Slashdot Mirror
Ballmer Repeats Threats Against Linux
daria42 writes "Steve Ballmer has reissued Microsoft's patent threat against Linux, warning open-source vendors that they must respect his company's intellectual property. In a no-nonsense presentation to New York financial analysts last week, Microsoft's chief executive said the company's partnership with Novell, which it signed in November 2006, "demonstrated clearly the value of intellectual property, even in the open-source world.""
I wonder how Balmer thinks that they are going to sue something that no one owns, that no one made.
Is he going to sue anyone who uses this?
Is he going to sue those who hoste the code?
From the article it seems it is mostly the Linux vendors that Ballmer wants to target.
The US is, as far as I know, the only country that has implented all these sick software patent laws until now, how are they going to sue a UK based company?
With the current state of things the worst that could happen is that companies stop using Linux in the US, I don't see how they want to sue anyone based in Europe?
Would the US government then start supporting Microsoft in trade wars?
This whole software patent thing is beyond my understanding, I wonder if anyone out there really get the idea behind this?
IBM is still digging into SCO's near corpse to find the detials of SCO's accusations. Which were, are and for ever more shall be totally bogus.
Ballmer needs to stop saying "they stole our IP" and start citing versions, files, lines and patent numbers. Otherwise Microsoft looks like a bigger SCO. And that is not a pretty picture for a company like Microsoft intends itself to be.
To: Steve Ballmer
Dear sir,
Either file suit against the parties infringing on your precious IP, or SHUT THE FUCK UP.
Sincerely,
Everyone
P.S. - Vista blows donkey balls.
Insisting on "correct" English is like saying that there is only one, definitive recipe for chili.
Ballmer's Thought Process:
Hmmm Vista is floundering and we need to distract the press from this and the piracy angle isn't working... what can we do... oh yeah, let's threaten open source, that should distract them.
Alternately
Hmmm Vista sales are floundering, and even I'm not stupid enough to really think it's piracy causing it, Hmmmm.... it must be that open source stuff, time to threaten to sue somebody.
.technomancer
How long ago was it that Microsoft was complaining that the better product should prevail due to competition and not through litigation in the courts?
Seems that they are now changing their tune... I'm not surprised...
Here's the threat. The Business Software Alliance already can come in and audit companies for bootleg copies of Microsoft software. If they've forced their way in to do an audit anyway, and they find "unauthorized copies" of Microsoft-claimed "IP" - which is to say, Linux running - then in the future they can try to levy the same penalties against you as they currently do for running more copies of Office than you can produce licenses for.
From our perspective, this absolutely has to be stopped. But the BSA already has the legal authority to get in the door in many cases, and once they're looking at your systems for Microsoft wares, they'd better be checking the Linux boxes for Word running under Wine anyway - so checking them for Linux is a minor afterthought.
"with their freedom lost all virtue lose" - Milton
Microsoft spent the last 20 years copying ideas from Apple, Netscape, Sun, AOL, Burst, and Google -- and now they have the nerve to complain that Linux looks like Windows??
In both cases there would be a brief chilling effect on the competition -- until the offending IP is pulled out of the Linux core and it is recompiled, at which point M$ has nothing. Except that in the mean time they may get hauled back into court for anti-monopoly practices, and that offending the highly intelligent Linux community is about as smart as kicking over a nest of fire ants -- because every major bit of M$ released code will be targeted for suing M$ for their own patent infringing code, etc.
So Ballmer's threat is akin to a robber pulling a gun in a doughnut shop only to discover that he is surrounded by a room full of well-armed, motivated policeman who would like nothing more than to put his sorry a$$ back where it belongs. We all know this, and M$ knows it as well. But so long as he can sell a few more copies of Vista, XP, etc. Ballmer has little to lose by acting the bully in the mean time.
...Open Source isn't the only answer -- but it's almost always a better value than the alternatives...
This sabre rattling against Linux has potential adverse effects for the entire economy, if Microsoft is able to push Windows into every corner. Windows is just terrible in certain situations, such as ATMs and aruably, pocket PCs and handheld devices. Perhaps the government should be looking into anti-trust; we need to see competition in the market place for operating systems.
If the bloated corporations abusing intellectual property law started suing each other into bankrupcy, the downside would be... what, exactly?
I agree, Ballmer is a bully. Ballmer has taken his ignorant behavior to an extreme, in my opinion: He is a prime example of someone who lacks social skills and technical insight, who can only survive in a technical world by being adversarial toward those who would rather not have a fight.
Don't forget: Microsoft's Zune music player is named after Creative's excellent Zen Player. Aside from being morally criminal to infringe on someone else's intellectual property, it's just mean.
If the world were technically knowledgeable enough not to be locked into Microsoft's file formats and virtual OS monopoly, and other adversarial behavior, Microsoft could not make a profit.