Samsung Joins Ranks of Android Vendors Licensing Microsoft Patents

theodp writes "GeekWire reports that Microsoft and Samsung just announced a patent licensing agreement that gives Samsung legal coverage for its use of Google's Android OS in its smartphones. Under the deal, which covers both mobile phones and tablets, Microsoft says it will receive unspecified royalties for every Android device that Samsung sells. Microsoft previously struck a similar patent deal with HTC, under which Microsoft is reportedly receiving $5 for every Android handset that HTC sells. This latest deal leaves Motorola Mobility, with which Microsoft is currently in litigation, as the only major Android smartphone manufacturer in the U.S. without a license to Microsoft's patent portfolio."

Comments

B&N

[Microlith]

Barnes and Noble is currently fighting MS in court, even if they aren't a smartphone vendor.

Re:B&N

[Penguinisto]

I think the funniest day to come will be when (hopefully not "if") Microsoft loses that one in court.

I wonder if the companies currently paying up could turn around and sue Microsoft if that happens?

Re:B&N

[Joce640k]

That depends on the contract they sign, but it's *very* unlikely that a patent troll would sign a contract that allowed people to get their money back if the patent is found invalid.

Re:B&N

[Anonymous Coward]

MS is a patent troll now? Seriously? Does that term now encompass every company that has ever owned a patent?

Re:B&N

[Missing.Matter]

That's kind of the point of patents... you patent something and sell it so no one else can. If someone else wants to sell something with your patent they have to pay you. If someone uses your patent without paying you, you sue them. A patent troll is someone who patents something just to license it, and does not actually produce it themselves.

The patents in question here aren't specified, but since Microsoft is actively engaged in the same market at Samsung, they're probably producing goods using their own patents.

Re:B&N

[Penguinisto]

They are licensing patents that are currently valid under US law.

That has yet to be tested. Once said patents have been found invalid, then what?

Re:B&N

[MobileTatsu-NJG]

But but but we don't need patents at all because the technology will just materialize on its own!

Re:B&N

[kartik.thapar]

Is that your argument?

Re:B&N

[NFN_NLN]

This latest deal leaves Motorola Mobility, with which Microsoft is currently in litigation, as the only major Android smartphone manufacturer in the U.S. without a license to Microsoft's patent portfolio."

The article fails to mention that Google bought MMI (http://www.marketwatch.com/story/google-buys-moto-gives-microsoft-an-opening-goog-mmi-aapl-rimm-nok-msft-2011-08-15). So when they say Motorola Mobility, they really mean Google. Things will probably get interesting when Google fires back with some of MMI's patents.

Then again the whole thing is a non-productive waste of time and resources. Three cheers for a broken and counter-productive patent system.

Re:B&N

[s73v3r]

Even that is far too much. Microsoft actually uses their patents in their products. Patent trolls don't have any kind of product to speak of.

Re:B&N

[s73v3r]

As of now, the presumption is that the patents are valid. Proof has to be brought in order to overturn that presumption.

Re:B&N

[Alex Belits]

But once proven that patents are invalid or that Microsoft did not spell out actual patents in "licensing agreements", Microsoft can be proven to be acting in bad faith or even fraud.

Re:B&N

[AJH16]

How are we sure that the bulk of Microsoft's patent portfolio is pure garbage? They have quite an extensive research division and come up with some pretty novel concepts. That said, I think software patents in general are given for ideas that are far too simple, but I would hazard that MS is probably one of the few companies that have software patents I would actually qualify as being validly innovative and non-obvious. (Though I am sure they have a number of very obvious patents as well as you simply have to play the game to survive the way things are currently structured.)

Re:B&N

[NFN_NLN]

The reason the article doesn't mention it is because it hasn't happened yet. Google is trying to buy MMI, it hasn't happened yet. These things don't happen overnight...

"Trying to buy" and "definitive agreement" have very different implications. I'll side with the article as a more "definitive" source.

"The company announced this morning that it has entered a definitive agreement to buy Motorola Mobility Holdings Inc. (NYSE: MMI) for $40/share in cash, a premium of 63% to Friday's closing price on Motorola Mobility's shares."

Re:B&N

[cavreader]

Do you think this is a scenario that MS and it's lawyers have not considered or do they troll this sight looking for legal advice before writing their contracts? I doubt a money back guarantee was included in the terms of the contract.

Re:B&N

[LucidBeast]

You know what is really funny. It seems that just about everybody is making money off Android except Google. Sure they show some ads, but they show them to everybody.

Re:B&N

[kiddygrinder]

because before patents it was impossible to invent things...

Re:B&N

[Flipao]

You know what's funnier?, Google makes money from search and advertising on both iOS and Android devices. Talk about win/win. Even better is the fact that MS makes more money from Android that they'll ever make from WP7.

Re:B&N

[justforgetme]

Patent on software? Yes!

Re:B&N

[LucidBeast]

I guess I missed my point. Google is spending money on Android, but gets no direct revenue from it that it wouldn't get anyway. Only reason it makes sense for Google to do this is that other platform makers could try to close or obstruct the advertising revenue from Google, which I think is very unlikely scenario.

Re:B&N

[godefroi]

Are all the patents in question software patents? It's possible that MS has patents on other components of the system.

Re:B&N

[AJH16]

True, that's another good point. MS isn't limited to only software research.

Re:B&N

[s73v3r]

Do you honestly think that Samsung would enter into a "licensing agreement" with Microsoft without knowing exactly which patents are covered?

Re:B&N

[Alex Belits]

Absolutely! Microsoft will just claim that all patents are covered, so Samsung won't expect another extortion letter tomorrow.

Re:WTF?

