Slashdot Mirror
Microsoft Dilutes Open Source, Coins 'Open Surface'
sfcrazy writes "Now, Microsoft is coining yet another term to further confuse users — 'Open Surface.' Senior Director for Open Source Communities at Microsoft, Gianugo Rabellino, said at Oscon 2011 that customers don't care about the underlying platform as long as the APIs, protocols and standards for the cloud are open. That's when he threw the term 'open surface.'" This seems to have more than a grain of truth to it — after all, programmers have been creating open-source software with closed-source programming languages for many years, and I'm certainly more impressed by Google's willingness to let me export my data than I am turned off by the fact that they use a mix of open and closed source software to run the Google circus.
I believe this is step 2
Folks, while this little "too-doo" might seem to be an important event in your little lives, really it's nothing at all.
You need to understand that RIGHT NOW, Selena Gomez and Justin Bieber are HAVING PREMARITAL SEX. In the nude
Yes, it's true. "The Bieb" and possible illegal alien and card carrying "Latino" Gomez (prostitute) are attempting to procreate even though they are both under-age and indeed NOT MARRIED.
This unholy liaison is being coordinated by these two teenager's "handlers" because Justin Bieber IS GAY and they desperately want to convert him to be "straight".
If it were to become common knowledge that "The Bieb" *IS* gay, it would mean the END of the gravy train
Folks, please set your PRIORITIES.
WE NEED TO START A PETITION TO END THIS UNHOLY EXPERIMENT KNOWN AS "THE BIEB".
He *MUST NOT* be allowed to procreate with the "Latino" Gomez, and produce a "love" child that can only be named DAMIAN.
This is so backwards from Slashdot norm. A summary with a tidbit of "news" in it and intelligently written opinion, no FA to read.
Am I missing something, did Microsoft not really coin this term or is there some biased, slanderous opinion that was unintentionally left out of the summary?
when ya cant EEE this is the next step, empty skull
There's no reason to coin a silly new term. They're talking about function, object, and other types of libraries with a well-documented and therefore "open" programming interfaces.
Problem is, sometimes if you don't know how the code that implements the interface is structured, you won't be able to use the interface optimally. You *can* try to do so, and in some ways not knowing is better (then the code can be changed as usage patterns change, or whenever new algorithms are implemented), but it will always be easier to figure out what's going on with access to the source code than without it.
Then there's the "undocumented" parts of the interface, which Microsoft is particularly famous for historically.
... that's called "open standards". You know, things like IMAP and SMTP enabling mail exchange between open and closed source MxAs alike. Or routing protocols, like BGP or OSPF (and the story of the interop labs), or, well, TCP/IP already. All fairly huge successes. Or HTML enabling... well not much interop of anything, really, as everyone chooses to interpret the browser side of w3c "standards" differently. Yes, they're open, but they also are ambigious on that side, and thus fairly poor standards. And micros~1 abusing the crap out of this loophole plus abuse of their OS installed base monopoly to push a browser, drowing out the others to such wild success that they themselves got sick of it eventually. micros~1 out-micros~1ing micros~1, now that's impressive.
There really isn't much call for yet another term, except if you're called micros~1, of course. Please ignore the chair-throwing monkey behind the curtain. Nothing to see here, move along.
It's called "published API".
Microsoft, as usual, is trying to conflate "published protocol" (an interface that can be used by independently developed software that may share no components with software providing interface) and "published API" (an interface that requires direct use of software providing the interface within common framework such as libraries, plugins, compilers' handling of interface definitions, etc.)
Shut up, Microsoft. Nothing short of published, open protocol is going to suffice. And none of your products will survive if you won't hide and obfuscate protocols used by them. You know that and we know that, so don't pretend that you are not our enemies.
Contrary to the popular belief, there indeed is no God.
Take the word as it is - open as in open, and forever to be open.
That requires whatever that is supposed to be open, not to be owned by any private party. Because, that only means 'open for now'. until the owner decides to close it.
