06.22.09
Posted in Antitrust, Ecma, Finance, Microsoft, Mono, Novell, Patents, TomTom at 8:52 am by Roy Schestowitz
Summary: Mono suffers from an issue of trust — one must trust Microsoft just like TomTom trusted them
NOVELL, like Mono, is impossible to trust. Would anyone trust a company whose CEO rakes in millions in bonuses despite abysmal performance? Yes, Novell fires GNU/Linux developers (supposedly its business focus) while giving Ron Hovsepian a $6 million bonus. Novell fails to beat its own goals and it had been taking loans while its CEO was essentially robbing the company for personal benefit. Why do so many good reporters fail to see this?
“Whose agenda is actually served by Mono? Microsoft’s of course.”As the treasonous deal with Microsoft demonstrated, Novell is a morally deprived company, with the possibility of imminent financial bankruptcy too, or at least the splitting for sake of survival. Whose agenda is actually served by Mono? Microsoft’s of course. And the more times goes on, the more obvious it becomes. In fact, Novell has begun development which puts Windows in a position of advantage even for Mono [1, 2, 3]. What more compelling proof do proponents of Mono require before the Eureka moment? Some of those Mono proponents are former Microsoft employees and at least one person from the Mono team is working for Microsoft at present.
And with this blunt introduction off my chest, I hand it over to Slated, who equally bluntly wrote the following about what makes Mono so dangerous:
This single, vague yet far reaching example, is as much as I personally have been able to discover.
The ECMA declaration is indeed just a statement of intent.
However, the substantive point is that .NET is Microsoft technology, and as such you can be sure they have it patented up to the hilt, and one way or another Microsoft will use those patents as a weapon against its enemies. It would be extremely naive (in fact dangerous) to assume otherwise, because Microsoft have a violent history of aggression in their crusade to protect their racketeering operation.
“The best case scenario might be that Mono developers find themselves having to abandon whole projects, or at least significant parts of them, in order to “work around” the problem.”The problem is that, outside of Redmond HQ (and presumably UPSTO), nobody has the faintest clue as to what these patents might be, if any, and of course Microsoft have so far remained silent on the issue (much like the infamous “Linux violates 235 Microsoft patents” scandal, except this time the intent is initially somewhat more subtle and subversive, rather than being a more obvious and aggressive FUD attack). This also begs the question of how de Icaza and friends intend to “work around” non-ECMA covered patents, if he doesn’t have the first clue as to what
exactly is, or is not, patented, and by the time he eventually finds out, it may be too late (assuming he isn’t already privy to Microsoft’s darkest secrets).
The best case scenario might be that Mono developers find themselves having to abandon whole projects, or at least significant parts of them, in order to “work around” the problem. The worst case scenario is that Microsoft begins an all-out frontal attack (just like they did with TomTom).
Naturally Microsoft finds this situation very useful, since it enables them to poison Free Software in a subversive fashion, and with little resistance, especially as they have pacified certain key developers with “RAND” assurances. The problem is that the ECMA RAND only pertains to certain parts of the .NET framework, and moreover the “RAND” itself only refers to price (i.e. a fair and reasonable price). This doesn’t actually prevent Microsoft from suing those who implement that technology without a license, and the private (i.e. unofficial) assurances they’ve given regarding “royalty free” are, at this stage, nothing more than hot air (i.e. dependent on implicit trust, rather than being legally binding). To be legally binding, every GNU/Linux distro would require an explicit patent grant from Microsoft, which is not what either the ECMA RAND nor the so-called “covenant” are. Novell presumably has such a grant, as part of their agreement, others don’t. Exactly what sinister implications entering into such an agreement entails, is anyone’s guess, since they are (like everything else Microsoft does) yet another dark secret (Memorandum of Understanding), but you can be sure it isn’t good, or at least it is very good for Microsoft, which means it will inevitably be very bad for everyone else.
IOW it’s all a big mystery, and deliberately so (patent pending).
Then again, maybe not.
After all, this is Microsoft we’re talking about, and there’s very little mystery about their motives, is there? So do we actually even need to know the details? We should all know more than enough about the history of these gangsters, to steer well clear of anything tainted by them.
Here’s a shortlist of things we can safely assume Microsoft considers to be their “enemy”:
. Competing operating systems
. Interoperability (i.e. anything which enables operation on the above)
. Open Standards (ditto)
. Free Software (ditto)
. Any company which distributes or primarily utilises any of the above
And here’s a few key facts about Microsoft:
. They have a global software monopoly
. They abuse that monopoly to suppress competition
. They use highly unethical, and often illegal, tactics in the above
. They are only motivated by power and greed, to attain domination
. They essentially operate like gangsters
Now study those two lists, then give me one good reason why anyone should implicitly trust Microsoft to:
a) Do anything that helps GNU/Linux
b) Keep their legally non-binding “royalty free” promise
c) Keep their “covenant to not sue” promise (hint: TomTom)
d) Not launch a submarine patent attack against Mono projects
e) Not abuse the confusion over Mono as leverage for cross-licensing “deals”, to pervert the GNU/Linux distro landscape into an extension of Microsoft’s portfolio of rotting carcasses
Seems pretty simple to me, but then I am allegedly rather “monochromatic”.
