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Xandros CEO Doesn�t Agree Linux is Patent Violator
whitehartstag writes with a link to a Network World article about statements from Xandros in the wake of their Microsoft deal. Xandros CEO Andreas Typaldos made a point of stating that they don't believe their product violates any of Microsoft's patents. Nor, he said, did the software giant share with them exactly which patents they believe Linux violates. Just the same, he's disappointed with the reaction they've received from the open source community. "Feedback from the Linux community has been on the order of 'you shouldn't really be talking to the devil.' Linux and open-source advocates believe it is a big issue and say the Xandros deal, and another signed by Novell with Microsoft last year, erodes open source licensing provisions especially around intellectual property issues. Indeed, the Free Software Foundation is rewriting its GNU General Public License (GPL) 3.0 to prohibit such patent deals in the future."
Future submitters, just keep this text on hand the next time some idiot signs a deal with Microshaft:
It's almost beyond belief that these guys keep giving the community a great big "FUCK YOU", and yet are always surprised when we don't welcome them as liberators, with flowers and open wallets.
you had me at #!
Until Microsoft actually reveals the patents that are being "violated" it really can't be judged what patents (if any) do and don't violate Microsoft patents. Until this happens, all we are being fed is hearsay and speculation.
Well, back to rejecting software patent applications.
FTFA: The customer in the market place is dictating what we are doing, not my engineers
You are using a tremendous amount of software your engineers didn't write. I'd say that inevitably, the authors of that software will dictate what you are doing. You and the customers are just enjoying the ride with their permission. Try to remember that the next time you throw dirt in their eyes--assuming you get that chance.
Especially when significant money is involved?
Are you competent to even run this company?
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
If they don't believe that their product violates any of Microsoft's patents then why did they enter into this arrangement?
The only reason I can think of is if Microsoft paid them some big bucks like they did with Novell. If this is true then Microsoft appears to be willing to pay through the nose for a FUD campaign.
i expected a list of infringing patents accompanied by a 50-page NDA. you knuckled under in the face of a bunch of hot air.
...vividly encapsulates that post-Watergate/pre-punk/coked-up moment when you could trust no one, least of all yourself.
The modern software world is pretty much ruled by GCC. It would be interesting to see what happens when that one's license changes to GPL3.
Excuse me, but please get off my Pennisetum Clandestinum, eh!
It looks like this company is actually helping the community. They're eliminating the fear that if their product is used, they, the customer, won't have to worry about the big bad MS coming after them. After all, wasn't this the exact same issue that kept folks from adopting Linux when the whole SCO thing was just getting started because they were afraid, and rightfully so, that SCO would come after them?
This deal doesn't look like a cut and dried "bend over and take it" type of thing; to me anyway.
I prefer Flambe as apposed flamebait.
IMHO, Microsoft's patent claims lack merit, for several reasons: prior art; obviousness; and limits on patenting math. Let's turn up the volume on our doubt of Microsoft's claims. Please challenge Microsoft to sue you (yes, you AND your company) by signing this list of 1,395 people who doubt Microsoft's patent claims:
l e=SMFM_list_page_11
http://digitaltippingpoint.com/wiki/index.php?tit
It's a rare company that has survived a close friendship with Microsoft. Still, it's always good to have an example to warn off future companies who think that they can deal with Microsoft as equals.
"Can't shake the devil's hand and say you're only kidding" -- Your Racist Friend by They Might Be Giants (from the album Flood)
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
From TFA:
"We did not discuss patents [with Microsoft] and we don't think Linux violates any patents and we were not asked about it," Typaldos said. "It is a non-issue for us."
...then...
"Linux says it does not infringe on patents, Microsoft say otherwise. But customers say let me buy some insurance because if there are any flying sparks I don't want to be caught in the middle of that."
Typaldos says that was the genesis of Monday's deal with Microsoft that covered interoperability and IP licensing and included "covenants" to protect customers using Xandros software from any potential patent-infringement claims from Microsoft.
If Microsoft is running around shrieking about patents, and if your customers are demanding you do something because they are feeling vulnerable about patents, and then you strike a deal on that very issue - but don't talk about patents, then you don't know what the hell you're doing.
This chicanery hasn't yet hit a distro that I use, but it's a trend that really should stop.
Running Windows^H^H^H^H^H^H^H OSX and Linux in the home. (I don't have time for Solitaire any more.)
"We did not discuss patents [with Microsoft] and we don't think Linux violates any patents and we were not asked about it," Typaldos said.
Typaldos, so you entered into a patent agreement with Micosoft including an agreement that Microsoft would not sue your customers over Microsoft patents w/o even discussing patents?
