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Adobe Threatens Microsoft With Suit
lseltzer writes "Adobe has threatened an antitrust suit against Microsoft, over PDF writing in Office 2007. Adobe wants Microsoft to separate the feature and charge extra for it. Microsoft has agreed to remove PDF writing, but won't charge extra." From the eWeek article: "In February, Adobe Chief Executive Bruce Chizen told Reuters he considered Microsoft to be the company's biggest concern. 'The competitor I worry about most is Microsoft,' Chizen said at the time. Adobe's PDF technology lets producers create and distribute documents digitally that retain designs, pictures and formatting. "
I think its FUD on MS's part: From Adobe's PDF Reference page:Unless MS extends PDF in a manner imcompatable with adobe's PDF. (but that would never happen)
There are shills on slashdot. Apparently, I'm one of them.
How is it that Apple is able to get away with allowing easy generation of PDFs via OS X's printing utilities, but Microsoft can't? Did Apple pony up Adobe's danegelt? Or are they too small for Adobe to care?
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I think the real concern is spectacular PDF authoring a la Acrobat. And then there's the darndest thing - Microsoft applications seem to import other peoples formats real well, but they don't export worth a damn (if at all).
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Because Apple licensed it from Adobe.
Don't lead me into temptation... I can find it myself.
How is it that Apple is able to get away with allowing easy generation of PDFs
How is it that the MS fanbois leap to defend MS & Bash Apple without reading the article?
Adobe's threatened nothing. Microsoft is spreading FUD.
(and Apple uses PDF for a helluva lot more then what you've mentioned)
There are shills on slashdot. Apparently, I'm one of them.
I can't speak for Adobe here, but I would speculate that they don't think a Unix-based command line PDF generating utility which has been integrated into very little with a meaningful UI to a typical office worker is a particularly big threat to their Windows-based GUI PDF generating utility which integrates into other software.
OTOH, Microsoft integrating such functionality into Office would effectively kill off a significant market for Adobe Acrobat pretty quickly. A lot of people either don't know of free Windows-based alternatives (hint: provided you don't need much more than "Print to PDF" functionality, they exist, and they don't have to be OpenOffice) or are still of the opinion that free software is free because it's worthless.
Well, NeXT did have a license to use Display PostScript in NeXTSTEP. So even if there were licensing fees for PDF (which there aren't, afaik), Apple would probably have been covered under NeXT's previous license agreement. This is pure speculation, of course...
This guy's the limit!
OK, I'm stumped. Why would Microsoft leak this story unless Adobe were threatening legal action? Why is Adobe refusing to comment on it?
There's no reasonable reading of the story that doesn't include an Adobe threat of legal action. And do you really find it hard to believe that another software company would threaten Microsoft with an antirust suit?
It's not really open when the vendor producing the operating system that 90+% of the world uses can't use it, is it?
This way, with microsoft "worried" about Adobe bringing a suit, Microsoft can introduce it's PDF replace technology.
The best thing Adobe can do is publically state that it would like MS Office to include an unadultered version of PDF output ability.
Help! I'm a slashdot refugee.
Seriously, I was suprised years ago when free, legal products started showing up that can create PDFs (e.g., OpenOffice). If they're OK legally then Adobe is on mighty thin ice going after Microsoft.
And for you folks saying PDFs are a scourge of the Internet I agree. My pet peeve is links that open PDFs without warning, especially when they're incorporated into some kind of fancy button that doesn't even reveal the destination in the status bar on the bottome of the browser.
However, PDF is the de facto standard for distributing print-ready documents, and in that role, it's a Good Thing.
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The key to the success of Adobe's PDF format is that it is free of any licensing restrictions, so anyone can implement PDF readers/writers. Microsoft's competitors have - both operating system vendors like Apple and Linux and competing office suites like Star Office and OpenOffice.org. However Microsoft isn't allowed to - not because Adobe has any legal right to prevent it, but because Adobe claims that it won't be able to compete with Microsoft if Microsoft makes PDF features available for free like most everyone else does. Adobe charges $449 for Adobe Acrobat - something it can only get away if Microsoft isn't allowed to compete with it. In effect, it is saying "anyone can use our format and compete with our products... unless you actually present a competitive challenge."
How is it that Apple is able to get away with allowing easy generation of PDFs via OS X's printing utilities, but Microsoft can't? Did Apple pony up Adobe's danegelt? Or are they too small for Adobe to care?
Repeat after me. Microsoft is a convicted monopolist, Apple is not. The rules are different for a monopoly.
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EPS? No. PDF? Usually not. SVG? No on that too.
All Adobe need to do is release a press statement explaining that PDF is open, anyone can use it, and that they have no intention of sueing MS. They can even cite Apple and open source examples. It'll make MS look pretty stupid and foil their little FUD plan all at once.
Anyone remember Microsoft announcing it's PDF replacement last year? http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/04/27/042225 0
"Hey if we support PDF, we think Adobe might sue us, so PDF sucks! Don't use it! By the way we have this new format coming out called Metro, you should check it out..."
I'm guessing the mods lack a (-1, Misinformed).
The PDF format is open, like many previous comments have pointed out. The situation with the Russian programmer, while detestable, was only tangentially related to PDF (it was their DRM'd ebook format).
Apple's not breaking any rules - and likely what Microsoft is trying to do is drop PDF in favour of a Microsoft portable document format. Only guessing here, but the article is pretty speculative as well.
And who else would need it? PDF writing is built into OSX. Most any Unix I've seen can print to a Postscript printer (dumped to a file) that can be converted to a PDF. I think KDE supports that natively. Anyone who uses OpenOffice can do that directly without a printer at all.
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