Microsoft Threatened With Fines By EU Again

ukhackster writes "The EC is threatening Microsoft with yet more fines. This time, it's over the interoperability protocols that Microsoft has been ordered to open up to its rivals. The EC has examined 1,500 pages of information about the protocols, and concluded that they 'lack significant innovation'. This is pretty damning for both Microsoft and the patent system, as it has been awarded 36 patents covering this technology and has another 37 pending. Could this encourage someone like the EFF to start pushing to get these patents overturned? The EU has a FAQ about this issue, containing additional details on the subject.

Comments

Shocking ...

[gstoddart]

<sarcasm>What, you mean Microsoft didn't invent all of their networking technology from scratch?</sarcasm>

I mean, really ... MS has been acting like they invented all networking technologies ever, and they are entitled to protection for their 'innovations'.

The reality of it is, I bet all of their protocols are ones which were "embraced and extended" over time. Hopefully, they'll be forced to play a little nicer with others.

Taking stuff someone else did, obfuscating it, calling it proprietary, and then patenting it is just in bad form. I'm glad to see someone finally taking them to task over this. I'm even more glad that, after they were ordered to cough up the information, the information they gave demonstrated that they hadn't 'innovated' anything.

Cheers

Microsoft vs. the Law

[arevos]

From the BBC article:

In the 50 years of European antitrust policy, it's the first time we've been confronted with a company that has failed to comply with an antitrust decision," a Commission spokesman said. When dealing with anti-trust suits, Microsoft's tactic seems to just ignore the verdict in the hope it'll go away. The strange thing is, it actually appears to work...

Re:slightly queasy

[profplump]

You could argue that this is modified since MS is a monopoly but what if I become a monopoly thats been convicted of unfair trade practices. But what if I got a monopoly through fair dealing - the competition just wasn't good enough?

If you obtained a monoploy and dealt fairly you presumably wouldn't lose a trial about your unfair trade practices. But Microsoft did, in fact, lose such a trial. This is the penalty phase of that trial, not a ruling that being applied to someone dealt fairly and happened to be best.

Yay for eu while U.S. senate sucks up to big buck

[unity100]

Dont even dare think of flaming me - remember the recent crap from u.s. senate we had to put up with about net neutrality, drm, patents, any shit that is beneficial to big buck, but detrimental to ALL people.

What eu did is something good. U.S. senate should learn to follow in its tracks.

you americans started to demean europe TOO much lately.

dont forget that, the ideas that sparked the united states revolution, the concepts of humanity, equality, republicanism and the like spread from europe especially with the 18th century writers like Rousseau, Voltaire, Diderot. If there werent these guys in the earlier parts of 18th century, many american founding fathers wouldnt field the same ideas with same strength in years coming up to 1774.

give some god damn deserved crecedence to europe dammit - some part of that soul which made 1789 still lives on in there - support them !

Re:Thank you mods, may I have another?

[WhiteWolf666]

Disclaimer: I make ~ $50,000 a year.

The president of my company makes ~ $150,000 a year.

We live or die by our patents. We're primarily a soil remediation/washing company; we developed a technology completely different from anything else on the market. We do what other companies cannot do, and we do it cheaper than disposal/incineration.

If we didn't have a patent on our core equipment, we would not be in business. Why? Because several of our contractors have already tried to steal our design, and got bitch-slapped in court doing so.

Not that I totally disagree with you. I believe patents should cover a very narrow range of mechanical/technical innovation. Definitely not software concepts, and most likely not biotechnology, either. But can a small company like ours utilize the patent system to our advantage? Most definitely; if we didn't have a patented technology, we'd be out of business, because someone would literally steal our equipment (this HAS happened to us), reverse engineer it (this HAS happened to us), and we'd have no legal recourse, except possibly against the original theft, which would be difficult to prove.

Does the patent system need major reform? Yes. Do I think that the USPTO's standard of obviousness is ridiculous? Yes.

Do I think a patent system, in principle, is a good idea? Yes.