I have been a long-time Xandros customer. But, with this type of mindless drool, I will no longer be a customer nor will I ever again recommend any of your services for consideration.
You must be new here. Anything that suggests Microsoft is doing something good is immediately shot down. Considering the symbol for Microsoft related stories is a picture of Bill Gates' face covered in Borg parts, I'm not surprised.
Didn't this happen at least ten times with SCO?? A company/CEO signs a deal with a very unpopular/hostile to the free/open source movement and the CEO/PHB always manages to be "shocked" by the angry response of the community... Do these guys read anything besides pr0n? The Novell (and reactions from the 'community') deal was front page news... This guy must be looking for a job in the White House
"Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but not their own facts." ~The Honorable Daniel Patrick Moynihan
So, in effect, Xandros is making a deal that puts their 'community' above the community at large, whereas I would argue that the intent of the GPL in general, and the open-source developers that use it, is to create something that the wider community (all developers, all users, including Xandros and their customers) will ultimately benefit from.
I think that as long as companies like Novell and Xandros keep thinking of the community of only being made up of their paying customers, they are missing the point of free software and ultimately will be missing out on the crucial developments that they require to maintain profitability.
No. Ever since SCO first started talking, Linux has never stopped gaining market share.
...the signal they are sending to customers and (worse yet) potential customers is what matters...
...and that signal is: "Yes we do belive Linux is violating Microsoft's patents."
Do not sign those deals, Microsoft will kill you wheather you sign or not and you are giving them more ammo to kill you with.
Maybe the linux kernel & lots of gnu software does infringe on microsoft patents. That's a very real possiblity, I don't know for sure though. What sucks is that microsoft can hide any patent violations in their closed/hidden source software. Is there a way to force them in court to open it up so third parties can go on a fishing expedition of their code?
At least they listen to their customers. I would like to see a lot more open source projects, and the companies that may be behind them, listen to their customers or users more.
Take NetBeans, for instance. In terms of its features, it's quite a nice IDE. I know a lot of people who especially like its text editor. Unfortunately, the whole IDE is damn slow. It's not unusual for it to lock up for a second or two while repainting, even on very modern multi-processor systems with tons of RAM.
I don't know if this slowness is due to its use of Swing, due to its use of Java, or what. All I know is that Eclipse runs far faster on the same systems when performing similar tasks, so I suppose it may be a problem with Swing. That said, a lot of people have requested that the responsiveness problems of NetBeans be addressed, rather than more new features added. Unfortunately, those requests seem to fall on deaf ears. Each release of NetBeans gets slower and slower and slower and slower. It's nearly at the point now where I'll have to switch to Eclipse just to remain somewhat productive, as the lag of NetBeans is really starting to hurt.
"The community owes you nothing. Not dignity. Not respect. Nothing."
That cuts both ways. So please keep the above attitude in mind next time you all are complaining about binary blobs, and unreleased specs, and "whaaa! no one's dumping their proprietary (but working) solutions for our untested, barely documented, and a 1000 eyes couldn't cut it, open source software"
"The community continually develops and improves a product for free - you take it, modify it, and profit from it. Without them your business doesn't exist."
Sounds like a reason to NOT depend upon the GPL. Are you certain you're an advocate?
Is it me, or do these companies not see that for the majority of distros these are simply an complex form of suicide?
It looks as though they get whispered blandishments from MS that this will make them special and unique, and improve their attractiveness to their customers, but all I can see is that a lot of individuals and SMEs will automatically exclude them from consideration as a distro after the deal is inked.
An alternative interpretation is that the people who sign the deals stand to make $$$ from the deals, and they see that as better than being YALD (Yet Another Linux Distro).
I'm likely missing something, of course...
Call me old fashioned, but I like a dump to be as memorable as it is devastating - Bender
But doesn't anything that hurts Xandros' customers also hurt the community as you defined them?
I prefer Flambe as apposed flamebait.
And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.
John 8:32(King James Version)
Defendant: I'm *not* guilty, I totally didn't kill that guy.
Community: But.. [looks in a the report paper] why did you bought the judge flowers, then bribed her, then threatened her if "she doesn't behave"?
Defendant: Have you seen her? She's a very hot chick. I just totally dig her. It's got nothing to do with my case. I mean, we all like a hot chick. You gays or something? I'm disappointed.
The target that you should be aiming for regarding these patent agreements is not Xandros, or Novell, or even Microsoft. It should be the borked Software Patent laws that you've got in the US. Fix those, and you'll have no need of any patent agreemetns, or any patent clauses in the GPLv3.
/Novell, then you might actually achieve something.
