understand the same IPCs but it's not clear that they have legal bearing.