07.09.08
Posted in Microsoft, Novell, Mono, Australia at 6:41 am by Roy Schestowitz
Good bye, and don’t let the door smack you in the face
Novell’s top management seems not to be in a very stable state. This is just the latest example and it all happened very quietly. A belated inquiry seems to have revealed this weeks after it had actually happened.
NOVELL Asia-Pacific president Maarten Koster has relocated from Singapore to Sydney to oversee local operations after Australian manager Rob Mills resigned a few weeks ago.
Novell has had difficulty retaining senior executives.
How many more such departures complete escape the media’s radar?
No reason was publicly specified. Each time such a leader walks away, the replacement is sure to be Microsoft-sympathetic. It’s part of the job, it’s a requirement. Novell’s strategy now revolves around turning Free Software into Fee Software.
Reappointments are likely to reshape the corporate fabric of Novell, which is the next Corel in the sense that it becomes a Microsoft company shortly after it strays to GNU/Linux (soon to be offered a fat check from Microsoft to defect). Just look at the activities at Novell nowadays.
Last year Novell said that it was hiring .NET developers, amid times when there are just layoffs and offshoring.
Microsoft’s Linux subsidiary, Novell, is also trying to ensure .NET and Silverlight catch on. From the news:
Silverlight, Novell And Open Source
Even though the Silverlight community is still quite small and the examples produced by Microsoft developers are sparse, there’s a sense that Silverlight can win over designers and corporate .Net developers, more so than Adobe’s Flex has been able to do.
Novell is even extending the technology with Moonlight to run on Linux. Moonlight is Novell’s take on Silverlight for Linux technologies. With the help of Mono, a Novell tool, developers can run Silverlight applications on Linux.
Whenever Microsoft does not want to offer support for GNU/Linux (required to make some technology a de facto standard), it can approach Novell and use Novell’s resources to make something half-baked. Remember: it has to be half-baked in order for GNU/Linux to be perceived as unready for the enterprise. Novell then does Microsoft’s job, by proxy. It empowers Microsoft. █
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05.21.08
Posted in Formats, Microsoft, Standard, OpenDocument, Europe, Interoperability, Open XML, Ecma, OpenOffice, ISO, Australia at 12:50 am by Roy Schestowitz
BECTA’s Complaint About OOXML Returned on Monday
BECTA’s complaints have not ceased yet [1, 2]. Monday saw another wave of coverage. Here are some of the latest articles, which are pretty handy because they show a long-time Microsoft ‘alliance’ and its growing pains. An obedient client of Microsoft, BECTA, mops the floor with this attempt to go too far with lock-in. Microsoft believes that if it builds it (OOXML), they will come. “They” as in customers? Or as in anti-trust regulators?
The British Educational Communications and Technology Agency (Becta) said Monday that it has filed a complaint with the European Commission against Microsoft, alleging that its new Office 2007 file format will impede educational initiatives because it does not natively support open standards.
Here is another article where Marino’s comments are quoted:
In response to last week’s action by Becta, the ODF Alliance’s managing director, Marino Marcich, released the following statement today: “That a major government agency, in this case the UK Government’s lead agency for information and communications technology (ICT) in education, felt compelled to take such an action demonstrates that the wider marketplace, which includes educational and training organizations, libraries and archival institutions, will be adversely impacted by OOXML’s impediments to interoperability. We have repeatedly urged Microsoft to provide native, built-in support for the truly open ODF document standard, as [Becta] has suggested.”
You Don’t {”Get What You Paid For”}™
You get a lot more.
If you think that you always get what you pay for, the just-released beta of OpenOffice 3.0 should convince you otherwise. This free, open-source software suite provides most of what anyone could want in an office suite, including a word processor, spreadsheet, presentation program, database, drawing tools, and math equation editor.
Then again, doesn’t Microsoft try to force OpenOffice 3.0 to implement the ‘unimplementable’, essentially tossing thousands of pages of bug-ridden specifications that nobody will ever comply with, not even Microsoft itself? Rest assured, it’s a goalpost-moving routine that is nothing short of technical sabotage of competitors’ products. Microsoft wants it both way: get praised for ‘openness’ while at the same time stifling interoperability.
A Missed Opportunity
In this new article from Australia it is said that an opportunity was missed when Australia chose to stay neutral. The claim was made by by a Red Hat representative.
Australia was one of 41 countries that participated in decision to replace the previous standard, OpenDocument Format (ODF), with OOXML (Open Office XML) which is developed and promoted by Microsoft.