[alen]

MS was making OS's when Samsung could barely make a working microwave. MS was making mobile devices when Samsung was still associated with cheap and LArry and Sergey were still in college.

Extortion

[cmdr_klarg]

Legalized extortion is what this is. Patent reform is needed, and needed sooner rather than later.

Re:Extortion

[h4rr4r]

Something that should not apply to math?

The fact is software patents are total bullshit.

Re:Extortion

[jonbryce]

As a guess, the FAT32 file system and Exchange Activesync.

Re:Extortion

[alen]

then samsung should just make up their own algorithm and code for all these problems. not like there is only one way to do things.

oh wait, it's going to cost money and eat into their margins

Re:Extortion

[h4rr4r]

They already have too. Copying code would be copyright violation. Patents protect the entire idea of the solution.

Re:Extortion

[Gadget_Guy]

It's extortion because Microsoft has failed to state what IP Android is infringing.

Do you seriously think that Samsung was not informed what patents has that this agreement would cover? The agreement may be open ended and include some patents that have not been fully specified, but Microsoft do have enough examples (that have specific licensing programs) that they can show Samsung.

I do believe the level of discussion between the legal departments of the two companies would have been a bit more specific than the simplistic and vague statements that get posted around here.

What's suppose to happen is Microsoft would sue Google stating what specific patent Android is infringing. Once the proper evidence has been presented and deemed proper, the court would rule in Microsoft's favor. The court would order Google to remove the offending code and pay Microsoft a fine.

The code may not be part of Google's code. Some things like VFAT and ActiveSync could be add-ons by the vendors that use Android. And why would Microsoft want Google to remove the code anyway? This is exactly why they have licensing programs for their IP.

Re:Extortion

[Anonymous Coward]

Shut up and think about it. Linux is a very public project, and has been for a very long time. MS claim Linux violates some patents of theirs and yet MS have not once mentioned which ones, and have not made a single attempt to stop the Linux kernel from using them. They can simply list each patent in 1 email, point to the code that infringes each, and send it to the LKML. Within a few days, all suspect code will be changed or their patent claims may be crushed under an avalanche of prior-art.

Now you tell me why MS has made zero effort to address their claims against the very public project that is supposedly using their patents? It's not some kids in a basement in a country they cannot touch, it's mostly funded by the computer and tech industry's heaviest hitters. Again, you tell me why they're extorting a Linux fee and not merely telling the Linux project where they have concerns.

Re:Extortion

[Anthony Mouse]

Clearly hardware is patent-able. So a novel arrangement of logic gates soldered onto a PCB should be patent-able, therefore the same configuration of logic gates implemented on a FPGA should be covered by that patent (it's the same logic gate arrangement after all)

You've already failed. Let's try it this way: Clearly hardware is patentable. So a novel arrangement of letters in movable type affixed to a printing press should be patentable, therefore the same story on a computer should be covered by that patent (it's the same text after all).

But obviously it isn't. You can't patent literature, in the same way as you ought not to patent software.

Re:Extortion

[penguinbrat]

Didn't you hear? It was already reformed, just last week - it's not about inventions anymore, it's about $$$ and who can file the paper work first..

Re:Extortion

[Anthony Mouse]

I do believe the level of discussion between the legal departments of the two companies would have been a bit more specific than the simplistic and vague statements that get posted around here.

The problem is that it usually goes something like this: We have several hundred patents which have some vague relation to what you're doing. Some of them you don't really infringe, others would probably be invalidated if challenged, but if you wanted to actually challenge them all you'd end up spending many millions of dollars. In the meantime the lawsuit makes the news, your stock price goes down and customers and developers shy away from your products. How about you just pay us the money instead?

Licensing one patent is patent licensing. Licensing dozens or hundreds of patents is a protection racket -- because the cost of actually analyzing and challenging them exceeds the cost of the protection money.

Re:Extortion

[kikito]

Microsoft has not disclosed which patents they allegedly would infringe.

This is the situation:

Microsoft: We've got some patents here that these guys are infringing. They should pay us.
Judge: Which patents are those?
Microsoft: I can't tell you, they are secret. But they must pay us, trust us.

The only thing that surprises me is that they got away with that.

Re:Extortion

[Missing.Matter]

Uh, what makes you think they went to a judge? This sounds like a deal between Samsung and Microsoft, no courts involved. Why would Samsung, a company with as much financial clout as Microsoft, just rollover and pay royalties on bogus patents? Obviously looking at their battle with Apple they're willing to fight.

Re:Extortion

[Raenex]

Microsoft has not disclosed which patents they allegedly would infringe.

Yes they have.

Re:Extortion

[GrievousMistake]

We do have some idea.

We know that Microsoft is approaching this in pretty much the most scummy and mafia-like way possible, using strong-arm tactics to make companies sign NDA agreements to prevent information leaking out that would allow other companies to protect themselves ahead of time.

We know that the patents that we have seen, mostly thanks to B&N having some balls and not falling for the MS's cheap tricks, are dubious and certainly not worth what Microsoft is demanding, given that you can licence Windows 7 for about the same price.

I personally know that I'll do my best to not give MS a dime of my money, though they sure know to take their rent from PC and phone manufacturers, and in fact I'm glad this story came up, because I was about to inadvertently buy some of their hardware, but come to think of it I won't, because who wants to subsidize shit like this?

Re:Extortion

[Trahloc]

Got a link? Or do you mean they disclosed them to Samsung under an NDA? I don't count that as disclosure.

Re:Extortion

[westlake]

Legalized extortion is what this is. Patent reform is needed, and needed sooner rather than later.

