Microsoft Steals Code From Microblogging Startup

Readers davidlougheed and TSHTF both let us know that microblogging service Plurk reported today that Microsoft China not only copied look and feel from its interface, but also copied raw code from Plurk's service, when it released its own microblogging service called MSN Juku (or Mclub). In instances of the code released on the Plurk blog, the layout, code structure, and variable names were very similar or in some cases 100% identical. The story has been covered in multiple media sources. The software theft is hypocritical, given Microsoft's past threats against Chinese software piracy."

Comments

Of course being in China,

[pecosdave]

the Chinese portion of anything is going to deny it's theft and call the original coders liars. The Chinese are great about this, the government mindset is embedded in the younger citizens - such as "We do not filter our Internet access, we have a few routing issues."

Yeah, right.

Re:Of course being in China,

[Anonymous Coward]

Troll? Seriously? Has anyone seen the way younger Chinese react to anything even resembling the mildest criticism of China or Chinese people or the Chinese government? Dude! They're pricklier than a porcupine.

Re:Of course being in China,

[ozmanjusri]

Just because there are multiple evils, doesn't make one of them less evil.

Right,

And the evil in this case, since everybody seems to have forgotten, is Microsoft.

Microsoft stole Plurk's design and code. Not the Chinese. Not the Americans.

This business with a long history of unethical behavior and misappropriation is what we should be discussing here, not two nations of very diverse people.

Re:This is slashdot.

[BasilBrush]

Poor old Microsoft, getting flamed for STEALING code. Clearly it's Slashdot that deserves the blame for mentioning it.

Re:As someone who works with outsourced Chinese la

[sapphire wyvern]

Oh, I think Microsoft will take responsibility - my personal bet is that the service isn't going to come back online, and someone is going to cop an absolute reaming within Microsoft (probably someone at MS China). The real question is whether MS will attempt to settle with Plurk to head off a lawsuit - I'd say they've probably got one justifiably incoming. Because MS takes such a strong anti-infringement position, they're not going to be able to just shrug this off.

Speaking of hypocrisy...

[Spasmodeus]

How can this be stealing?

Nothing physical was lost, only data was copied and Plurk lost nothing!

Also, it's not piracy, because we all know that piracy only happens on ships at sea!

Therefore, it is only logical that the title of this article be changed to "Microsoft Shares Code with Microblogging Startup".

Re:The people are the culture of the company locat

[frank_adrian314159]

That's a very hard thing to manage for any transcontinental company.

And that's why you either monitor things very closely or keep the code writing at home. Regardless of the fact that it's Microsoft China, it was Microsoft's choice to set up the organization, it was their choice to put whoever was in charge of managing the operation and the code from that organization in their position and, ultimately, they bear the responsibilities for those actions. Especially given that it's a company that screams to high heaven about IP rights (and specifically, issues with IP rights in the far east).

Bottom line, Microsoft deserves everything negative it gets from this.