So, where are the details of the letters you're all sending to your Senators / Congress-people? (You ARE sending them aren't you???) Where is the campaign to change the law? If you lot spent half the time trying to amend legislation that you do bitching about Xandros
(I can't do anything, as where I'm from we don't have software patents. Software clauses in the GPLv3, or patent agreements between Xandros / Novell and Microsoft mean nothing to me, as they are irrelevant. However, seeing various parts of the Linux community slag into each other because of the uncertainty caused by a borked patent system pisses me off royally - FIX YOUR PATENT SYSTEM!!!)
Sesostris III
You never know what is enough unless you know what is more than enough. - Blake
I find it amusing and utterly hypocritical that Microsoft is pulling the IP rights trick. They've literally written the book on such maneuvers. I don't think I have to enumerate them here as the audience is probably quite well versed on this. You can basically write the entire NT kernel and Explorer shell from examples garnered elsewhere - open source or not. Good luck on trying to prove this case, btw. IP is literally a galaxies worth of spiderwebs interspersing billions and billions of lines of code from thousands of companies, educational institutions, Joe-six pack, and yes, even Homer Simpson.
Actually, it's "Don't make deals with the devil." And, it's just plain good advice. What were they expecting? Especially since they did the exact same thing Novell did. Why were they expecting results different from Novell's?
Write your own Choose Your Own Adventure. http://www.freegameengines.org/gamebook-engine/
Microsoft will soon go "open source" in a more wide way and are just making sure they pre-emptively strike these licensing deals because their code is already full of GNU and BSD code. So all this is just Microsoft covering their hind quarters.
When I go to linuxworld at SF in August, I'm going to have so much fun taunting the people running the Novell and Xandros booths.
"...today consumers have been conditioned to think of beer when they see a bullfrog..."
That's the nice thing about free software - everyone is always invited to the party.
GPL 3 is going to sink such deals, so the outcome is little more than noise and some M$ money in Xandros pockets. Sure I'm disappointed, but I'm not going to let it worry me.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
These deals with MS go against the spirit of GPL. Attempting to provide protection for unspecified patent claims puts open source projects under undue clouds of FUD - exactly what MS wants. Novell and Xandros have played right into MS' hands and are rightfully being chastised. Seriously, I could see how one linux distributor might fall for this, but Xandros had to know that there would be damaging backlash. Just how dumb could they be?
Changing the GPL is the only defense available to the community. Besides, how do you propose that the open source community find out what MS patents, if any, are being violated? Until MS provides proof, there is no other recourse.
"...today consumers have been conditioned to think of beer when they see a bullfrog..."
In the end, they aren't helping anybody. They are, in effect, affirming all the FUD that MS has generated about Linux violating their software patents. The community can potentially get screwed over because anyone not using Novell or Xandros are then subject to lawsuits.
"...today consumers have been conditioned to think of beer when they see a bullfrog..."
Well, I've not been following this whole thing very closely, but I do recall seeing the frequent complaint that Microsoft refuses to identify which patents are being infringed upon. Given that Microsoft probably holds thousands upon thousands of patents, I expect that it's not reasonable to expect the Linux community to proactively slog through them all and make sure all violations are corrected.
If I understand correctly, at least part of the burden is on Microsoft to defend their patents. I'm sure if they provided a list of the violations, the community would take care of the violations. It just seems to me that not releasing the list means either (1) there's not really any substantial violations, or (2) Microsoft just wants the spectre of patent infringement hanging over Linux as long as possible. Or maybe a little of both.
Just my uninformed two cents, though...take it with a block of salt.
[b.belong('us') for b in bases if b.owner() == 'you']
And you have the list of these patents that are contained in GNU/Linux so that we can remove said code.
Or baring that do you have the Microsoft source codes so that we can look them over and find the infrigments ourselves.
I thought not.
Undetectable Steganography? Yep, there's an app fo
Do you happen to have a reference for that claim? Has anyone from FSF ever publically stated that they have no interest in making the output of GCC covered by the GPL?
Given Stallman and the FSF's recent power-grab with the "anti-tivoisation" language in the GPLv3, why wouldn't they change the license such that anything compiled with GCC is automatically covered by the GPL, as well?
Henry Ford spent a not inconsiderable sum invalidating the patents of one George B. Selden, whom many auto manufacturers simply paid off just to be rid of him. Ford correctly foresaw the legal and financial troubles that would pursue him were he to simply pay off Selden, and beat him even though it meant spending a sizeable amount of money and despite the fact that there was only a year left on the patent at the time Ford finally won in appeals court.
Dog is my co-pilot.
Just the opposite.
Msft wants the public to believe that *only* novell and xandros can be used without fear. Where does that leave redhat, which has about 75% of the enterprise market? Or Debian, or Ubuntu, or Mandrake, or Slackware?