These are grown-ups signing licensing agreements with Microsoft. Companies like General Dynamics, the sixth largest defense contractor in the world.

Samsung with revenues of $172 billion and with 276,000 employees. 50 years experience in consumer electronics. Manufactuer of 800 million mobile phones. Samsung

So tell me what you know about these patents that Samsung's engineers, legal counsel, management and financial advisors do not.

Re:Extortion

[Raenex]

http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=2278670&cid=36607816

Re:Extortion

[godefroi]

How do you know the patents in question are all software patents?

Re:Extortion

[dei5]

So don't inter-operate with the Microsoft system?

Re:Extortion

[dei5]

Perhaps you would prefer that they flood your email box with several hundred claims and require you to spend time settling and licensing each independently?

Re:Extortion

[Anthony Mouse]

That is the same thing. Splitting it into separate transactions does not make it any less of a protection racket.

Let me spell it out for you. Let's say a company comes to you with two patents, one of which you aren't infringing and the other of which could be invalidated in court. The cost of vindicating yourself is $X/patent, after legal fees, wasted programmer time, marketing detriments, etc. They're asking for an aggregate licensing cost of $20X, so you go to court, win, and come out ahead, since $2X is less than $20X. And since everybody knows that is what would happen at the outset, they don't try it unless they have some legitimate patents that you're legitimately infringing.

Now let's say a company comes to you with fifty patents. The cost of vindicating yourself is still $X/patent, and they're still asking for an aggregate licensing cost of $20X, but now you would have to pay $50X to vindicate yourself in court. It costs more to win than to license, so you're coerced into paying the license fee completely regardless of whether you're infringing the patents and whether they could be invalidated.

The fact that you are still coerced into paying even if you aren't infringing any valid patents is what makes it a protection racket.

How does M$ get away with this?

[sl4shd0rk]

They didn't make android and sure as hell didn't make the Linux OS it runs it. Why is it that microsoft is able to extort money like this?

Re:How does M$ get away with this?

[Andy Dodd]

FAT Long File Name support

Re:How does M$ get away with this?

[MonsterTrimble]

Look at what Apple & Samsung fought over in Europe with the Galaxy Tab. Samsung LOST when it was pretty clear it was obvious and had a ton of prior art. Who's to say Microsoft doesn't hold something like that? It could be a multi-input touch screen or could be tied in with something from the Zune. Who knows?

Honestly, I'm sure the cost/benefit analysis is why it happen this way. Assuming Samsung's lawyers evaluated Microsoft's patents and think they are bunk, it's still cheaper to pay microsoft X amount over Y period of years than to spend W amount in lawyers fees over Z years fighting in court and then risk losing, where you have to pay X*Y anyway plus whatever additional damages the court gives. As well, we're talking millions, if not billions of dollars here. Even if there is only a 10% chance of the courts siding with Microsoft who wants to risk that kind of cash? Any CEO who would gamble like that would (and should) be fired.

Re:How does M$ get away with this?

[mangu]

I install Microsoft software on anyone's computer. I download the software from torrents. I figure there's no need to pay for it, since people have already paid Microsoft when they bought their Android phones,

Re:How does M$ get away with this?

[jrumney]

Licensing the FAT patents costs $0.25. The license fees Microsoft is reported to be getting from HTC are $5. So FAT is a small part of what they are claiming.

Re:WTF?

[Penguinisto]

Given Microsoft's history of IP theft back then, I wonder how they would have fared if the established players back then demanded and got the same fees and licenses that Microsoft is demanding now?

Steve Ballmer was a prophet.

[Howitzer86]

Linux now officially belongs to Microsoft. Pay up.

Re:Steve Ballmer was a prophet.

[Howitzer86]

That doesn't matter. Thanks to the likes of Samsung, HTC, and others, Microsoft is emboldened and willing to go after more businesses who depend on Linux.

Microsoft invented the file system

[tepples]

Microsoft invented the file system used by many Android-powered devices to store data on SD cards, including a major enhancement released in 1995 that allowed file names to exceed the 8.3 limitation of early versions of this file system. This enhancement, commonly called "VFAT", is patented.

Re:Microsoft invented the file system

[Dr_Barnowl]

It's a shame that it's the de-facto standard for a file system that you can plug into anything.

If the card was formatted as ext2, it wouldn't be a patent issue any more - it's a shame about the droves of users complaining about not being able to read their SD card on Windows...

You can get ext2 file system drivers for Windows (and they've been available for some time), but MS choose not to integrate any kind of support for "foreign" file systems into their OS.

Re:Microsoft invented the file system

[goruka]

Only in the US you can patent duct taping long filenames into a crappy filesystem by sticking many short filenames together and using a special character not allowed in the original filesystem as delimiter. There is nothing innovative about it and the only reason there isn't much prior art is because any other sane company would simply just replace the filesystem for a better one that supports long filenames natively. On top of that, Microsoft used it's monopoly power (for which they were convicted) to make it a standard by forcing everyone to use it.
So, yes, this is legal extortion thanks to a very flawed US legal system.

Re:Microsoft invented the file system

[gmack]

Invented? You mean copied from CP/M. Dos V2 added Unix style directories. The only reason anyone uses VFAT is because it is the only filesystem that windows can read that is both properly documented and simple to implement.

It's a tax on being compatible with Windows.

Re:Microsoft invented the file system

[Miamicanes]

I'm pretty sure only about 14 cents of the $5 is FAT32-related, and the bulk of it is due to patents that originated with Windows Mobile. Like it or hate it, WinMo was doing more or less the same stuff Android does today circa 2004. IOS and Android just made it pretty, and gave the dialer app a finger-friendly user interface.