Denmark, Germany, Japan and Singapore were among 24 countries that voted in favour of Microsoft’s format. Eight countries, including China and New Zealand disapproved, while nine countries, including Australia, chose to abstain from voting.
“I was very disappointed that Australia did not vote,” Feldmann said. “Your New Zealand cousins did, and they said no.”
“You really missed an opportunity there,” he said.
For more information about OOXML and Australia, consider reading:
Under normal circumstances, Australia would have probably voted “No”. Every country would. In reality, however, it was more of a Puppet Show®.
Relying on Ignorance, Apathy, Specifications Scale
OOXML is still very broken, sometimes by design. We last wrote about Excel/OOXML issues a couple of days ago. Here is a technical analysis.
In theory, the OOXML (OXML) specification is supposed to define what Excel 2007 reads and writes. In practice, it’s not true at all; the latest public drafts of OOXML are unable to represent many actual Excel 2007 files.
Won’t people realise this at some stage? Will people understand that they get betrayed by the spreadsheets that they use are forced to use? █
“Let’s face it - the average computer user has the brain of a Spider Monkey.”
–Bill Gates
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05.10.08
Posted in Microsoft, Windows, GNU/Linux, Deception, Australia, xandros, Linspire at 12:54 am by Roy Schestowitz
What’s with eWeek’s infatuation with the Windows-esque, Microsoft-tied distributions?
A certain pattern has become a bit difficult to ignore. It would be easy to just let it pass or make a quick observation (as we did several times before), but this has gone on for too long and it cannot be a coincidence.
Linspire
Let’s be a little more specific here and go by the past week’s examples alone. Here is a non-event announcement that CNR supports a simple derivative of Ubuntu, which contains some more binaries.
Linspire announced the support for the Linux Mint operating system. To gain access to the free CNR Service, Linux Mint 4.0 users simply install the free CNR Client that is available at CNR.com.
Additionally, here you have yet another incognito application that is included in CNR. There is a huge number of them already, so it’s hardly worth crowing about.
Linspire, Inc. developer of CNR.com, an easy-to-use, one-click digital software delivery service for desktop Linux software, and WeatherBug(R), the leading provider of live, local weather information and severe weather alerts, today announced the immediate availability of WeatherBug for Freespire 2.0, Linspire 6.0, Linux Mint 4.0, Ubuntu 7.04, 7.10 and 8.04 (32 bit) users and will soon expand to additional popular desktop Linux distributions.
As usual, the only Web site that pays attention to these non-announcements (press releases) from Linspire is DesktopLinux (eWeek), which makes one wonder about the relationships there. Is eWeek paid to publish these? Are the editors in good touch with some executives in Linux companies/distributors? The same goes for Xandros, but we’ll come to that in a moment. It’s only eWeek that always pays attention, this time with the following article.
Linspire has upgraded its CNR.com (Click’N'Run) download site for Linux software to support the Ubuntu-based, consumer-friendly Linux Mint distribution. CNR.com will also add a Linux version of Weatherbug’s weather service, which offers live, local weather information and severe weather alerts.
Another noteworthy bit: Matt Hartley (of MadPanguin, OSWeekly, and Datamation) flirts for a bit with Carmony. It was the same with Xandros at one time. It’s just something to bear in mind.
While Carmony is out and about after ruining Linspire, the boss of the company, Michael Robertson, is giving public talks.
10:20 - 10:50 Keynote - Michael Robertson, Founder, Linspire, MP3tunes, SIPphone, and REEF What does it take to transform a vision into a business?
Xandros
Linspire is one case of a company that gets eWeek’s love while getting virtually ignored by the rest. Linspire is not alone, however, for Xandros is pretty much the same. Once again, DesktopLinux does some legwork for Xandros:
Packt Publishing has published a book about administrating Scalix, an open source email and calendaring software package.
Needless to say, this is a very promotional item. It’s hardly even news. Also about Scalix (now under the wing of Xandros), consider this new article
She founded Scalix Corp., a maker of open source corporate e-mail software, in Palo Alto, Calif., in June 2002. Open source software is available to everyone for use free of charge for modifying.
“One of the areas where open source has thrived and grown the most is in academic environments and research. It’s a way for researchers to share knowledge and collaborate with others,” she said.
For UAB researchers, she said, open source generates that potential - a way of connecting with people doing that same research in other parts of the world.
Yesterday we wrote about the Eee PC kerkuffle in Australia. Based on the latest investigative reporting by iTWire it doesn’t look too encouraging. People begin to point fingers at Xandros and Microsoft whilst Asustek fails to deliver a convincing explanation for price anomalies. Have a look:
$50 more for Linux Eee PC 900 – what gives Asus?