Open means open - not 'open for now'.
So, microsoft, if you own anything, it cannot be open. now go shove your intentional concept obfuscation up your ass. the people who are technically apt enough to be working on these matters, are not as clueless as your customers to be deceived like idiots.
Read radical news here
I'll be the first to coin "free (as in freedom) surface."
as long as the APIs, protocols and standards for the cloud are open
The key thing is to ensure that the APIs cannot be controlled, or changed or withdrawn or have conditions of use imposed on them. Open means more than just having them documented.
The only way to ensure that the APIs remain usable is to have the ability to rebuild the underlying software, rather than simply have a third party provide us with it - where the way the API is still under their sole control. To do that requires unencumbered access to the source code, and the entitlement to copy it and make other things that use it.
Without those abilities, there will always be the possibility that the original owner could arbitrarily change it, refuse to support it, add private functions and features or prevent certain classes of users from benefitting from it. These are the attributes that make free software valuable.
politicians are like babies' nappies: they should both be changed regularly and for the same reasons
I certainly understand, as a software developer, that freedom does not come with open source. I'm still required to publish and inform every single user when GPL is included in the code base. And that's intentional. Same applies to BSD,
MIT and about everything but public domain, CC0 and the other do what you want licenses.
Now there are easy ways to serve them. You can add an about page, you can do what you must, but the protocol still applies. It's very difficult to create a visual surface on the internet that is truly free. Consider a public domain book.
Can you really publish an application to view and download that book without tripping on licenses? It's very expensive, it's very difficult. Unless you're looking for an ascii reader. And don't get me wrong, I love colorForth. But that doesn't quite reach the level.
There is a fundamental distinction between a computing surface, patents and copyright involved, an open surface, with copyright involved, and a free surface. That last part is expensive, it's difficult, and from a perspective of practice
and pragmatism, it's not something I would wish on anyone. I've spent the cash, it is expensive on an individual or group of individuals to develop a truly free surface. This doesn't even get into the complications [patents] involved in actually touching a surface.
I'd need a half million dollars to even start. And believe it, Intellectual Ventures, or one of many others would have an attack strategy. But at least there, I can deal with lawyers and patents. There's enough ammunition cataloged in the W3C and other patent databases to regain costs on attorney fees.
This semantic is worth saving. An open surface is not the same as open content, but it's the best that most can hope for at this time. I've put up enough money and time to have full confidence.
Whether or not this is a move to co-opt FOSS, I can't say, although I have my suspicions. But from a security standpoint, it sucks. Security breaches are becoming more and more common; with the underlying code being closed, there can be no independent confirmation of the quality of security measures, patches, etc. So when a vulnerability is found and 'patched', we still won't have any assurance, beyond Microsoft's say-so, that the patch fixes the problem and doesn't introduce any new ones.
This announcement doesn't really change anything, and on the face of it it's non-news. But as propaganda, it stands a good chance of getting more people to drink the MS Kool-aid. And remember when MS used to use undocumented OS calls to give their own applications an edge over competitors? I think we can expect such abuses to increase greatly - the appearance of openness will hide what's really going on.. The 'surface' may be 'open', but the underlying code, and the underlying politics, are murkier and more closed than ever.
Besides, 'Open Surface' sounds rather shallow, doesn't it?
'The Economy' is a giant Ponzi scheme whose most pitiable suckers are the youngest among us and the yet-unborn.
Could the *nix dream be coming true? They have finally admitted defeat?
I love this shit. Is anyone as excited as I am?
His revelation is right on the mark. I constantly see proponents of Open Source say things such as "It's auditable because the source code is free". Well yes it is, but no one cares. I think even from the Slashdot crowd the number of people who bothered to build Firefox from source is a small minority compared to those who downloaded it. Those who actually look at the code are an even smaller subset of those bothered to build from source.
People talk about open source as if users give a damn. Users are only interested in 2 things, how much it costs, and if it works. Open APIs are part of the ability for something to work if your idea of working is interoperability.