Architecturally, PalmOS phones and WinMo phones were VERY different, and iPhones & Android phones have more in common with WinMo than PalmOS hardware.

Metaphorically:

A PalmOS phone (pre-Treo) was a Dragonball PDA duct-taped onto a cell phone through a serial port, much like a PC with an internal non-Winmodem.

A Windows Mobile phone (and later Treos) was a nasty Windows XP PC with $14 HSP winmodem that offloaded everything to software, including the signal processing itself.

An Android phone is kind of a compromise between the two extremes, like the later-vintage Lucent Winmodems that had a real DSP for the heavy lifting grunt work, but used the host CPU for logic and high-level protocol. There's a software RIL that mediates between the two, but much of the "radio" side has been moved back into its own dedicated hardware (or at least its own dedicated chunk of silicon with its own dedicated CPU on the same die). The "unitary" Windows Mobile hardware model was cheaper to manufacture, but bound the OS very, very tightly to specific architectures (it's not a coincidence that basically all Windows Mobile phones came from HTC -- porting WinMo to some other phone hardware would have been a MAJOR undertaking well beyond the capabilities of any group of hobbyists, even WITH the sourcecode).

Anyway, the bundle of hardware similarities between WinMo's hardware-software architecture and Android's is where most of the royalties go. Between Palm, Microsoft/HTC, and Motorola, it's pretty hard to make a modern phone without infringing on SOMETHING owned by them.

Re:Microsoft invented the file system

[Gadget_Guy]

Invented? You mean copied from CP/M.

There were a lot of similarities in the way that you accessed files between DOS and CP/M (drive letters, 8.3 filenames), but the actual FAT file system was not the same as CP/M's.

In fact, that was one of the advantages of MS-DOS over CP/M - the standardized disk format. The old CP/M systems made by the different vendors could not read each other's disks because they had their own customization of the file system. Disk interoperability was one of the reasons that DOS won in the end.

Re:Microsoft invented the file system

[tlhIngan]

Actually, it's a bit disingenious to think that you can stick a modem to a serial port and call it a day. Hardware wise, that's all it is in all smartphones - even highly integrated chips have the baseband connected to the application CPU core via a standard interface like USB or shared memory or somesuch. Very easy and separates cleanly.

The software tack that resides on the application core (regardless of Android, WinMo, iOS, PalmOS, etc) is where the money's at. You may think it's trivial issuing AT commands to control the modem, but there's a TON more stuff going on behind the scenes.

It's a huge complex state machine for starters, and while you're doing one thing, your RIL proxy has to arbitrate by determining if it's safe to issue the command at the time (e.g., set up a data connection in the middle of sending/receiving an SMS or MMS).

In fact, it's so freaking huge and complex that it's really buggy. And modems are equally buggy - GSM07.07 leaves a lot to the imagination. Heck, I've seen a modem trip up the state machine of WinMo (and the RIL) because instead of sending "\r\n" to end a line, it sent "\n\r". Or sometimes "\n" only. (And sometimes you're handling multi-line inputs).

Then there are times when optional parameters aren't, and you have to get the current value so you don't change it, which is ferociously hard at times (in WinMo, everything is asynchronous - the AT command and AT response code were handled separately, easy for software since you just have a receive thread, but insane if you need to synchronously do something).

And nevermind the unsolicited events to complicate the mix (you're int he midst of getting a parameter so you can adjust it or pass it back, and you get an SMS... or a phone call).

It's actually quite a complex piece of code - RIL, the rest of the telephony stack, etc.

Re:Microsoft invented the file system

[dunkelfalke]

That is really quite metaphorically, because at least one of the last Windows Mobile phones (HTC HD2) had almost the same hardware as Nexus One, so porting Android to that phone was not that difficult. There are also ports for other Windows Mobile devices.

Re:Microsoft invented the file system

[Miamicanes]

Well, the HD2 was kind of an exception, because it was literally the last of the line and was already well into the Android evolutionary hardware curve. I was mainly talking about HTC phones from roughly 2004 through 2008, when there were still people crazy enough to think that single-core smartphones (as in, a single CPU controlling everything from the OS to the phone itself) were viable, let alone a good idea. Anyone remember the useless, crippled super low-end Windows Mobile 6 "smartphones" that lacked touchscreens and couldn't really do much besides display custom wallpaper and wave the (Windows) flag?

Re:Microsoft invented the file system

[dunkelfalke]

I never had those crippled WinMo phones without touchscreens, but before the HD2 that I currently use, I used to own HTC Wallaby, Himalaya, Blue Angel, Universal, Athena and Blackstone, so I went through pretty much all Windows Mobile versions from 2002 to 6.5, mostly using custom ROMs from xda-developers. I have also disassembled a few Himalayas and Universals and I am pretty sure that there were some DSPs on the motherboard.

Modus Operandi

[deweyhewson]

This is nothing more than a legalized protection racket.

Microsoft has made claims for years to own the patents on various aspects of Linux (which Android is built on), making only vague references and never specifying what exactly it owns. It then uses this to strongarm companies using Linux into paying them royalties.

The best part is that, unlike illegal protection rackets, this one is entirely supported by the broken patent (and legal) system we have today.

Re:Modus Operandi

[Missing.Matter]

Don't you think a company as big as Samsung (US$ 294.5 billion in total assets, almost 3x Microsoft's) couldn't fight Microsoft in court if these claims weren't substantial? Do you honestly thing MS went to Samsung and said "We have some patents you're infringing. We're not going to tell you what they are but they're really good." and Samsung just rolled over? That makes zero business sense.

No. Most likely Samsung knows exactly what they're dealing with, decided it would be more expensive to fight in court and they'd probably lose anyway, so they made a deal.