The very fact that these deals are made makes Linux look dirtry - which is of course the idea. These companies take msft fud money to help msft imply that linux is a legal mine-field.
And exactly what is the Xandros product? Just an FYI, Xandros does not own linux, they distriute linux which is licensed to them by the owners of the copyrights under the GPL. The Novell and Xandros deals are BS because they are linux distributors and at best a small player in the development of linux.
From the base of the kernel source code I ran an egrep -ir "Xandros" * | egrep "Copyright" and came up with nothing, for Novell there was only one. If you try something like "Red Hat" or "IBM" or "Hewlett" you come up with a list of multiple copyrights.
So is Microsoft signing a deal with Xandros to not go after their customers for the services that Xandros provides? Its definitely not for any Xandros intellectual property.
It is the same issue, both are based on posturing rather than facts, linux adoption did not stop, and there was no reason to fear The SCO Group unless you were a previous customer of the original SCO. The SCO Group professed loudly the same threats in the press but in the end they didn't go after a single linux user, they went after their own customers who did business with them in the past.
So if The SCO Group is any hint of what will happen its likely the people who are signing deals with Microsoft are the ones who will get screwed.
We are talking about a company that outright lied the USA-DOJ, and the EU, A company which has been caught red-handed in numerous scams, and outright theft. A company with a very well documented history of numerous mis-information campaigns.
7 229
t ml
- attorney-admits-to-falsifying-emails-in-racketeeri ng-case-266395.php
Msft is funding the scox-scam, stold stacker technology, hires bloggers to post msft propaganda, hires shill journalists like Enderle, files dozens - if not hundreds - of bogus patents, and creates fake think-tanks. Msft is currently running a enormous fud campain against ODF - and ruined the career of Peter Quinn along the way. Msft has been caught secretly sponsoring fake TCO studies, and fake benchmarking studies.
Not to mention tax scams and racketeering.
Msft astroturfing:
http://lxer.com/module/forums/t/24514/
Fake TCO:
http://os.newsforge.com/print.pl?sid=05/06/23/202
Microsoft Tax Scam
http://multinationalmonitor.org/hyper/mm1297.08.h
Bestbuy rackteering
http://consumerist.com/consumer/lawsuits/best-buy
When msft won't specify anything?
- how many patents does MS have? or how/where to find out? can they be electronically leached somehow?
- how easy are they to turn from legalease technojumbo to english?
- what kind of effort it might take to review each one?
Maybe an MS patent wiki is in order.
Start with (hopefully) an automated dump of all patents into a wiki of some sort where people can read them, and link to prior art, and/or state whether this might be in use by OSS somewhere... that way we can work to invalidate on one side and assess and remove possible risks on the other.
If this becomes a community effort then perhaps it can be dealt with more manageably ... anyone know how to get it started?
If you think imaginary property and real property are the same, when does your house become public domain?
I think that as long as companies like Novell and Xandros keep thinking of the community of only being made up of their paying customers, they are missing the point of free software and ultimately will be missing out on the crucial developments that they require to maintain profitability.
It goes a little deeper than that for me. Myself and many fellow Xandros users spent hours helping each other out and paying Xandros for their distro in the perhaps naive belief that we were helping make Linux profitable and approachable. That paying a company to pay developers would speed along the adoption.
And Xandros pays us back by getting in bed with Microsoft and tops it off by acting surprised when we start installing Ubuntu over the Xandros partition.
Can you say "Duh!" boys and girls? I knew you could!
That's our life, the big wheel of shit. - The Fat Man, Blue Tango Salvage
There's a subtle difference between the Mafia and Microsoft lately :
- Mafia ask only money for protection.
It's a one way transaction.
Also note that the Mafia is known to have really attacked non paying victims.
Microsoft usually make a two way transaction :
- You pay us and we promise we won't crush you for reasons that we can't even show, but believe us there are 253 of them.
- We pay you a big wad of cash and you'll work with us on interoperability (so we'll have some proof to show the EU ? or so they want to get better interoperability in a market where they don't have monopoly and where their products are challenged - the server market ?)
Money goes both ways, and usually the net result is massively in favour of the Linux company.
Also note that a lot of people seriously doubt that Microsoft could really sue anyone on that grounds.
So my opinion :
- I'm not sure the GPLv3 violation are that serious. For the GPLv3 to be violated, Microsoft has to be able to selectively sue some users, while other will be under protection. Microsoft has yet to prove that they can actually sue.
- The net direction of money is a flow that is being injected into development. Specially cross operation, which is actually useful.
Technically Microsoft is currently funding their adversary for a feature that their client has always wanted.