[…]
Well what can one say except that this is simply outrageous behavior on the part of Asustek Australia. Treating Australian consumers like dummies in a global marketplace is no way to win friends. In fact as some of our posters have pointed out it’s a good way to lose customers. No one likes to feel as though they’re getting ripped off. Bad form Asustek, and just when everyone here were at the height of singing your praises.
Is this the future? Is so, then the following new push will hopefully fail before it starts.
Xandros expands mobile device push
[…]
The move is an indication of the growing popularity of Linux on portable devices, the two companies said.
More on this announcement here.
Viyya Technologies, Inc. (PINKSHEETS: VYON), the developer and marketer of the world’s most advanced, web-based internet content management application, announced planning for the delivery phase of its agreement with Xandros, in the EeePC NetBook market.
[…]
The EeePC designed and marketed by ASUS, is a 7″, .92kg miniaturized wireless notebook computer (NetBook) that appears to have revolutionized the “laptop” world. The EeePC was voted the “Product of the Year” in February at CeBIT in Germany and has won over 616 awards in 2008. The first 10,000 shipped to the U.S. were sold out immediately and independent analysts predict over 50 million units to be in circulation by 2011.
Viyya ought to run away from Xandros as soon as possible. It’s not a GNU/Linux distribution. It’s Xandros. It’s Ballnux. It’s neither free nor Free (gratis or libre) and it’s controlled by Microsoft, by proxy. █
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05.04.08
Posted in Microsoft, DRM, FUD, Patents, Standard, Europe, FOSS, Australia at 3:35 am by Roy Schestowitz
“Lobbying” a gentle propaganda term for legalised bribery
The numerous problems associated with the role of money in writing laws was brought up in here before. The lobbying business has mushroomed to become a multi-billion-dollar industry in the United States alone. Yes, that’s an industry whose only role is akin to a middleman serving corporate agenda, typically against the interest of citizens whose activists (benign equivalent of lobbyists) are honest volunteers.
It was both surprising and encouraging to find that there will finally be some sort of a crackdown on lobbying in the United Kingdom.
The Department of Business Enterprise and Regulatory Reform (BERR) has lost an appeal to keep secret its meetings with business lobbying group the Confederation of British Industry.
The case has dragged on for three years and originally concerned secret meetings between the CBI and BERR, which was formerly known as the Department of Trade and Industry.
[…]
The victory is a big filip for the wider movement, led by the Alliance for Lobbying Transparency, to force the UK government to introduce more transparency into its dealings with lobbying groups. ALT is calling for compulsory registration of lobby groups and a record of their meetings with politicians and civil servants.
Might we actually enter an age when laws are written for a purpose rather than for a company? Might laws actually serve the nation rather than those funding those who run it (corporations, not taxpayers)? There’s a glimmer or hope. To be fair, the United States government tried to save face by claiming to have done the same thing, but other than astonishing disclosures, which result from new and compulsory disclosure rules, not much appears to be done to curb the phenomenon. Recognition of a problem through transparency does not practically resolve it.
“Diplomacy typically trumps logic.”As we have witnessed over the past few months, similar games are being played inside standards bodies, not just in politics of law-making. Diplomacy typically trumps logic. Another important aspect that’s affected is patent laws, which can be used to ban Free software if politicians are corrupted sufficiently. It’s not just DMCA laws that are being spread by media companies and software companies to whom Free software is a threat; it’s also laws pertaining or directly applying to patents.
Whatever the implication of this might be, Australia has just facilitated easier access to patents by the broad public. Is more visibility a solution really?
The Federal government and patent agency IP Australia have launched a new open, online database featuring almost 20 years’ worth of the country’s patent application records, in a bid to make it easier for inventors to check if someone else has already had their light bulb moment.
What would be nice to have, theoretically at least, is a detector of patent collisions in computer programs. Why? Because it would soon reveal that programmers — not just in this large ‘niche’ that is Free software — are supposedly a nation of infringers in a handful of countries (the phrase “nation of in infringers” was famously used to illustrate just how out-of-hand and insane copyright law had become in the United States). Software patents do not make economic or scientific sense, yet Australia fell right into this deep trap. The same goes for DMCA, which Microsoft is still trying to force if not just push [5.a] onto Canada [5.b-g] (see references below).
For those interested in other funny new laws from Australia, here are some fairly recent articles (all from Australia). Watch how laws against “terrorist”, for example, evolve to become laws for political censorship, among other things (introduce & extend). The references below Labeled and numbered only for referencing purposes.