Re:Modus Operandi

[Anonymous Coward]

Samsung also sells Microsoft-running devices.

"Would be a shame if you didn't get the same 'discount' on your Microsoft OS licenses that all your competitors do"...

Re:Modus Operandi

[kirkb]

I've got no mod points, but you're exactly right. The biggest guys to cave in to MS's extortion are WinPhone partners: HTC, Samsung.

Re:Modus Operandi

[tobiasly]

No. Most likely Samsung knows exactly what they're dealing with, decided it would be more expensive to fight in court and they'd probably lose anyway, so they made a deal.

How can you say that when you have no clue what the terms of the deal were? Maybe the monetary aspect is negligible and it's a cross-license deal that keeps Samsung from also suing Microsoft as they're doing with Apple. Samsung's patent portfolio is also very formidable. Maybe MS is more interested in the PR victory this represents as a boost to WinMo at Android's expense.

Re:Modus Operandi

[Yvanhoe]

Well, maybe Samsung considered that indeed the patent laws would bite them hard if they fought MS patents. The fact that it is legal doesn't make it any less of a immoral racketing scheme. These laws need to go away.

Re:Modus Operandi

[DinDaddy]

All these hardware mfrs will be competing with Apple, who have their own hardware and OS. MS wants them to buy its OS, not use the free one. The hardware mfrs are more likely to use the free one to compete with Apple better on price. MS is applying leverage to make sure it is NOT cheaper to use the free one, so they have a hope of selling theirs. They don't want to depend solely on Nokia to compete with Apple.

I refuse to pay Microsoft for an Android phone

[OFnow]

So shortly the wife and I will need 21st century phones. And apparently the only phone not involving payments to MS is the iphone. I refuse to buy an Samsung or HTC phone now and pay extortion even though I'd prefer Android.

Re:I refuse to pay Microsoft for an Android phone

[Anonymous Coward]

Or you know.. Motorola... you didn't even need to RTFA to know that

Re:I refuse to pay Microsoft for an Android phone

[Rhodri Mawr]

So shortly the wife and I will need 21st century phones. And apparently the only phone not involving payments to MS is the iphone. I refuse to buy an Samsung or HTC phone now and pay extortion even though I'd prefer Android.

How bizarrely short-sighted and quaint. Buy the phone that does the best job for you and fulfils your requirements on features vs cost.

Re:I refuse to pay Microsoft for an Android phone

[Jeng]

Your idealism is idiotic.

Get the best phone that meets your needs.

Yes HTC does pay MS $5 for every Android phone they produce, but it is only $5, get over it.

Without Android you are forced to go with Apple who is suing the crap out of everyone. Or a MS mobile based phone which well you hate MS so why would you do that? Then there is Nokia with Symbian for a little while longer before they go full on MS, so you can guess that getting support for Symbian is going to suck down the road.

Or, you could go without a smartphone.

Re:I refuse to pay Microsoft for an Android phone

[PoopCat]

Why should you think your purchasing criteria apply to anyone else?

Re:I refuse to pay Microsoft for an Android phone

[aitan]

So you rather sell your soul to Apple instead of paying 5$ to Microsoft?

Remember, we're talking about Apple, the one that sues everyone else because they invented the rectangle with rounded corners, the one that only allows you to install the apps that it has approved, the one that thinks that you don't need to be able to replace your battery and it's better if each new design uses a different set of screwdrivers that no one else uses so you don't mess with the internals.

Re:I refuse to pay Microsoft for an Android phone

[shutdown -p now]

Do you also refuse to do business with any company that runs Windows on their office machines?

Because, you know, some of your money also goes to MS if you do that.

Re:I refuse to pay Microsoft for an Android phone

[stephanruby]

Wow! You didn't even read the summary!

Motorola Mobility (now owned by Google) is also not paying up, and counter-suing for MS's infringements of their patents on WP7 (not that they can recover very much from MS, it's not like the infringing WP7/WP7.5 is harming anyone right now -- except Microsoft).

Re:I refuse to pay Microsoft for an Android phone

[Jeng]

I made more than $5 sitting here and thinking about this topic.

Yes, it is idiotic for HTC/Samsung to pay $5 per phone to Microsoft, but it is just $5, get over it.

Wars may be noble, but battles are ugly, pick your battles to win the war. If HTC or Samsung had fought to the bitter end on this you would either have to pay a lot more, or you would not have even had the choice.

Re:I refuse to pay Microsoft for an Android phone

[OFnow]

Ok, I read half the post and my brain turned off. If it could ever be said to be on. Sigh. I'm an idiot. Motorola is it.

Re:I refuse to pay Microsoft for an Android phone

[PC_THE_GREAT]

what kind of reasoning is that to claim someone's idealism is stupid! I'd pretty much say out loud that saying "it is only $5 just pay it" is plain stupid, tommorrow someone puts a dagger under your throat and ask you $5, you'll say its just $5, then he comes back the next day and on and on, you'll again say its $5. Son, you should learn to kick back and snatch out the kidney of the dude asking you $5 on the next day he does that :) its worth a lot more.

Re:I refuse to pay Microsoft for an Android phone

[Jeng]

If you found out that your favorite restaurant was being extorted on a regular basis would you quit going to it?

Because that is what is going on here, HTC and Samsung are getting extorted and people are saying they won't buy from HTC and Samsung even though they are the victims here.

Re:I refuse to pay Microsoft for an Android phone

[PC_THE_GREAT]

Well its business, either you fight to keep your customers happy or you get extorted and put the extortion costs on the customers who then becomes the victims. But then your point of view on that also is not totally wrong either then.

Why They Are Paying Up...