I believe the following statement on the front page says it all:
"rights under Microsoft patents covering such specifications are available separately"
So we can expect to see proper documentation of the interfaces, standards and protocols Microsoft will be pushing?
Somehow I suspect we'll see more things like Open Office XML. Sigh.
Published APIs are important, nay, necessary for "cloud" applications and services to be useful to developers to build upon. Open source is necessary for community based development of the underlying applications or services.
Open source software is completely irrelevant in this instance and this appears to be a simple strawman attack from Microsoft against the open source movement.
customers don't care about the underlying platform as long as stuff works. Problem with Microsoft is that their stuff does not work and their users don't have any option for fixing it.
And this open shit coming from MS which has history of closed APIs, protocols and standards.
yeah, just wait till you use the APIs and get hit with suit for violating patents and copyrights.
Kaching!
El Reg has it named well enough already now !! MS always at the ready to copy-embrace-extend/rename, but really now, come on, OPEN SORES it is and shall remain !!
And yes, yes, you'd have open sores if you beat it all around, yes, yes, I got that !! Child !!
Naysayants get back to your Linux, this is a huge step towards modularity.
Assuming you had this open surface* then in the context of cloud computing* i'd say you probably wouldn't care what the back end platform is since you could be running on any platform that implements the open surface*, in the same way that most people don't care about what OS the server that their website is hosted on is running. Then again if you want vendor lock-in then i don't see how this would be beneficial.
*yeah i don't think we need yet another term for an existing concept
This is, as stated, a ploy to dilute what open source means. To say customers don't care about the platform is silly considering how serious platform intrusions are, how serious platform reliability is and how platform updates are handled. Can Microsoft really say that Windows gets out of developers way and out of the way of maintenance admins? No, and for decades they designed Windows so it wasn't out of the way. This is just another Microsoft ploy in their attempt to Embrace, Extend, and Extinguish open source and in particular GNU/Linux. IMO
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> customers don't care about the underlying platform as long as the APIs, protocols and standards for the cloud are open.
That seems true. Customers want openness in the part that they deal with. Since the customer does not deal with system maintenance and development, he does not care whether the underlying platform is open. The provider of the cloud service, on the other hand, has a deeply vested interest in the openness of the platform. Maintenance, repair, and extension requirements all strongly favor an open platform from the cloud service provider's perspective.
Pointing out that the customer does not care about platform openness as long as the protocol is open is a bit like saying that automobile drivers do not care if the paving crew uses horse-drawn paving machines as long as they get the job done in a timely manner. It does not necessarily follow that horse-drawn paving machines make sense.
Stop-Prism.org: Opt Out of Surveillance
That's not true. I'm a customer, and I care. Is that not enough to disprove such a claim? So perhaps I am in the minority...
I suppose that makes me a mouse, and not a man.
Microsoft has taken some big hits and seems like they are ready to play ball with the community. They are totally OK with modifications to their phone platform where Apple and Android Handset makers are not. They have reversed their stance on linux and are actively using it, contributing to it, and offering it as part of their cloud services. Is Ballmer a nutjob? Yes. Do you really think after how badly he tanked the company since Gates left he's calling the shots anymore, and will not be "stepping down" soon? Come on.
Microsoft, please first open "surface" Skype. Give us somewhere to get an API key and a protocol specification to the Skype network so we can make apps to send push notifications to Skype usernames that subscribe to them. Digium has stopped Skype support for Asterisk, open up the protocol and instantly every PBX software in existance can have a Skype module -- instantly you add amazing corporate-level value to your product. Make all your services as easy to manage for Linux admins as Amazon's cloud platform services are. I might even use MS-SQL server in my web app if it were hosted on a server I could manage with nothing more than an SSH and the occaisional VNC connection. Give Oracle some real competition to Java and SQL, give Apple some real competition to handheld gaming/communication, give Google some real competition to Online Presence Management and Advertising.