Introduce Stage
[1.a] Conroy announces mandatory internet filters to protect children
“Labor makes no apologies to those that argue that any regulation of the internet is like going down the Chinese road,” he said.
[1.b] Feds tout malware as Australia’s biggest cyber threat
This change in landscape has seen cyber crime rise to a podium place in the competition for the most significant criminal threat facing the nation.
[1.c] Australia to get net censorship
The Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) will be able to force content providers to take down offensive material and issue notices for live content to be stopped and links to the content deleted.
Extend Stage
[2.a] Australia to extend web censorship
Privacy advocates take a dim view of this proposal, naturally. Roger Clarke, chair of the Australian Privacy Foundation, said “This government’s extremism has reached new heights today.” He asked “How can a politician claim the right to hold office if they set out to undermine the critical democratic right of freedom of speech, and blatantly decline to evaluate the impact of measures put before the Parliament?”
[2.b] Web ‘censorship’ bill brings police state one stop closer
Electronic Frontiers Australia (EFA) has slammed moves to give the Federal Police powers to ban access to certain Internet content as “another step in Australia’s descent into a police state”.
[2.c] Howard row over Wikipedia edits
Staff in the Australian prime minister’s department have been accused of editing potentially damaging entries in online encyclopaedia Wikipedia.
[2.d] Australia’s porn-blocking plan unveiled
While individual filters will be available beginning later this month, ISP-level blocking may take some time to implement. The Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) is currently planning a trial of ISP-level filtering in Tasmania that will inform the government’s decision on a national launch.
[2.e] Australia becoming a totalitarian state with email snooping to become the norm?
Federal Attorney-General Robert McClelland wants to let employers snoop on employees emails – without the consent of workers – as an anti-terrorism measure. Where do we draw the line on privacy?
[2.f] NSW police to search computer networks
The New South Wales Cabinet has approved new powers for police designed to help them track terrorist threats, fraudsters and paedophiles through computer networks.
[2.g] Major Aussie ISP Telstra BigPond shafts open source OpenOffice
Australia’s largest Internet service provider Telstra BigPond has removed the free open source office suite OpenOffice from its unmetered file download area following the launch of its own, free, hosted, office application, BigPond Office.
[…]
Our reader was outraged by Telstra’s move, which he sees as an attack on the open source software movement.
“The principle of the matter upsets me,” he said. “The fact that BigPond has removed previously allowed open source software is un-ethical. They are discriminating against me, even though I pay the same as other customers. They are attacking the Free Software movement.”
Moving on to a more on-topic example, watch how laws are used to suppress Free software procurement.
A Reality
[3.a] Is Open Source adoption set to mushroom in Australia?
Optimism and take-up is growing around the platform-independent code with the industry taking more notice of this fast growing area
[3.b] Open source increases its share
BUSINESS generated directly from open source software in Australia is worth about $300 million a year, with government a large contributor to the pie, a study shows.
[3.c] Australian open source industry worth $500 million
“The industry as a whole is earning $500 million,” said Jeff Waugh, co-founder of Waugh Partners, which conducted the survey online late last year. “Directly open source related earnings are about $300 million, but the reason why we’re distinguishing between these numbers is the industry is not just companies that build open source software. They also use open source products to support other parts of their business as well.”
Waugh said the figure was calculated by taking the midpoint earnings figures specified by companies who took part, and extrapolating over the broader ICT industry using existing data such as surveys by the Australian Bureau of Statistics and Australian Computer Society. Waugh Partners estimates the respondents represent about a quarter of the overall industry.
[3.d] Open Source programmers earn more and combat trade deficit
The findings from the fourth-quarter 2007 Open Source Industry and Community survey is out. The authors say the results show open source is effective in combating trade deficit and that IT professionals involved in open source earn more than their more proprietary colleagues. Let’s check it out.
[3.e] Local Government Urged to Consider Open Source
The senior IT officer from a West Australian shire says open source software can provide a way forward for councils suffering budgetary constraints.
The Anti-FOSS Policies and Laws
[4.a] Open source the biggest potential game changer for government: Senator Lundy
Senator Lundy, a former Shadow Minister for IT, said she’d elected to focus on open source as the biggest potential game changer across the portfolios she’s involved in.
[…]
“The key issue that needs to be solved is independent invention. IP doesn’t cope with the commonly occurring ‘idea whose time has come’ - the patent system considers that a crime,” Tridgell said.
[4.b] Governments slammed for anti-competitive software tendering practices
A leading Australian open source advocate has called for an end for to tender lock-outs of competitors to Microsoft, claiming the practice is costing Australian taxpayers tens of millions of dollars each year.