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
"They're eliminating the fear that if their product is used, they, the customer, won't have to worry about the big bad MS coming after them."
No, they're trying to create fear that Linux contains their IP. They want to eliminate all free as in beer versions of Linux. This is just step two of their plan. The SCO litigation was step one.
The race isn't always to the swift... but that's the way to bet!
And in response to the ceo's statements the linux community responded with "Who the fuck is Xandros? I mean does anyone actually use this distro".
Any chance of unplugging Xandros developers from Debian repository access?
Tech Public Policy stuff
Microsoft deals with other businesses. Open source developers are just a loose cannon to them.
The first part of this strategy from my point of view, would be to relegate where developers can release source code, and through whom. That way they can contain any threat (or perceived threat) from the open source community without having to search for someone to sue. Secondly by writing up cross licensing deals with other companies, Microsoft is able to show that there is value , and therefore a recognizable loss when it comes time to collect on thier IP debt.
Microsoft does nothing out of the goodness of it's heart.. it has no heart.
once more into the breach
First they came...
First they came and they took Novell
And I said nothing because I did not use SuSE
Then one day they came and they took the people of the Xandros faith
And I said nothing because I had no faith left
One day they came and they took LG Electronics
And I said nothing because I had no Xbox
One day they burned Open Office.org
And I said nothing because I was born to use Emacs
Then one day they came and they took me
And I could say nothing because I was as guilty as they were
For not speaking out and saying that all men have a right to freedom
On any land
I was as guilty of genocide
As you
All of you
For you know when a man is free
And when to set him free from his slavery
So I charge you all with genocide
The same as I
One of the 18 million dead Jews
18 million dead people
-- from Charles Mingus, after Martin Niemöller
People should not fear their government. Governments should fear their people.
Or something like that?
From the article: "Indeed, the Free Software Foundation is rewriting its GNU General Public License (GPL) 3.0 to prohibit such patent deals in the future." GLP 3.0 does no such thing. What it does is extend any such patent protection deals to all users of the GPL 3.0 software, not just the group that made the deal.
Hello, it only helps to prove that Bill is starting to worry a little more about Linux Now that it is becoming competitive. Also, they are using a well known strategy by attempting to coerce and subdue and enemy they can't beat outright. Rome wasn't deposed by any mighty army but instead consumed from within by people who didn't care about Rome at all. All Microsoft has to do is screw Linux up enough to make the average desktop user sensitive to FUD and they will have snuffed the Linux revolution from within.
"When the critical pieces are removed from these systems then they have no more product to distribute. Maybe they'll move on to BSD or something else."
Well no one ever said that RMSers were modest. You seem to be under the impression that the world needs GPL software more than GPL software needs the world.* Nothing could be farther from the truth. The world has been doing just fine before there was ever the GPL. It has been doing in the majority fine with it's proprietary and non-GPL software in the meantime. It's nothing but arrogance to believe that you can hurt the world more than it can hurt you. e.g. patents. At best the GPL will go back to kernel 1.0 levels. All because RMSers believe they're gods gift to the software world.
*Make note that only the GPLers are the ones beating their chest. All the other licenses are doing what they do best. Create and give away.
It was nice knowing you. Too bad that a single bad management decision killed you. Bye bye now.
Meh.
Yeah I agree. These guys don't see the damage that they are doing by signing such a deal. They are giving Microsoft legitimacy to bully people in the community. The companies of Xandros, Novell and LG will never be free of Microsoft who provides them with no benefit when it comes to the Linux Community if they keep doing this. I guess they don't realize that what the community is fighting for is ultimately better for them then what Microsoft is offering.
The reality is that software patents are bad for the Software industry as a whole. It will be the undoing of the industry creating a situation that even Microsoft won't be able to afford to operate in. What benefit will they have when they have to pay company X for one patent and then company Y for another patent and company Z for another patent and company Q for another patent. Its a situation that will bring even Microsoft down. I wouldn't be surprised if Windows already violates thousands of patents today while they are professing their fictitious patents against Linux. The way the US Patent office has been filing such patents has probably already created such a situation. Pretty soon the only places where people will be able to innovate is places like Canada where Software patents are not recognized by the Legal System.
"I mean, really. Can you point to any letter writing campaign that wasn't also accompanied by a lot of money changing hands that resulted in any substantive change in Congress' stance on any issue of any importance? No? Didn't think so."
Uh, huh. Interesting little "outs" you're leaving yourself.
We need to have an inside proving that money DIDN'T change hands. assuming you'd believe it anyway.
There's that little "substantive", and "importance". Hopefully our proof will be earth shaking enough for you?