You have the potential to surpass your former glory, but you aren't going to do it by mimicing anymore. Drop "embrace, extend, extinguish" for "innovate, profit, liberate". Hell, you want some amazing branding, open source Windows XP and watch the ensuing holy war in the open source community over which Desktop OS to run once the first mashup is made. Change with the times and you will not be left behind.
Have gnu, will travel.
besides English, or is Microsoft marketing just losing it? Anything that's on the 'surface' in English is bad. 'Scratch the surface' and you haven't done enough. 'On the surface' means superficial, shallow. Maybe it's different in British English, but in American English this just sounds awful.
Either that or it's April 1st again...
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
His revelation is right on the mark. I constantly see proponents of Open Source say things such as "It's auditable because the source code is free". Well yes it is, but no one cares. I think even from the Slashdot crowd the number of people who bothered to build Firefox from source is a small minority compared to those who downloaded it. Those who actually look at the code are an even smaller subset of those bothered to build from source.
It isn't necessary for a user to personally view, modify, or even compile the source to benefit from open source. At some point the copyright holder may add shovelware, spyware or just plain bugs. They may choose not to port to other platforms. They may just abandon the product. In these cases. a user of a closed source app can do little but continue to use the old version until it no longer runs on current platforms or until advanced security threats make it unsafe.
But as long as one person has the will and ability to adopt what the developer has effectively or literally abandoned, the freeloaders can still their updated binaries. They won't be exactly what they wanted but the freeloaders never had or asked for that anyway.
They had their chance to brand it to the point of Nintendo, Nike, and Kleenex
and ?
What is a closed-source programming language ?
> customers don't care about the underlying platform as long as the APIs, protocols and standards for the cloud are open
Customers do care about security breaches and closed source software has become the major source of security breaches (previously Microsoft, now Adobe and Siemens).
Customers do also care about non-working products like Word, recently a spokesman for danish police told us: "It just stopped working, it couldn't load or save just like Word" he was speaking about a big custom built police system.
With a majority of 'customers' moving towards open source technologies such as Linux,
...what? What majority is that?
I think this guy is a bit delusional when it comes to how he perceives the broad majority of users. Most users don't give a shit if the product is open source/free software and especially what that means at the source level. They just want something that works for them. If it happens to be free, great, but it often isn't, and it more than often isn't Linux. Vendor lock is meaningless to the broad majority of users.
It's a pretty bold admission because customers "not caring about the underlying platform" means windows won't be the infection vector for all that other MS software. Maybe they're getting ready for a future when there are hordes of iOS and android devices out there. They have to do something to get people using their libraries and other software. I don't think anyone really believes that windows mobile or whatever mobile OS microsoft tries next will take over the market like back in the wintel days.
"I'm certainly more impressed by Google's willingness to let me export their data"
Once you give it to Google, it ain't yours any more.
All I am going to say to those of you who think "open source" does not matter is read Richard Stallman's paper "Who Does That Server Really Serve?"
http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/who-does-that-server-really-serve.html
Having open and honestly published API's and protocols is important and certainly better than nothing, but there are so many other reasons why access to source code is important for trust and freedom in computing.
I think it's a good idea to differentiate between a truely Open Source thing and something that operates with the outside world in an open way.
For example, a standard USB port verses an ipad connector.
Although it might dilute attitudes, it's also a useful term. You shouldn't turn ones back on that with emotion. Sure, avoid the term but recognise it's usefulness, if only to coin another term because otherwise we're blinding ourselves with emotion... and if having a holy war this is where the enemy creeps in.
A blog I run for the wealth
Microsoft again...does anyone really care?
Yeah, their stuff is "not working" on 95% of personal computers, keep that up, dork, but know that not even the FOSS community likes you.
...to register some domainnames like open-surface.com. Then build a page that explains what Open Surface means and why Open Source is actually better.