[4.c] Feds revise IT procurement model
The federal government has launched version two of the SourceIT model contracts and user notes aimed at simplifying procurement of information technology 12 months after the first version.
[4.d] Ignore the open source hot heads, CIOs told
Some of the public responses to the article labelled Gibson a “bureaucratic parasite” and his concerns “short-sighted”.
While Waugh believes the open source model holds better security outcomes than its proprietary equivalent, he equally describes the vitriolic reaction to Gibson’s comments as being ‘disgraceful’ and says they achieve nothing for the industry.
[…]
“I can tell you that at the very highest levels of government, there is interest and opportunities that exist for open source,” Waugh said. “This doesn’t help.” Waugh was also disheartened when personal attacks were levelled at Standards Australia’s Alistair Tegart over Microsoft’s push to have its OOXML format accepted as an ISO standard.
[4.e] Govt ‘computer bungle cost $51m
THE State Government has bungled a deal and bought computer software for 12,000 computers in the Health Department that do not need it – costing taxpayers more than $50 million over five years, Parliament has heard.
[…]
Opposition Leader Martin Hamilton-Smith yesterday said the computer “blunder” saw thousands of Health Department computers loaded up with $675 versions of Microsoft Office software, which the computers did not use or need. Just 4000 of the 16,000 computers actually used the software, Mr Hamilton-Smith told Parliament.
DMCA Laws
[5.a] Microsoft Misleads on Copyright Reform
The Hill Times this week includes an astonishingly misleading and factually incorrect article on Canadian copyright written by Microsoft.
[5.b] Movie, music giants seek a Canadian DMCA
The Canadian copyright reform debate raged on during a panel discussion on intellectual property rights Wednesday, and while members of the recording, film, and Parliament argued in support for controversial legislation, at least one industry expert said they are failing to listen to the Canadian public.
[5.c] Canadian DMCA On Hold?
Rumours tonight indicate that the government has again decided to delay introducing the Canadian DMCA. With the House of Commons off next week and the budget coming the following week, if this is true it would appear that there will be no copyright legislation for at least another month (assuming there is no election).
[5.d] CD copying OK, DRM circumvention not OK
Circumventing DRM to make copies for personal use will remain illegal for consumers, under copyright reform proposals floated by the UK government today….Copyright law should also recognise that consumers can legitimately make copies of copyright material they’ve already bought, the government proposes.
Speaking at the launch today, Lord Triesman said it made no sense to prevent someone making a playlist for use in the car from material they had legitimately purchased.
[5.e] Microsoft: We Like DRM
Steve Jobs wants the music business to drop restrictions for digital tunes. But Microsoft, which began competing head to head with Apple in the digital music business last fall, is happy with the way things are, says media exec Robbie Bach.
[5.f] Microsoft Tells Apple To Stop Complaining About DRM
[5.g] DRM – a big win for Microsoft
Recently I came to conclusion that Microsoft is the company, which profits most from the Digital Rights Management.
I don’t know the numbers, but I guess that DRM is little or no success for the recording industry. To say it stopped pirating films and music would be a joke.
Microsoft people must have known that the protection would be broken very soon. So why they are implementing it after all?
Companies that love to change laws using money have used their money to change laws and legalise the practice used to change laws using money. It’s called lobbying. A little funny, is it not? Welcome to Planet Earth, the place where your basic rights will be taken away from you unless you protect them. █
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04.07.08
Posted in Novell, Samba, Patents, Europe, America, Australia at 3:52 am by Roy Schestowitz
The subject of Free software is closely related to the subject of software patents, which are a great threat to it. In order to illustrate just what sort of mess Novell has committed itself to, we continue to present some examples of the system’s failure and beneath lie some of the very latest.
Business Methods and… Marriage Methods Patents?!?!
This one is really spooky. It’s titled “Method and instrument for proposing marriage to an individual” [via Groklaw] and it had me check the Web browser’s address bar because it’s almost too bizarre to be true (none yet beats “Method of swinging on a swing” though). Alas, it turns out that this one is no forgery and it is actually filed in the USPTO. Here is the abstract:
The purpose of this invention is to provide an improved method of proposing marriage to an individual. The method of proposing to an individual generally comprising the steps of meeting the individual; exchanging names with the individual; dating the individual (not necessary); drafting a government document having a proposal to marry the individual incorporated therein; and showing the government document to the individual. The government document may be a patent application. The patent application may claim the method by which the proposor will make a marriage proposal to the individual. The proposor could then use the method claimed in the patent application to propose to the individual. The patent application could be the actual marriage proposal.