"Letters such as what you suggest will only go one place: the dustbin. That is, unless they're all accompanied by multi-thousand-dollar bribes (oh, sorry, did I say that? I meant "campaign contributions"). And even then, it's doubtful that it'll have any real impact."
Just one thing. When the shit hits the fan. Don't be standing anywhere near me. I'll be needing someone with courage, and you're not it.
"Xenu" is the name of the alien overlord that caused all of the problems that Scientologists claim to fix with their "tech".
However, it is interesting to note the methods used by Microsoft seem to match what L. Ron Hubbard said was the way to deal with critics of Scientology. First off, you accuse them of various crimes or violations. Then, when accused, one announces publicly that they welcome an investigation of their critics.
So, to hammer the comparison home with a tac-nuke, Microsoft accuses various Linux distros of unspecified patent violations, then upon being countered with "Which violations? Put up or shut up," Microsoft then announces that they would welcome an investigation of these distributions for violations of their patents.
Repeat until said distros either settle or are bankrupt.
Now, I'm sure someone is going to suggest that I'm accusing Microsoft of being a tool of Scientology. I don't believe that - I simply think that they saw a slimy-but-effective tactic, and decided to duplicate it.
(And for my personal beliefs about Scientology: I don't think it's any better or worse than many religions. The way it is being organized and run, though, appalls me.)
Strike while the irony is hot! -- The Freethinker
I hear Soviet Russia might also be a good safe haven for innovation. Word has it that there patents innovate you.
The Farewell Tour II
I was an intern at Xandros and that quote sums it up nicely, they really don't listen to the engineers when it comes to a lot of decisions. They really base all their decisions on what people are asking about and often pursue "check mark features".
But to be perfectly honest, I'm glad that's how it is. Xandros is really the only Linux distribution I'd be comfortable recommending to my dad because it just works. With Crossover Office and all the perfectly ingrained little tweaks like working flash, Adobe Reader, realplayer, etc. out of the box, the experience is pretty seamless for a non-technical windows user. Ya ya sure, you can make Ubuntu do all those things and I use kubuntu myself, but I don't trust a complete novice to work with ubuntu or any other distro and come away with the good experience that Xandros gives.
So ya, when you get angry that they're ignoring that vast open source movement that makes all their applications, in reality, they see you as just another idealistic propeller-head, just like most normal people do. They just want to get things done and this deal helps them do that.
Posted anonymously for obvious reasons.
I was using a windows desktop today. You're in for a long wait before that license talk, buddy.
The Farewell Tour II
That's what insurance is.
The difference between insurance and protection money is that the insurance company isn't threatening to burn down your store.
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
Oh, Give me a freaking break "Anything that suggests Microsoft is doing something good is immediately shot down."?
/. readers that would love to jump up and down praising MS (or any other vendor) for doing good. The problem is that so few do "good". MS in particular has kept a smile off my face much longer that and human should let a corporation affect them. It is just as a developer who uses the products on a semi regular basis, I can't totaly escape (yes, I even have a MSDN sub).
I am one of many
This cruisade seperates the wheat from the chaff in the Linux world, and makes it clearer to all what MS has become.(sadly)
When the moral decay and corruption breaks through the glossy corporate veneer, we finally have to address what they really are, this is a good thing!
i guess Micro$oft is going after companies who make good desktops for linux. if you notice, both xandros and novell had excellent desktops. maybe they're very scared after dell started talking to canonical. maybe dell is only one of the scores of vendors tired of being dictated by MS; so MS knows very well that others might start 'idea forums' to ask people what they prefer, and the vocal linux community might just ask for linux :)
Ive used open-suse before they made the deal with the devil, i left it for principle mostly. although i do not regret shifting to kubuntu which seems to be really fast and agile, easy to maintain desktop right now (as opposed to Novell's kitchen sink, commode & bath-tub distro, im glad i got rid of the flab).
who's next canonical ?
decides to sell out to M$. Honestly, its fine with me. Less company products to even consider when we need to make a purchase for our department.
Reminding you to PAY YOUR LINUX TAXES! You need to pay for good things, like a good little consumer. They didn't teach you that in school?
Did anyone ever notice that Xandros sounds very similar to Xanatos, the last name of the villain from the television cartoon series, Gargoyles? I'm not sure how I feel about that.
I don't know if I just didn't read enough fine articles or what, but I'm still not sure what this hush-money is actually FOR. I know what kind of net affect it's having on opinion (though openSUSE is still doing pretty well on distrowatch's HPD ranking), but I don't know why the money is changing hands. One /. post indicated that the newest release of SUSE didn't have some of the features that we all figured were now covered by protection money.
This new activity makes me very nervous. Like a known enemy suddenly having lots of trucks moving around from factory to factory. . . I wanna know what's really going on.