[Frosty Piss]

Microsoft invented the file system used by many Android-powered devices to store data on SD cards, including a major enhancement released in 1995 that allowed file names to exceed the 8.3 limitation of early versions of this file system. This enhancement, commonly called "VFAT", is patented.
--

Re:Why They Are Paying Up...

[IgnoramusMaximus]

Microsoft invented...

No, they did not. There are very, very few real inventions that can be attributed to Microsoft. This is not one of them. VFAT is an "invention" in the same vain as a janitor is "inventing clean" via an application of a mop and a bucket of soapy water to a floor. The term, now apparently forgotten, that once used to describe why such things are not patentable is "an obvious application of the art"

So, as many people pointed out thousands of times:

• 1. FAT is a copy of the earlier CP/M file system mixed with some bastard, half-assed ports of some features of UNIX file systems of the time.
• 2. VFAT is an "obvious application of the art" and any patents on it are pure insanity that violates even the most basic premise of the whole idea of patents. But insane is what the US Patent system has become.
• 3. The very idea of patenting software is another form of demonstrable mental retardation, a part of larger, even more dangerous to the progress of civilization and personal liberties, raving lunacy called "intellectual property".

Re:Why They Are Paying Up...

[inode_buddha]

What I can't understand is, how is this any different from SAMBA?

Re:Why They Are Paying Up...

[Maquis196]

I'll happily be called obtuse on this but I would prefer an android phone being sold without vfat support or anything that microsoft thinks they own and the ability to add such capabilities would be paid for as a plugin directly from ms (like virtualbox does with premium modules). This way I can buy a phone knowing that microsoft won't be getting a penny out of me since I have no need for fat32 and people that do need it (say when they plug it into a windows computer something pops up saying "you'll need this to talk to windows".

What about mac users? Mac has access to extX does it? (I really don't know) if so then only windows users need to pay microsoft more money to use their os. Hell, maybe windows can come bundled with the ability to tether android devices to it.

Re:Why They Are Paying Up...

[blackair]

This has gotten so out of hand, its like ALL the major tech companies have lost their collective fning mind. instead of creating new and better tech its turned into little kids fighting ( I know what you are, what am I) smh.

Re:Why They Are Paying Up...

[F.Ultra]

Because SMBFS was an IBM invention perhaps?

Re:Why They Are Paying Up...

[IgnoramusMaximus]

This is actually quite obvious consequence of the whole trend into which most industrial nations have been purposefully egged on, bullied and downright terrorized if need be, by the very people who now fight amongst each other.

One can think of this in a very simple way that explains the whole thing: feudalism and thievery. In a feudal system, the "landed gentry" i.e. land owners, rule a nation and all others, i.e. peons, are forced - by virtue of geography - to rent their places to live from these land-lords (hence the name), usually at ruinous rates that make them eventually into indentured slaves and finally outright property. This scheme is being presently imposed slowly onto the industrialized nations, and eventually the whole world. Note that as the end result, the land-owners (or knowledge owners in this new version of the idea) will be eventually more powerful than nations and will dictate all policy to them, instead of just some policy as it is now.

The natural consequence of such a system is that greedy land owners constantly war (usually by expending lives of the peons) between each other trying to expand their empires by consuming others. This is what you are seeing the companies (as proxies of their owners) doing now, trying to establish the boundaries of their holdings and in effect their feudal ranking in their rule over the future generations.

Sometimes however a new landmass is discovered and this is where outright thievery comes in: the "settlers" move in, usually murdering whomever happened to live there already and establish new branches of aristocracy, shamelessly announcing that "we stole it fair and square" or (for the more bothered by their conscience) "the land was unused!", etc. Soon after a free-for-all period hoever, the old rules reassert themselves and the progress towards de-facto feudal order resumes apace.

Note that most de-facto feudal societies are calling themselves anything but: People's Republics, Constitutional Democracies etc abound amongst them - after all the peons love to have their precious illusions.

The drive to enshrine "intellectual property" as actual property in human societies is a direct parallel to the formation of "landed gentry" of the old-fashioned, real dirt kind. That is why, for example, seemingly illogical steps are taken, such as the ever expanding durations of patents and copyrights that are in direct conflict with the "official" reasoning for both patent and copyright systems. Naturally the official version is one of those "War is Peace" things Orwell was so fond of, the real reason is establishment of a rent-seeking system on all human progress and the civilization as a whole, in which context endless extensions (up to infinity eventually) make perfect sense.

Re:Why They Are Paying Up...

[DinDaddy]

Not sure if I completely agree, but an interesting post.

Re:Why They Are Paying Up...

[mgiuca]

It's worse than that. VFAT (FAT with long file names) is not "obvious" in the sense that a "swipe to unlock" is obvious or a linked list. It's actually quite complicated and something that even an expert in the field wouldn't be able to come up with on their own. As Wikipedia explains, if you were to come up with all of this on your own, you would have to decide that you are going to repurpose directory entries, having N directory entries before the actual file's entry forming a linked list containing 13 characters of a file name, chained together in reverse order, encoded in UTF-16 and split up among bytes 1-A, E-19 and 1C-1F, with the remaining bytes forming a unique sequence number, the bytes 0F, 00, a checksum of the original filename, 00 and 00.

In other words, this isn't a broad patent on "all file systems allowing long file names" (which would be ridiculous, trivial and obvious). It is a specific patent on the above precise arrangement of bytes which is unlikely that an expert would come up with (because it's a batshit-crazy hack). The problem with this patent is not that it's broad: it's that it's a patent on a de facto standard. By controlling the operating system of every computer on the planet, Microsoft has total control over what file systems people use. By ensuring that their operating system supports ONLY file systems on which they have patents (VFAT and NTFS), Microsoft ensures that if anybody wants to write files in a manner that can be read by 99% of computers on the planet, you have to license this patent.