Be careful. And be very afraid of the ‘marriage police’ (see the recent CeBit incident). They could storm into the restaurant and confiscate your golden ring if you ‘dare’ to propose without paying for a licence. Sarcasm aside, business methods in Australia and Europe are not an impossibility either. Digital Majority has just found this paper. From the abstract:
This paper reviews the availability of business method patents in Australia in light of the 2006 decision of the Full Court of the Federal Court in Grant v Commissioner of Patents,5 which confirmed the need in Australia for a ‘useful product’ to issue from the working of a method (business or otherwise) in order for the method to be patentable.
It hardly gets as bad as business and tax patents (how about patents that kill?), but fortunately there might be some reversals in the United States.
Australia Receives Lesson in Software Patents
Tridgell, of Samba fame, has served some ministers justice down there in Australia where decision makers gathered to discuss Free software. Here is a quote-worthy bit from a much larger article.
“The key issue that needs to be solved is independent invention. IP doesn’t cope with the commonly occurring ‘idea whose time has come’ - the patent system considers that a crime,” Tridgell said.
There is a similar situation down in South Africa (down as in “southern hemisphere”, just to be clear). It will be presented in the next post.
Bilski Case Revisited
A reader sent us a headsup with the following press release, adding: “Bilski is a case that is being closely watched by the Patent Bar.”
> http://www.aclu.org/freespeech/gen/34784prs20080404.html
> http://www.aclu.org/pdfs/freespeech/in_re_bilski_aclu_amicus.pdf [PDF]
—
ACLU Introduces First Amendment Argument In Key Patent Law Case
(4/4/2008)
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CONTACT: (212)549-2666; media@aclu.org
Patenting Abstract Ideas Violates The Constitution, Group Says
WASHINGTON - Introducing a rare argument applying the First Amendment
to patent law, the American Civil Liberties Union filed a friend of
the court brief today urging a federal court to uphold the denial of a
patent that would, if awarded, violate freedom of speech. In the
brief, the ACLU argues that Bernard L. Bilski is seeking a patent for
an abstract idea, and that abstract ideas are not patentable under the
First Amendment.
“The court must ensure that any test it uses in determining whether to
award a patent is in line with the Constitution,” said Christopher
Hansen, senior staff attorney with the ACLU First Amendment Working
Group, who filed the brief. “If the government had the authority to
grant exclusive rights to an idea, the fundamental purpose of the
First Amendment - to protect an individual’s right to thought and
expression - would be rendered meaningless.”
In 2006, Bilski sought a patent for his idea that the weather risk
involved in buying and selling commodities could be minimized if
sellers had conversations with two buyers instead of one. The U.S.
Patent and Trademark Office denied his request and the Board of Patent
Appeals and Interferences affirmed the denial. Bilski appealed that
decision to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, and the
court has agreed to hear the case in a single joint session in May.
“Patent law prohibits the patenting of abstract ideas, but recently
the courts and the patent office have been granting patents that
consist essentially of speech or thought,” said Hansen. “If the
government continues to allow patents of speech or thought it risks
violating the First Amendment. No one can have a monopoly on an idea
or prohibit speech on a particular subject.”
The ACLU’s brief is available online here:
www.aclu.org/freespeech/gen/34783lgl20080403.html
Pay-to-think schemes, eh? Where does one pay the toll? █
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04.01.08
Posted in Formats, Microsoft, Standard, Europe, Open XML, ISO, Australia at 7:27 am by Roy Schestowitz
Does ISO teach our children that crime pays?
First off, before proceeding to the latest batch of irregularities, you may wish to know that ISO’s announcement has been leaked prematurely (well, obviously) and unsurprisingly it revealed that ISO had become a lot less relevant, whereas Microsoft can give the illusion that technical qualities — not crime — granted it a standard.
ISO is furthermore an irrelevance in technology standardisation.
It is a sad day for standards as a whole. Moving on to stories which are yet to be discussed, maybe even reverse the decision or put it in great doubt afterwards, here are new bits about the story from Norway.
OpenDocument and OOXMLOne of the things that most of us learn at our mother’s knee is that you shouldn’t rush things. If you do, you’ll make silly mistakes. Mothers also tend to tell their children to play by the rules, but some apparently listen better than others to that advice as well.
The wisdom of the first truism was demonstrated most clearly during the Ballot Resolution Meeting in Geneva, although its effects had been evident throughout the entire Fast Track process. In the latest evidence of the other truism, the first formal protest has been filed with ISO over a National Body vote. The National Body in question is Norway, and the protest has been filed by…(wait for it)…Norway itself.