Oh, it'll be well documented all right. Only the product being documented will be some huge gargantuan beast of a thing that requires hundreds, if not thousands of pages to adequately document. And the documentation will be released 6-12 months after Microsoft release their implementation; the first version of the documentation will be mysteriously different to the implementation and the documentation may never be updated - meaning that by the time anyone else has a hope of having some competition implemented, Microsoft will be well entrenched.
Even so, this would be an improvement over the status quo.
" Please, please let us sit next to your Linux clusters, let us at least get one Windows Server in! "
Really, this is hardly newsworthy. Any developer would know that WSDL/REST driven webservice contracts abstract the underlying OS & hardware. They've lost the server game. As the saying goes empty vessels make the most noise! Ignore, move on.
Look on the bright side - with M$ involved nobody's going to suggest intelligent design.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
.. to just avoid, at every conceivable cost and in any way possible, the term Open Standards.
It hurts, doesn't it? I mean, having to work with others?
Insert
Would have been more fitting... Followed by Open Wallet.
Join the Slashcott! Feb 10 thru Feb 17!
Is it just me, or are open* and cloud* becoming the new cyber*?
Middle manager: "Hey, did you try the new CyberCloud 2.0 Open-Surface ® operating system by OpenMicrosoft ®?"
MS patent goon: "You bet your Zune ® I did! It allows me to innovate my value-added cyberdata to enhance availability in scalable cloud based enterprise architectures channeling an enterprise virtualisation solution, thus leveraging existing ROI and increasing key delivarables as per OpenMicrosoft ® BestPractise ®!"
"The most dangerous enemy of a better solution is an existing codebase that is just good enough." -- Eric S. Raymond
Yes customers only care for software that works but if they are educated about their rights and freedom, they will definitely adopt gnu/gpl software.
The solution is GNU/GPL not opensource. Unless you use or develop quality software under strict GNU/GPL defined by rms, no such attempt can become successful or gain popularity.
This problem has been started long before by many. Even the team of android are trying to create there own a$$ fog deviating from linux kernel and now they are close source.
All opensource project must shift to strict GNU/GPL license and throw away their close source component. Even Meego contain close source ux components.
A good inspiration and example is libre office of document foundation.
This is more typical BS from M$.
But as Corporate IT droids loose control of the desktop, especially for e-mail and document
interchange EEE no longer has traction, since if the CEO can't get his e-mail on his iPhone
he will replace the ITers stopping him.
There are just so many Nokia-s that you can buy!
I'm fairly hard-core, so I apply [what I call] the 'walk away' test to everything. That is: 'can I take my data and set up another instance of x on infrastructure that I control?'.
As far as I'm concerned both protocols and APIs, even if published, are potential lock in, I prefer to have the whole stack and my data -available-, even if I'm not going to move every month.
I deal with a certain amount of non-tech-savvy non-profits in the UK who end up glued to apparently 'free' stuff, because they don't understand this.
On y va, qui mal y pense!
Remember when MS and apologists were all claiming that there were no hidden APIs in windows, then when the EU made them open up more API calls that weren't open:
a) None of them said "OK, we were mistaken"
b) See, there WERE hidden APIs
So how do you know the APIs are open.
Now we get on to copyright.
Why is there copyright? So that the creative work done by someone doesn't get ripped off and we, the public, can still learn from the works. E.g. study Shakespeare's use of metaphor and meter to inform our own creations.
So when the API is open, what have we learned?
NOTHING.
So why is it under copyright???
Remember: just because you have the source code for Microsoft Windows 7 doesn't mean you can compile it and sell your copy. BUT you CAN learn from the coding in Windows 7 and when copyright is ended, you CAN sell your copy.
Docs aren't perfect. We all know this. To me, if there isn't a open reference implementation I'm not sure it's a open. Only an implementation covers everything required. Yes, in theory, the docs should be an implementation written in English, but that fails as it can't be run and tested, so it's always an incomplete implementation. Also, personally, I often find it easier to dig out exact details for code from other code, rather than from written English.
I'm certainly more impressed by Google's willingness to let me export my data.
