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Microsoft EU Decision Protects OSS Projects From Suits
rfc1394 writes "An article in Australia's IT News mentions that under its antitrust agreement with the European Union, 'Microsoft will publish an irrevocable pledge not to assert any patents it may have over the interoperability information against non-commercial open source software development projects.' Essentially, in addition to getting them to comply with the anti-trust decision, the EU has forced Microsoft to back off of its saber-rattling when it comes to EU open source projects. That protection in no way extends to US projects, of course."
only eu bureaucrats could pull such 2 stunts in just one gig. when a bureaucracy works, it really shines.
Read radical news here
So, can projects threatened by patent infringement suits now move development to the EU?
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Microsoft EU Decision Protects OSS Projects From Suits
Which is good, because the OSS crowd is more into t-shirts and jeans.
The theory of relativity doesn't work right in Arkansas.
That protection in no way extends to US projects, of course.
This, of course, insures profitable OSS projects will not be based in the US. Damn shame. Some of us like Tech jobs.
Having to work for a living is the root of all evil.
... the sharp sword of unbridled capitalism won't be dulled here in the US! A wonderful victory for the go-getters at MS!
We figured out a long time ago that it's easier to elect seven judges than to elect 132 legislators.
As an Australian, I think this whole argument goes beyond Microsoft or any other GloboCorp. We are facing a tumultuous election campaign over here. There's much venom between the parties vying for election. This issue highlights a much over-looked aspect of Australian politics; do we take our values and principles from the EU? or from south-east asia? Should Australia join the EU? or should we go down the ASEAN route?
I ran a benchmark on my quantum computer, now I can't find it anywhere!
Umm... Is it just me or is this just mealy mouthed enough to get projects into HUGE trouble down the road when they are distributed commercially? Just what is Microsoft's definition of "non-commercial"?
This is a sig. This is only a sig. Had this been an actual sig you would have been informed where to tune for more sigs.
non-commercial open source software only? So any commercial use of that software will still open you up to infringement claims? If so, what's the point. MS is not worried about little Joey using FOSS in his basement for "non-commerical purposes". The use of that same software in a data center is apparently not covered by this agreement, so again... what's the point?
If you're a zombie and you know it, bite your friend!
Scene opens at Imperial Headquarters, Redmond. Imperial march plays and quiets as conversation begins.
Bill: Man, I am getting so tired of the EU. I am going to have to buy Europe. Bring me my checkbook.
Accountant: Sir, it's a little out of your price range.
Bill: (Staring blankly) Price range?
Accountant: Yes, sir. It costs more than you have, especially since most of your money is in dollar currency.
Bill: (Picks up phone.) Steve, get in here. And bring your chair.
Let us not become the evil that we deplore.
Several of the 'startups' on the MS buy list are currently known as governments or regulatory bodies across the globe. Who would have thought that? Each day that passes makes me more certain that nuclear war will not end the human race... we will starve to death when the food vending machines finally suffer that one last BSOD.
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End The FED. -
These were also my first thoughts in reading the summary. From the article, the European Commissioner for Competition Policy says (emphasis is mine):
Presumably all this means is that Microsoft won't be going after developers, but it may still be going after anyone who makes use of those developers' efforts. It's some good news for developers, but it's not exactly a let off the hook if you can't tell your users with any confidence that they won't be sued by Microsoft for obscure patents that wouldn't hold up in the face of anyone who could afford to defend themselves. If anything, this might give Microsoft more power to spread FUD about OSS. They're just narrowing the target, basically saying that it's okay to develop OSS, but they might not let people use it without paying up.
Hopefully the linked article isn't representative of what the actual arrangement is. For the thing to be of any use, Microsoft really needs to be pledging that they won't enforce whatever patents they claim to have at all.
Just look at how the RIAA tricked the various US attorney generals into accepting all those CDs for schools and libraries as a 'penalty' when they were just unloading dead inventory.
Does this mean that if Microsoft asserts patents against US OSS projects that they can relocate to Europe and be home free?
I hear a "giant sucking sound"...
How do you establish whether an OSS project is "here" or "there" anyway, when the developers are all over the place?
Richard Steven Hack - This sig is TOO GODDAMN SHORT TO DO ANYTHING USEFUL WITH! MORONS!
Turkey isn't going to form a "Caliphate" any time this century - unless the Turkish military gets taken out. The Islamic government in Turkey now is entirely different from the hardliners you see in Iran. Turkey has a history of being secular and the Turkish military intends to see that it stays that way. They nearly did a coup over the elections this time because of their concerns.