"He may be mad, but there's method in his madness. [...] It's what drives men mad, being methodical." G.K.Chesterton
It's an excellent idea in some ways. Not too hard to find Microsoft's patents:
Search Results for microsoftResults 1 - 70 of 23926 (0.27 seconds)
http://www.patentstorm.us/patents/search-results.
The problem is that with these agreements Microsoft is creating an interlocking mesh of agreements intended to prevent newcomers entering the market and to stifle small players. For a patent-invalidating wiki to succeed, you'd also need to go after Microsoft's partners - Novell, Xandros, LG, etc etc
It might be worth doing anyway just to show how ridiculous most of these patents are, but I suspect it'll be too late to save FOSS as we know it.
"I've got more toys than Teruhisa Kitahara."
They keep on going for the ~idiot~proof type of operating system... so we are safe :))
click
clickclickclickclickclickclickclickclickclickclick ...
At the moment, there are many people in europe who completely ignore the US patent system. SW patents are already absurd and deserve no more time wasted even talking about them.
The big companies (MS, SIEMENS, even IBM) *like* patents. They kill the little developer and knowledge is property of the richest.
Such deals as the OIN (open invention network) and MS/Novell and, etc are only used to *lure* open source developers into accepting sw patents. Because "now that we have OIN on our side, software patents are *good*". Despite the absurdity of the issue.
So this whole deal is done to pass the message that sw patents do exists and that certain businesses and their customers take them very seriously. so everybody should just accept this fact, etc, etc.
MS is extorting protection money and also creating doubt in the minds of many (why would these companies buy insurance if they didnt think linux infringed?).
Someone with deep pockets (an ibm or redhat) needs to fund someone who can legally repsond. a legal case would test MS on the evidence of their claims and clarify for the industry the risks associated with using Linux.
I see these possibilities. even if not successful getting to the discovery would be very useful and would be watched very closely.
1) tortious interference with contract. MS statements affect company's relationships with vendors such as redhat, on this basis these vendors are proper plaintiffs to an action that is contractual in nature. this is better because a company cannot generally be a plaintiff to a tortious libel.
2) MS statements can ammount to a personal libel against a GPL developer such as Linus or RMS himself. Companies and associations generally cannot defend against libel. however an individual representing a group can be a proper plaintiff to an action if the imputation can be seen to be enveloping that individual in its bound. ie Is MS alleging Linus has wilfully included patented IP in the kernel?
3. against the owener of the linux trademark. MS is hurting the linux trademark. i dont know if the owner of the linux trademark can claim on the damage to reputation but i suspect there is likely some legislation (not common law) covering this possibilty.
please anyone who understands the legal issues better than me, repsond and correct me on any of this since i am very interested in the technical possibilities.
Note how these deals are being made with commercial Linux vendors. And only the ones that have not made a success of it financially. Red Hat isn't interested. And Microsoft either isn't approaching developers directly or they're not interested either.
Microsoft wants one thing out of all this patent nonsense - for Linux to no longer be considered viable as free beer software. For them, that's the driving force behind all of these deals. They don't really care about interoperability, but they don't mind it either - as long as they can eventually price-gouge their way to the top. And as long as Linux is free, they can't.
The commercial distros are in a funny business. They take free software and try to make a living selling and supporting it. It's not illegal, it's not evil. And the GPL guarantees that it provides some benefit to the community at large. But essentially, these guys are on the same side of the fence as Microsoft. They want to sell software. They understand that they have to live with the fact that the software they sell is available legally for free - after all, that's how they got it. But that doesn't mean that they like it.
Red Hat is a different case. They got to the top first and are able to make money based on a combination of quality, stability, playing by the rules and, not incidentally, staying mostly out of Microsoft's way on the desktop. They understand that it would be to their great disadvantage to join the Microsoft protection racket, and they don't really have much to gain from it either. That's lucky for us.
Ubuntu is still living off of its status as a billionaire's plaything. That works out okay for us too.
But Novell has to make a living, and their business competes directly with Microsoft. If they were able to show Red Hat's consistent growth, their need of the community might outweigh their need of Microsoft's dollars and co-marketing. The patent thing's a red herring for them, but they're also not averse to wiping out the market for free Linux. At some level, they must realize that wiping out the market for free Linux means wiping out Linux, and with it, Novell. But they're a public company, and they can't afford to thing anything like long-term. And there's the other dirty secret about public companies. Their leadership has lots of incentives to rake in short-term gains, and rarely sticks around long enough to be penalized for their bad decisions.
So expect more of this until which time the patent issue goes away - either through changes in the law or a counterthreat from the likes of IBM.