The patent is total horse shit in that it is not a "useful" invention for mankind at all. In any sane world, I wouldn't have any need to a file system that operates with the precise arrangement of bytes as I described above. Purely in order to make cameras, printers, USB sticks and phones that are compatible with the majority of the world's computers, I need to violate or license this patent. This is not an "invention", this is extortion.

Re:Why They Are Paying Up...

[IgnoramusMaximus]

While you do bring up another aspect of the insanity that is the patent system which involves patenting common standards, I would have to disagree here as to the argument of uniqueness.

A particular, unique sequence of bytes is no different here then a particular, unique sequence of mop swipes of that janitor I mentioned above. No two janitors will mop that floor in the exact same way. In fact they are pretty much guaranteed to do it with completely unique sequences of motions.

The fact that something is unique is not an automatic exception from the "obvious application of the art" rule.

The test is somewhat different: would a significant portion of experts in the field trained in the art come up with a functionally equivalent solution when asked? In case of VFAT the answer is not only a resounding "yes" but as an insult added to injury, Computer Science course students of the time were routinely asked to design file systems far exceeding the capabilities of VFAT as part their semester test material (I have first hand knowledge of this).

In order for something to be an invention worthy of the draconian provisions of the patent law, its originality must go well beyond the routine abilities of an expert in the field, never you mind a mere student's test sheet!

The fact that every student would have picked a different arrangement of bit-fields in his file system is completely irrelevant to this.

Re:Why They Are Paying Up...

[mgiuca]

Yeah okay, fair point. So it really shouldn't be a patent by any standards. But I still raise the additional point that the problem with FAT is not its usefulness, but the fact that it is a de facto standard and so it is impossible to get away from it, despite the fact that there are much better solutions that do not violate patents but we can't use them with Microsoft Windows.

Just one point about your students: yes they can design file systems that far exceed the VFAT capabilities. But what is important is if, given the old short filename FAT system, they are able to come up with a method for extending the file system to support long filenames with Unicode characters in a backwards-compatible way (that is what the patent covers, not merely the idea of long file names). I agree with you though -- I don't doubt that your students could come up with that extension.

Google Vs Microsoft

[JayHades]

Motorola/Google *NOT* signing anything and bringing this into court might be exactly what the whole Linux sphere needs to bring some light over the MS FUD surrounding their so-called infringment.

It's just like NewSCO (Linux has out code. We won't tell you which, but sign here and it's fine)

One needs to step up to it, to break it.
That's how it works I guess...

Re:Google Vs Microsoft

[Desler]

If this was all just FUD then HTC and Samsung would be fighting these in court rather than licensing them. Neither company backs down from patent fights.

Re:Google Vs Microsoft

[F.Ultra]

You do have to remember that both HTC and Samsung sells hardware that runs Windows Mobile OS so they might not think it wise to litigate with a partner that they depend upon!

Not until 2016

[tepples]

U.S. Patent 5,758,352, filed in September 1996, won't expire until the fourth quarter of 2016.

Non-admin users; how to load the driver

[tepples]

You can get ext2 file system drivers for Windows

Can a user who is not a member of the administrators group install such driver? And there appears to be a chicken-and-egg problem: how does one load such driver onto an Internet-disconnected PC without first inserting a memory card formatted in FAT or NTFS?

Re:Non-admin users; how to load the driver

[Gadget_Guy]

And there appears to be a chicken-and-egg problem: how does one load such driver onto an Internet-disconnected PC without first inserting a memory card formatted in FAT or NTFS?

FAT is fine. Just keep to 8.3 length filenames and you do not infringe on any patents.

Re:Non-admin users; how to load the driver

[tepples]

I've been told (I don't remember where) that FAT32 is also patented, whether or not long filenames are involved. Any volume bigger than 2 GiB that Windows can read and write is going to be either FAT32 or NTFS.

Re:Non-admin users; how to load the driver

[Gadget_Guy]

I've been told (I don't remember where) that FAT32 is also patented, whether or not long filenames are involved.

I think the patents just cover long filenames, but I could be wrong. However, the Windows driver to the read/write ext2 filesystem fits on a single floppy disk so it does not require FAT32. It could also fit on a CD-ROM, which also does not require any Microsoft patented technology.

Re:here are the patents in msft-moto suit

[Anonymous Coward]

Such fucking bullshit. Americans - we don't recognise your ownership of any of these concepts, you neo-mercantilist bastards.

What the article fails to mention

[DaScribbler]

What the article fails to mention is that Microsoft and Samsung came to a cross-licensing agreement. Microsoft isn't extorting Samsung like some replies above like to believe. In the deal, Microsoft is also licensing some patents from Samsung as well. It's just not made transparent.

Re:What the article fails to mention

[DinDaddy]

Maybe so, but the money in the deal is all going Samsung-->MS

Re:That isn't the patent MS have

[tepples]

I thought "turning the longer-than-8.3 filenames into 8.3 filenames for DOS programs" was VFAT. As I understand it, it's impossible to store a long filename on a FAT volume without also transforming it into a short filename.

Re:WTF?

[MobileTatsu-NJG]

Yeah it's all really bad... except when it's used against a company we don't like, then it's justified and we hope the patent litigation is successful.

Default

[phorm]

It's also the filesystem that comes by standard on most SD cards, USB drives, etc.

Most people would probably be fairly annoyed if they copied a bunch of pictures/music/whatever on to the card only to have it be reformatted in order to be used on the device...