How can all of this be true in a country like Norway? Elections this flawed usually only occur in Florida.
For more information about Norway see:
Someone can hopefully use whatever information is available in pursuit of justice. Australia’s process is described as one resulting in “controversy” over at the Australian press.
CONTROVERSY over the proposed Office Open XML standard forced Standards Australia to abstain as international balloting concluded overnight.
As we wrote yesterday, the process had been stalled. Some say it’s because April 1st is an inappropriate date for such an announcement to be taken seriously. It also makes a dark day for everyone but Microsoft and its partners. The significance of this to Microsoft was explained earlier and here is another take on the subject.
If Microsoft gets its technology approved, it will be a blow to internet connectivity and issues of data ownership. They already refuse to comply with web standards for their Internet Explorer browser and make using their operating systems next to impossible, especially the newest version of Windows, Vista. To assume they’d remain compliant with ISO regulations once approved is ludicrous, this is, after all, Microsoft we are talking about.
The story isn’t over yet. The next post deals with H-P’s latest shilling for Microsoft — a recurrence of unfortunate past events. █
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03.31.08
Posted in Microsoft, GNU/Linux, Humor, Novell, Mono, Australia at 8:59 pm by Roy Schestowitz
What would be a better day for an opportunity to say the truth about Mono in the press, under the moral shield that it the day of the Fools? Sam Varghese takes advantage and it’s a recommended read.
Mr de Icaza told those assembled that he had always had a dual purpose in starting the project - to provide an implementation of Microsoft’s .NET development framework so that Linux developers could enjoy the wonderful programming tools built in Redmond and also to ensure that in future Linux became so integrated with Microsoft that it would not be possible to pull the two apart.
The rest of the article is fictional and satirical, but the above is true.
Mind the date before getting confused. Interestingly enough, iTWire removed the article “SUMDAM award for GNOME media spokesman” (article pulled now). Obviously, going ad hominem against Jeff Waugh was not tactful, not even on a day to amuse (as opposed to abuse). █
Image contributed by Beranger
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Posted in Microsoft, Deception, Standard, Europe, America, Asia, Courtroom, Antitrust, Fraud, ISO, Australia at 8:30 pm by Roy Schestowitz
Dysfunctional ISO, courtesy of Microsoft and abuse
Two days ago we mentioned Bill Beebe’s list of Microsoft abuses, which go as far back as 15 years ago. Here are some portions from a good long post which takes a careful look at some of Microsoft’s most recent abuses.
Attacking Non-Profits Seeking to Help Children in Poor Countries
Professor Negroponte wants to make the world a better place. His vision? An affordable laptop in the hands of every child. He founded a non-profit group and created the XO, an amazing machine targeted specifically at children living in poor countries, with features such as mesh networking to easily connect and share info, a screen viewable outdoors, tiny power consumption and a battery rechargeable through a solar panel.
Microsoft earlier labeled this a toy and attempted to mock it, but in 2007 as the XO began to become a reality the real attack began.
[…]
Microsoft Threatens Linux with Patent Claims
Microsoft loves to sling mud on others and then refuse to say where the mud came from. In 2007, Microsoft claimed Linux violates 235 of its patents. They, of course, refused to provide any specificity to the claim, for if it is true Microsoft is not interested in allowing Linux to work around the patents.
[…]
ISO AND MSOOXML
Perhaps the worst story about Microsoft in 2007 is its unrelenting assault on ISO, the International Standards Organization.
[…]
Here is a quick list of some of the “Irregularities” uncovered so far:
Brazil, Colombia, Denmark, Egypt, Italy, Kenya, Mexico, Nigeria, Norway, Switzerland, USA: Committee Stuffing
Finland: chairman fired
Hungary: rule bending (deadlines and majority rules bent to favor MS)
India: astroturfing
Malaysia: voted no, but overridden by government anyways and changed to yes
Netherlands: voted no, but was overridden by Microsoft
Pakistan, Sweden: members bought
Poland: voted no, taken and given to another committee who rubber stamped it
Germany, Russia: irregularity
Spain: Microsoft spreads misinformation
Ukraine, Venezuela: discrimination
That’s just the tip of the iceberg really, but seeing it all in one place certainly lends credibility to arguments about sheer abuse.
Regarding OOXML, the WTO and EC might be on their way, so any announcements about an OOXML ‘win’ can be taken with a grain of salt and require some patience. Regardless of the outcome and sadly enough, ISO possibly won’t recover and that in itself is a win for Microsoft. The company never cared about industry standards anyway, by its very own admission.