As for Iraq, they are going to in fight a terrorist group - listed as terrorists by the US and Iraq and Iran and Syria - that are killing their soldiers. Has nothing to do with anything else going on, although it will screw up Iraq more than it is already. This incursion has the possibility of becoming a full scale war between Turkey and the Kurds. And if the US doesn't go along with it, Turkey can cut off US access to the Incirlik US Air Force base which is vital to supply routes to Iraq. Relations between the US and Turkey are considerably strained at the moment. The US has no argument against Turkey's incursion because Turkey is under attack by a terrorist group harbored across the border in Iraq and supported - or at least not condemned - by the two major Kurdish parties, who happen to be the only two allies the US has in Iraq. So the US can either attack the terrorist group, which will alienate the Kurds from the US, or do nothing, which will irritate the Turks and force them to act. A no-win scenario for the US. Which is also complicated by the fact that a second Kurdish terrorist group which targets Iran is being directly supported by the US in order to destabilize Iran. Which is why Turkey and Iran are thinking of cooperating and both attacking the Kurds, according to the latest news.
The next problem for the US is that the two Kurdish parties intend to either establish a "federated" Kurdistan as part of Iraq with oil-rich Kirkuk as their center, or if Iraq is not partitioned, secede from Iraq and form an independent Kurdistan. That would be a disaster for Turkey, Iran and Syria as Kurdistan would then be in a position to fund and foment secessionist groups in all three countries. Turkey has said it will outright invade northern Iraq if that is allowed to occur, which would be a much wider war than the current incursion intention.
As for oppression of the Kurds, that is correct - but not much different than Turkish oppression of the Armenians, and who knows who else. In fact, the Turks used Kurds to murder the Armenians back around WWI.
Richard Steven Hack - This sig is TOO GODDAMN SHORT TO DO ANYTHING USEFUL WITH! MORONS!
lunch
What exactly is it the US produces now, other than food? Knowledge? With both China and India graduating more and more engineers and scientists the US's lead may not last long. One thing they both need are accountants and US accountants can make a boat load of money showing Chinese and Indian companies how to setup an accounting system. Actually as my sister is a CPA, Certified Public Accountant, and runs her own business, I've thought of suggesting she learn Mandarin Chinese then go to China.
FalconShould there be a Law?
Indeed, Microsoft's strategy in this respect (->SCO) hasn't been very successful up to now. Which doesn't mean they didn't try.
Not all problems: Nobody claims 9/11 was done by MS.
But seriously, MS has a long history of applying unfair methods against their competition (see e.g. DR DOS, OS/2, Java). And they are seeing Linux/OSS as threat (see e.g. the Halloween documents), and already target them (SCO law suit payed by MS, dirty playing in the OOXML standardization process).
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
Actually EU doesn't have anything to do with patents right now. A few years down ago EU Commission tried to bring legislation that would have introduced EU wide harmonization of patents and brought unified judicial system. As the European Parliament didn't accept the directive, the attempted legislation was withdrawn. More about the subject.
How ever there is European Patent Organization which works by the power of European Patent Convention. EPO is fully independent organization and isn't part of EU. EPO actually is the only organization in Europe causing real grief in regards of patents. They award software patents even if they don't have any power to do so. Many big corporations and also smaller companies have applied basically pure software patents from EPO. How ever as the EPO really doesn't have power to award these kind of patents, the situation is that those patents are more or less worthless. They also will stay worthless even if EU would make software patents legal as those patents were filed and awarded before they were legal.
In my company we have talked and researched the software patent issue some what. My own point of view is that software patents are worthless and as long as the member state we operate doesn't allow software patents, we don't have any reason to worry. I really do hope that this situation will stay the same as the business of software company is to make software and solve customers problems, not pay big fat checks to lawyers.
Survey research tool for commercial and scientific use
A few things we still kick ass in:
1) Music/movies (we outsell the rest of the World in these combined).
2) Advanced weapons sales
3) Software of any sort
4) Basic research and devt. (not readily marketable AND given for free to the rest of the world. We are the absolute leader in "pure" research investment, though starting to slow down for obvious reasons).
5) Applied research, design, and devt. (sattelites, pharmaceuticals, consumer electronics, you name it)
6) Agriculture (including the GM foods that EU farmers are scared of).
7) Exporting Democracy!
Obama likes poor people so much, he wants to make more of them.
"Remember the last 'punishment' they gave MS for anti-trust violations? They forced MS to unbundle media player from XP. But the idiots didn't require MS to proportionally, or even at all, reduce the price of the stripped down XP. So MS sells two versions of XP in the EU - regular XP and stripped XP for the same price and no one buys the stripped-down XP. Doh! Big freaking homer doh!"
Well, you're half right. It was the unbundling idea itself that was stupid, not the price. This was a gift to Real and provided zero value to EU consumers and businesses.
In that way it was very much like the US antitrust effort - it was driven by and crafted to benefit specific MS competitors rather than consumers. The remedy was pretty much what the people behind the scenes wanted. Just because a company is anti-MS, doesn't mean it's pro-consumer or pro-FOSS. This is a lesson that many will learn when the real IBM rears its ugly head.
I believe your analysis wrong, due to unfortunate wording. I think there's ellipsis in the sentence.
Therefore: "commercial software distributors and end users."
Might read: "commercial software distributors and [commercial software] end users."