Petition to end software patents in the US

[SgtChaireBourne]

Link to the petition to end software patents then. It's a small step but a step forward nevertheless.

Because they have patents on something it does

[Sycraft-fu]

More to the point: They have patents on something it does, and they are valid enough that the companies are willing to pay the asking price. It may be the the patents are quite valid, or it may be that they are on the fence, but the price is low enough. Sometimes it is worth it for companies to just pay.

Patents only last 20 years

[Greymoon]

Look for patent length to be changing soon by a congresscritter near you.

Or maybe he actually has beliefs and principles

[daboochmeister]

Or maybe you believe that the whole idea of having principles and a backbone is "short-sighted and quaint".

Carry a USB CD-ROM drive

[tepples]

However, the Windows driver to the read/write ext2 filesystem fits on a single floppy disk [...] It could also fit on a CD-ROM

So one would have to carry a USB CD-ROM drive in order to install the ext2 driver on any computer that one uses. Otherwise, you're just replacing the Microsoft patents with the U3 patents.

Re:Carry a USB CD-ROM drive

[Sun]

Huawei phones, when connected to a PC, show themselves as a CDROM containing the drivers for their sync technology. If you select to share your internal SD Card, then an ADDITIONAL DoK appears to the PC.

I believe they were not the first to do such a thing.

Shachar

Re:Carry a USB CD-ROM drive

[RMH101]

Um, so how would the drivers present themselves to a vanilla PC, if not via FAT?

Re:Carry a USB CD-ROM drive

[bWareiWare.co.uk]

FAT isn't patented vFAT is (long file names).
CD-ROMs (and these phones) use ISO9660 a completely unrelated and unpattented file-system that Windows also supports (all be it read only in early versions).

Re:Carry a USB CD-ROM drive

[Sun]

CDROMs are formatted in a filesystem called ISO-9660, which is not FAT. There are extensions to this format (Juliet, RockRidge), and these, too, are not FAT.

Shachar

why does Android use FAT anyway?

[radarsat1]

Is Android really using FAT?

The only reason I can think of to use FAT on a device is because you'll sooner or later need to put the SD card into a Windows computer and it won't be able to access it. This makes some sense for SD cards and USB sticks, but Android devices are so good at using Wifi for file transfer (ftp apps, dropbox, http, email, many many options..)

I can hardly imagine really _needing_ to take the SD card out of my tablet and physically inserting it into my desktop computer. So why not just say that this is not a supported action, drop FAT, and use another file system by default?

Re:why does Android use FAT anyway?

[tycoex]

Because a lot of people are stupid and won't understand why their "sd card is broken" when they plug it into their windows laptops.

Re:Algorithms aren't patentable

[sourcerror]

Say hello to H.264.

Re:Bunch of whiny fanboys in this thread

[MightyMartian]

Actually, you'd be wrong. Most of the posters that I saw around here when i4i was going after Microsoft over that frivolous lawsuit were defending Microsoft (mainly because it goes beyond idiotic to patent what amounts to metadata in XML).

that patent has already been ignored for a long ti

[poetmatt]

what are you talking about? that patent has been effectively nullified. http://lwn.net/Articles/338981/

lwn.net/Articles/338981/

[tepples]

Very interesting. Was (and when was) a patch to implement this behavior added to Linux?

Re:Extortion - All your code are belong to us

[andydread]

Do you know what the patents are? How exactly are you qualified to call this extortion if you have no insight as to the facts of the situation?

What it is? Its a systematic campaign against open source code and free software in general and Linux in particular. What Microsoft is doing is using using software-patents to bludgeon open source and Linux. They have threatened for years now that if they find themselves losing in the marketplace they will sue successful open source projects out of the marketplace and the way to do so is with software-patents. And this is what they are doing.

I think what the OP is saying is that the tactics MS are using are akin to mobster-like tactics.

Microsoft approaches open source company:-
Microsoft: "What a nice open source business you have here buy you know the marketplace is a dangerous neighborhood."
Microsoft: "You should pay us for protection."
Store Owner: "Protection? from who?"
Microsoft: "Well...From us mainly, If you don't pay us for protection you will face our massive legal department and endless lawyer fees."
Microsoft: "Oh and sign this NDA you cannot discuss the details with anyone get it."

The difference between Microsoft's tactics here and those of a Mobster is mobsters threaten to shut you down with violence.
Microsoft threatens to do that by driving you bankrupt in court.

The end result is the same.

What Microsoft is doing is running a campaign to own other people's code through software-patents. Even if your code is totally different from them you still have to pay them for protection. This is the future. look for Microsoft and Apple to continue this trend. Where will it end up? Could this lead to the patenting of full applications? I wish i knew the answer to that. They are already filing software-patents on features of applications so I guess its not out of the question.

Re:WTF?

[toriver]

When was this then?
- MS DOS: Bought from a Seattle company
- Windows: Largely based on stuff they learned from OSF and Apple.
- Mobile devices: Did they make any before the Zune?

Re:WTF?

[F.Ultra]

Yeah because MS was making a shitload of software and hardware back in the 60:s when Samsung ventured into the electronics market... Or would the foundation of Microsoft full 15 years later in 1975 do something with that idea of yours?

ActiveSync

[kris2112]

Apple licensed ActiveSync from Microsoft to allow iOS and Mac OS X to communicate with Exchange Server.

I'm betting that wasn't free.

Moto/Google

[nurb432]

Not that i am approving of all these patent lawsuits, i hope that Google finds a small nugget of gold and teaches Microsoft a lesson and pounds them with it until they bleed. Motorola was around long before bill gates was even born and should have a portfolio to trump anyone in the communications business.