I hope you are aware of the fact that they can still hang on to your data, even if you leave? See their Terms of Service, chapter 11. Yes, it really says "perpetual".
Just so you go into this with your eyes open - few read this stuff.
Insert
Exactly. I've built a company (now almost 13 yo) on an open source foundation, wherever possible. Where that proved impossible or the available FOSS was just too poor technically, etc, then I willingly paid.
Simple.
I'm getting a vision of a solid block of cement with clear windows glued on to the outside.
Microsoft's history (see the OOXML debacle) of publishing accurate interface specifications is a bit checkered, to say the least.
Open Source is a whole lot different than "published API".
And this customer certainly does care about the underlying platform...if only to insure that the company behind it is not trying to control what I can do on said platform
People talk about open source as if users give a damn.
Most don't. That should be obvious. It should also be obvious that if only 1 in a million users actually does anything with the source, then the entire purpose of open source is realized.
Come on, this isn't rocket science. I'll hold your hand through an example. Firefox has over 250 million users. How many of those people actually do anything with the source? Hardly any! Ding ding! Probably less than a thousanth of one percent! But even a thousandth of one percent is still be 2500 people.
Look, you don't need to know how open source functions. All you need to know is that open source is quite mainstream in 2011, and if it's mainstream, you can't possibly deny that open source development not only works, but really works.
Or so said Alan Kay, more or less, arguing for open reference implementations.
A 21st century issue: the irony of technologies of abundance in the hands of those still thinking in terms of scarcity.
I really thought this was a fairly decent April 1st post....
This might have been more neaningful 10 or 15 years ago, when M$ was more dominant. I know they still have a huge market share, but as computing has gone more mobile, they've been left eating other's dust. The market will go where ever it chooses, but M$ will have less to do with it.
Next, they "improve" the "open surface". That is an old microsoft story in a new package. This is FUD, seeding uncertainty on open source and open standards, the fear and doubt are just under the surface. Judging by many of the comments here people are already drinking the cool-aid.
Just because they publish APIs doesn't mean they publish ALL of them. By hiding the source they can still tilt the playing field in their favour.
that computing is going to go the way of multiple backends, one frontend for developers. It's too costly not to. OS companies will compete on implementing fast, feature rich, and stable software that can execute the programs developers write for consoles, pcs, tablets, and phones. MS is in a wonderful position to profit from leading the pack because it has operating systems on all these platforms. It should, imo, use linux or bsd (why reinvent the wheel? apple isn't) for all their platforms and write a gpl'd api that spans them all. Being gpl is key, otherwise developers will fear 1) licensing costs, 2) abandonment, 3) new features that break the old, 4) lack of adoption by other companies, ie apple. When it's adopted, MS will have a time frame in which they alone have the capability to offer developers a 'write-once' system. They can sell the dev tools, sure, but the money will be in their being there first while apple proudly waits till its knees are busted to acknowledge it's the way to go.
"Shallow" implies a relative depth which is less thn the total depth. A surface is at the junction and thus has no depth. Thus, this is not shallow, it has zero depth.
Anyone who is too naive or too young should now be able to see what those of us who know better have been trying to tell them for years: Microsoft is our enemy, not because *we* choose them as our enemy, but because they are making themselves our enemy. Thank goodness Microsoft is being marginalized; I only wish there were something better than Google taking their place, although Google's a heck of a lot better than Apple.
Nathan's blog
It depends on the type of customer. You may be right about the typical home user, who is more interested in the free "as in beer" aspect of FLOSS.
However, for enterprises small and large, the issues of vendor lock-in (q.v. SAP, Oracle; it isn't just Microsoft out there) is an increasingly large issue. As CIO's become more technically informed they realize that there are alternatives to being held hostage.
Linux isn't "free". It takes time and money to deploy. Having a company like Redhat or Novell that a CIO can blame for failure will further dispell this myth. TCO is what counts. That is why Linux is displacing Microsoft from the back office. That is why more vendors are supporting Linux. Even desktop Linux support from both FLOSS and closed source comercial software is growing.
