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Microsoft Says Free Software Violates 235 Patents
prostoalex writes "Microsoft told Fortune magazine that various free software products violate at least 235 patents, and it's time to expect users of this software to pay up patent licensing royalties: 'Microsoft General Counsel Brad Smith and licensing chief Horacio Gutierrez sat down with Fortune recently to map out their strategy for getting FOSS users to pay royalties. Revealing the precise figure for the first time, they state that FOSS infringes on no fewer than 235 Microsoft patents.'"
Absolutely, and ultimately Microsoft is screwed either way. Either they attack FOSS and lose, or they don't attack and FOSS they lose anyway. There's no way they can win this fight - no matter how many lawsuits they file and how many open source projects they try to attack.
If FOSS were somehow limited to the US, maybe they could hire enough lawyers to mount an offensive. But with the extremely strong chunks of the community around the world they literally have no chance. At best they can just fuck things up and make themselves look even more "evil" than they already do.
Haiku for you!
Not that it's at all unexpected, coming from Fortune--a bastion of support for giant corporations--but man, is that article biased. I love the photos on the right: A picture of Steve Ballmer, wearing a suit, looking harmless, and captioned "The patent owner", followed by a picture of Richard Stallman, looking like an Al Qaeda member, captioned "The patent hater". Maybe this is just a coincidence but I like how they refer to RMS specifically as "Richard Matthew Stallman," which makes him sound like a presidential assassin or serial killer. Like there's another Richard Stallman we might get him confused with if they didn't use his middle name? :)
Later the article manages to imply that there's only one license that all FOSS projects use. You get three guesses which license it is, and the first two don't count.
Does anyone know where we can find out the 235 patents that MS claims are infringed? TFA didn't give any examples.
"Destroy science and religion. Science would re-emerge exactly the same; but not religion." - Penn Jillette, paraphrased
Nope, I refer you to the text base browser called "Lynx". This is a unix program and had tabbed navigating. So once again Microsoft claims a patent on something that it didn't invent.
Their problem is that they can't just keep braging that there are "238 patent violations in various OSS". The SCO case has proven how much staying vague about the actual violations is useful.
...BUT...
Microsoft, for credibility will have to produce a detailled list of said patent violations (and eventually a list of specific OSS application that they think are infringing).
And this, my friends, is a double edged sword.
On one hand, it will show that Microsoft HAS tangible proof that OSS are inferior because no company can be held responsible for patents infringement, and that patent lawyers will go after the users.
On another hand, such a list, and maybe a couple of days of work distributed across the whole community is everything needed to circumvent said patent and implement it either with a slightly different approach (see marching cubes vs. tetrahedron in 3D), using more generalised version (arithmetic coding vs. range coding in compression), or simply recycle some very old code in place - code who's age is a proof of prior art.
And suddenly, all this MS PR stunt is moot.
Just imagine :
This week press titles "Microsoft says OSS dangerous because patent mine field", "New microsoft sponsored studies proves TCO to by higher for OSS because of patent fees", "Microsoft to go after individual users MAFIAA style".
Next week press titles "238 patches and upgrades on Debian and Ubuntu repositories", "OSDL sponsored study proves that OSS has the highest reaction time in terms of patch release", "RMS & Linus to give speech about strengths of OSS development ; Ballmer responds throwing chairs".
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
What a serious strategic error this is, even if its only a PR trial balloon. Not only has Microsoft ignored a significant shift in national intellectual property law (per recent Supreme court decisions) and pretended the collapse of SCO litigation was irrelevant, but Microsoft once again presumes all commerce is predicated on U.S. intellectual property law.
Faced with serious issues in Australia, China, nearly every emerging market and even much of the EU, Microsoft wants to play "us vs. them" with open source? Even much of the Fortune 500 has been investing significantly into Linux (such as the corporation I work for, which is one of the larger global financial companies). Our company didn't take previous patent trolls lightly, and Microsoft's reliability issues don't give it a reliable foundation on which to make life any more difficult for us.
In an era of unprecedented foreign confiscation of pharmaceutical intellectual property, can Microsoft be this utterly ignorant and stupid? Does Microsoft not realize it has zero leverage outside the U.S., facing serious penalties in the EU for its disregard for their law and even worse conditions elsewhere? Does it really believe it can force Brazil, China, Mexico, India, Malaysia, emerging Eastern Europe, Russia and countless other markets to pay excessive royalties for a bunch of questionable patents it had its attorneys sneak through? The only certain outcome is that U.S. intellectual property law will be even further ignored and real issues like drug patent confiscations more common.
Apparently SCO was only the warm-up act. This certainly is going to be an interesting train wreck for us to watch if they venture down this path.
*scoove*
Actually, this is a great way to fight back,
start referring to Balmer as the new McCarthy, paint them with that nasty brush, it's a PR nightmare if it catches hold.
Emphasize the chair tossing, all the nasty things MS has done to the competitors over the years, what politician/lawmaker would want to be identified with the new McCarthy?
Say, Apple OSX has BSD unix under the hood, but I bet they don't go after apple with this smear campaign.
Much easier scare small businesses out of using linux.
Oh, and Hah!, to the novell people who claim they didn't sell out.
Bavarian Purity Law of Rice Krispie Squares: Rice Krispies, Marshmallows, Butter, Vanilla.
I'm a patent agent and when I read the article contribution, the same argument sprang to mind and I looked whether someone had used this argument. I believe it has some validity, but unfortunately I also have a counter argument. A patent doesn't mean that nobody else could think of it, just that the ordinary person skilled in the art wouldn't think of it. And with the big FOSS community, there are surely sufficient people that stand out (i.e. aren't ordinary people skilled in the art), who also could come up with the idea.
Bert
Who believes that getting rid of software patents is an uphill battle with the upcoming revision of the European patent law (in particular because of TRIPS, which contains an innocent looking but very nasty clause, that patents must be obtainable in any technical field).
If Microsoft starts sueing IBMs customers, then IBM will go to war, just like they did against SCO. IBM Legal aren't know as The Nazgul for no reason.
If this comes to blows, IBM will have to a) provide non-infringing replacements, or b) indemnify their customers and go to the mattresses with their unparalleled patent arsenal. My guess is the MS just bit off more than they can chew. There are some rules you never break, and getting into a patent battle with IBM is right up there with starting a land war in Asia.
Don Negro
Perl 6 will give you the big knob. -- Larry Wall