Speaking of IBM... I think that's where the future of Linux lies. As a free 'razor to sell the blades' part of a total hardware/software/support offering. Only in that context are there no incentives to work against the free nature of Linux. And in that context, there are also serious incentives to work toward the standardization that's a vital (if controversial) need for Linux to make the leap to the desktop.
And then there's TIVO. They're the good guys here too. They do nothing to harm Linux, they give back their improvements (assuming they make any - I assume they do). And they have a business model that isn't threatened by free Linux. So why are the GPL3'ers so against them? Because they don't give their hardware away with their software. That would be nuts, and it's nuts to expect that from them. Hardware has a cost. They subsidize that cost by selling a service. You may not like their business model, but it doesn't hurt Linux one bit. If you don't like it, don't buy a TIVO.
Posted from my Android phone. Oh, I can change this? There, that's better...
I've never understood the reasoning that a business is protected from patent suits. Isn't it true that after any of these deals expire, the company is subject to suit? What good is that? ... it's akin to Microsoft herding users into lawsuit-holding-pens. You can see the scenario playing out -- "You will now be sued ... unless of course you migrate to our Windows OS, employing the compatibility and migration tools that have been refined during our 5-year trojan horse relationship w/ LInux."
Even if you're covered from suit in perpetuity for licenses bought during the period the deal was active (and I don't know if that's the case or not), eventually you have to upgrade, and they can get you at that point, no?
"Ahh! I see you're in that indeterminate Schrodinger state where - oh, uh
No, it's not a real possibility that Linux infringes on MS patents. Just a bunch of smoke and mirrors by Microsoft - what else is new? I won't ever use Suse or Xandros linux because no, I don't trust MS at all. When a company that is supposedly creating or selling 'open source" enters an arrangement with a 'closed source only' company such as MS, that company or organization cannot be trusted by the majority of Linux users. This is kind of like the oil industry making a deal with an electric car company. It just smells bad.
MS will never be able to stomp out Linux. Linux has been around longer than MS and will be around when MS angers people enough to just not use their products anymore. As far as patent infringement is concerned, a 'bluff' by MS frightens Suse and Xandros linux enough to sign the devils contract pre-determining their own demise in the open source world.
Just how can I be Linux locked in? Their all free. If I don't like one I wipe it out download another distro and load it. Yes where I work as Senior Engineer of a data center we use only one distro of Linux (Fedora) but this is to keep a commonality of management of the systems. If we decide to go to Gentoo tomorrow well load them up. The apps running on Fedora will go on Gentoo just fine.
You think this is such a non-issue. We did have 15 Novell servers. When Novell struck the deal with MS they were all gone and replaced with Sun OpenSolaris. Also gone are the days of doing FREE beta testing for Novell as we had done in the past.
Typaldos you forget who GAVE to you the code that you have built your business on. People like me who have given countless hours of work to build Linux into what it is. Well you may be able to sell your slick words to a CIO who's only knowledge about networks he got from PC Mag, but people like me that built the code your business runs on will bury you. I'll be glad to see when the GPL3 come into play maybe then I'll have some protection for my work I do "For The People" for free from the likes of you.
Our company used to say "Yes we support all types of Linux." It got changed to "We support Linux except Novell." Now its "We support Linux except Novell and Xandros." Humm your slick words about "User Lockin" What about Distro Lock-out?
I would say think about this but even if you did and changed your mind its too late you will end up being another dead distro. I know that MS paid you enough to retire somewhere nice some whats to worry for you. I really only have two words for you (kind of like binary) one starts with F the other ends in U.
I was just responding to someone that claimed that GCC's output wasn't covered by the GPL, and never would be. Last year, you could have said that the GPL didn't put any restrictions on hardware developers in terms of how they implemented security for their products. Now the GPL v3 does exactly that (with weasel words about which hardware might or might not be immune to the new restrictions).
"FSF/GNU own the copyright to GCC... They can do anything they want with it."
Well, yeah - that was exactly the point I was trying to make. It's irresponsible for someone to claim that anything related to the GPL is absolutely not going to change. In addition to the general case of not making absolute statements, the FSF has made it clear that they're planning to change GPL however they need to to respond to what they consider "new threats to user's freedoms".
I wonder why the government does not become active. I think MS misuses its markt-dominating position with their patent threats. Linux only brakes several MS-patents because it wants to support several crappy standards of MS which a lot of people use (like .NET, Word-DOC, Win32, fat,...). Those standards are not very innovative but exists mainly because of MS's monopoly.
Honestly I installed the demo, got soo fed up with it, DEA formatted my partition and installed slackware to feel comfortable again. Xandros sucks!! Suse is ok though, but SLOW, stable but very slow. Fedora still kicks arse