In the end it is all about freedom of choice. That is why Microsoft's schemes are so noxious. Increasngly other vendors (Oracle in particular) will have to figure out if they are going to support freedom or if they are bent on domination.
Wait a minute, I thought what mattered was having a so called 'open core,' and knowing that we've always been at war with Eurasia
Its hard to tell a lot of detail (and its possible that the concept is fluff that doesn't have a strong concept behind it) from anything I've seen about it, but the "open surface" description includes not just APIs but also "protocols and standards". Its also not clear what sense of "open" is being used -- if open merely means "disclosed" (which it might, from MS) then its a fairly low bar, if its "unencumbered", then having both the the programming APIs, networking protocols, and other standards "open" means that other vendors are free to implement them, even if the existing implementation isn't open-source.
In either the weak or the strong form, "open surface" is a valuable feature in the cloud (and the strong form obviously more valuable to than the weak form), but "open source" remains valuable as well (open surface is in part important because if the original implementation isn't open source, open surface -- particularly of the unencumbered form -- makes it more likely that a third-party open-source implementation will come to exist.)
Open source implementation of open-surface services is really the gold standard of the cloud -- it provides the maximum flexibility, including the flexibility to freely deploy locally the same cloud apps that you would deploy with a cloud vendor, and to -- assuming you are deploying locally -- evolve (or pay the developer of your choice to evolve) the platform as well as the applications.
...
He coined these terms — open surface and open core — to describe a continued commingling — or a blurring — of open source and closed source software that lies at the core of the enterprise and the cloud.
Open core, or open source, is the existing model in which core features are open source and value-added proprietary commercial software is built on top of it to monetize the technology.
The open surface model, Microsoft’s approach, can be done with APIs, protocols and standards, the Microsoft exec said. The two models are coming together nicely.
So... A tivo is "open core" and a MS SMTP gateway is "open surface". I don't think we needed phrases or sound bites to describe the different ways that platforms could use a combination of closed and open source.
Also from TFA:
“Am I saying that openness doesn’t matter in the cloud? No, openness is extremely important [but] I argue that in the cloud the source code is the Terms of Use and the SLA,” Rabellino said, referring to service-level agreements.”
I have been around a while (I even had one of those wire wrapped IBM PCs a while back) and I have always thought that all Microsoft products were open sores. I guess I missed something along the way.
It's the same fake embrace the wiser propaganda derivative you have seen all to many times in politics and enterprise. Guy Andrew gets a cool term going for him (in this case the FOSS community finally gets Open Source projects mattering in the real world) so Guy Bernard, who is a dominant figure in its decline, dreams up an imitation of the term, similarly titled but semantically empty just to compete.
This tactic is very well documented in politics strategy texts and quite effective at that. It's main strength is the natural misinformation and possible disinformation of the general population who identifies qualities mostly by title and does so quite loosely. In fact non specialists will usually only keep the dominant word of the title in mind. In this case Cathrin 6pack will just understand that Microsoft goes Open, which fact immediately will be related to "Oh, Dean the tech guy always talked to me about Open Software" which will lead to the conclusion: "Microsoft is going Open Software" ergo "Microsoft is Open so there is no need to get uncomfortable and learn Other software to be Open since I am Open with the Microsoft Office"
-- no sig today
I disagree that we don't care about the underlying platform. In this case the underlying platform is the most bug ridden, virus infested, polished turd in history, and giving us another, "this is the latest and greatest thing", when it is in fact is just another "shallow" offering that is not "solid gold" but merely "gold plated".
For Microsoft it is of the uttermost importance to use the word "OPEN" in their products, since it targets mere users who would hardly understand what is actually open: "SURFACE? Huh? Ok, seems like this thing is OPEN..."
IMHO, the correct way to talk about CLOSED software with OPEN API is by using something like: "SEMICLOSED software" as to give the end user the right impression of the software he/she is going to use...