The latest report from Groklaw speaks about a delay, which is most likely tied to protests and ongoing investigations of ‘irregularities’ (too gentle a word).
ISO now says they will tell us the results Wednesday, not today after all. I suspect there may be a connection. And Microsoft says it won’t say anything until Wednesday either, “out of respect for the standards process.” Hahahahaha. Priceless.
There are other articles in the press which speak about the abuses. Take this one from ZDNet for example.
Details emerge of ’shocking’ OOXML meeting
[…]
In the run-up to the dealine, some national standards bodies have changed their stance. Denmark has made a last-minute switch to approve Office Open XML (OOXML), while the British Standards Institution (BSI) has been advised by a technical committee to change its vote to “yes”. The BSI today refused to say whether it will follow that advice, promising a statement on Monday; the vast majority of standards bodies will keep silent until after the deadline passes.
The silence around last month’s controversial ballot resolution meeting has been broken, however, with details supplied by a Brazilian delegate providing a “shocking tale”, according to IT law site Groklaw’s detailed post. The site links to the original meeting notes, and also suggests that South Korea’s vote has changed from “no” to “yes”.
Yesterday we wrote about the Singapore story and there is some more information about it here, along with higher-resolution scans of documents and letters. It’s handy to have all of this for future reference and for probes.
Some people are not very good at distinguishing Carbon Copy and Blind Carbon Copy. Hopefully, Carbon Copy helps when Microsoft Singapore asks to send letters of support of OOXML to the national Standards Body.
In LinuxJournal, Glyn Moody explains why this whole pursuit may actually cost Microsoft more than it will earn. It remains to be seen how Microsoft uses its media to rewrite history and approach ‘the masses’. In circles close to decision-making, the real (yet incomplete) story will be told though, based on the leaks.
Writing to MEPs (if you’re European) or to Neelie Kroes, the European Commissioner for Competition, (if you’re not) is one obvious action we can all take to press for an independent, transparent inquiry into possible irregularities during the OOXML voting process in Europe. But I think there’s something just as important that we need to start doing immediately.
It is striking that some parts of Microsoft have been making soothing noises to the open source world, speaking of their desire to work alongside free software projects and to ensure “interoperability” - a favourite concept at the moment - between the open and closed worlds. Those voices have become increasingly seductive to some, especially in the open source business world, who would rather work with than against the Seattle behemoth, and who seem to believe that Microsoft is genuine in its offers. But if the whole sorry OOXML saga shows anything, it is Microsoft’s deep and utter contempt for the whole idea of an open, collaborative process based on mutual respect and consensus. Henceforth, members of the open source community must view with deep cynicism all - not just some - offers by Microsoft to work more closely with the free software world. If they don’t, they could find themselves used and abused just like the once famous, and now former, International Standards Organisation.
More coverage about the vote and an exposition of Microsoft deception/abuse/manipulation you will find in this cumulative report from Groklaw
People have eyes. OOXML is a mess, and the whole world knows it. And there is no way to wipe that stain away. Ironically, had Microsoft put it on the regular track, it would probably have at least been made usable, if not necessary. No one can make it necessary. And there can be no doubt that Microsoft’s reputation has taken another hit, due to its behavior. We know now that there is no “new” Microsoft.
There are quite a few barriers that Microsoft faces after so many well-documented abuses. For each part of the world, horror stories are publicly available for citing in years to come. Microsoft will come to regret its ‘wins’. █
“This year WG1 have had another major development that has made it almost impossible to continue with our work within ISO. The influx of P members whose only interest is the fast-tracking of ECMA 376 as ISO 29500 has led to the failure of a number of key ballots. Though P members are required to vote, 50% of our current members, and some 66% of our new members, blatantly ignore this rule despite weekly email reminders and reminders on our website. As ISO require at least 50% of P members to vote before they start to count the votes we have had to reballot standards that should have been passed and completed their publication stages at Kyoto. This delay will mean that these standards will appear on the list of WG1 standards that have not been produced within the time limits set by ISO, despite our best efforts.
The disparity of rules for PAS, Fast-Track and ISO committee generated standards is fast making ISO a laughing stock in IT circles. The days of open standards development are fast disappearing. Instead we are getting “standardization by corporation”, something I have been fighting against for the 20 years I have served on ISO committees. I am glad to be retiring before the situation becomes impossible. I wish my colleagues every success for their future efforts, which I sincerely hope will not prove to be as wasted as I fear they could be.”
–Martin Bryan, ISO ‘Escapee’
Formerly Convenor, ISO/IEC JTC1/SC34 WG1
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