Ultimately, one only needs to ask oneself this single question, to determine whether or not they should have anything to do with Mono, either as users or developers:
Do you trust, and therefore wish to help, the self-declared enemy of Free Software, Microsoft, a company which inhibits all competition using immoral and criminal methods, similar to gangsters running a racketeering operation?
My answer: No.
I really don’t need to know any more.
Case closed. █
“Our partnership with Microsoft continues to expand.”
–Ron Hovsepian, Novell CEO
“[The partnership with Microsoft is] going very well insofar as we originally agreed to co-operate on three distinct projects and now we’re working on nine projects and there’s a good list of 19 other projects that we plan to co-operate on.”
–Ron Hovsepian, Novell CEO
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06.12.09
Posted in Ecma, GNU/Linux, Microsoft, Mono, Novell, Opensuse at 8:16 am by Roy Schestowitz
Siouxsie and the Banshees
Summary: Banshee brings Winforms with it after all (not part of ECMA reference)
ONE of our contributors mailed us regarding this post where we were vilified for suggesting that Banshee needed Winforms. Well, our contributor says that “it’s true that Ubuntu’s implementation of Banshee does not depend on Winforms, but on Fedora 11 it does. So does Tomboy. At least, when I try and install tomboy or banshee, they both want to pull in winforms.
“Whether it is actually needed by either application I’m not sure, but even though Red Hat is shipping Fedora 11 without Tomboy installing it will pull in Windows forms by default when users install it. Whether this is actually a problem or not, I can’t say.”
Those examples we were given (as above) can be proven as follows.
For Bashee:
Loaded plugins: downloadonly, refresh-packagekit
Setting up Install Process
Resolving Dependencies
--> Running transaction check
---> Package banshee.i586 0:1.4.3-3.fc11 set to be updated
--> Processing Dependency: mono(gdk-sharp) = 2.12.0.0 for package: banshee
--> Processing Dependency: mono(notify-sharp) = 0.4.0.0 for package: banshee
--> Processing Dependency: mono(NDesk.DBus.GLib) = 1.0.0.0 for package: banshee
--> Processing Dependency: mono(Mono.Cairo) = 2.0.0.0 for package: banshee
--> Processing Dependency: mono(Mono.Addins.Setup) = 0.4.0.0 for package: banshee
--> Processing Dependency: mono(Boo.Lang.Compiler) = 2.0.0.0 for package: banshee
--> Processing Dependency: mono(mscorlib) = 2.0.0.0 for package: banshee
--> Processing Dependency: mono(Mono.Addins.Gui) = 0.4.0.0 for package: banshee
--> Processing Dependency: mono(pango-sharp) = 2.12.0.0 for package: banshee
--> Processing Dependency: mono(MusicBrainz) = 1.4.0.0 for package: banshee
--> Processing Dependency: mono(Mono.Data.SqliteClient) = 2.0.0.0 for package: banshee
--> Processing Dependency: mono(gconf-sharp) = 2.24.0.0 for package: banshee
--> Processing Dependency: mono(System.Xml) = 2.0.0.0 for package: banshee
--> Processing Dependency: mono(glib-sharp) = 2.12.0.0 for package: banshee
--> Processing Dependency: mono(System) = 2.0.0.0 for package: banshee
--> Processing Dependency: mono(System.Web) = 2.0.0.0 for package: banshee
--> Processing Dependency: mono(Mono.Addins) = 0.4.0.0 for package: banshee
--> Processing Dependency: mono(Mono.Posix) = 2.0.0.0 for package: banshee
--> Processing Dependency: mono(gtk-sharp) = 2.12.0.0 for package: banshee
--> Processing Dependency: mono(ICSharpCode.SharpZipLib) = 2.84.0.0 for package: banshee
--> Processing Dependency: mono(System.Data) = 2.0.0.0 for package: banshee
--> Processing Dependency: mono(glade-sharp) = 2.12.0.0 for package: banshee
--> Processing Dependency: mono(Mono.Zeroconf) = 2.0.0.76 for package: banshee
--> Processing Dependency: mono(NDesk.DBus) = 1.0.0.0 for package: banshee
--> Processing Dependency: mono(gnome-sharp) = 2.24.0.0 for package: banshee
--> Processing Dependency: banshee-musicbrainz = 1.4.3-3.fc11 for package: banshee
--> Processing Dependency: mono(taglib-sharp) = 2.0.3.2 for package: banshee
--> Processing Dependency: podsleuth for package: banshee
--> Processing Dependency: mono-addins for package: banshee
--> Running transaction check
---> Package banshee-musicbrainz.i586 0:1.4.3-3.fc11 set to be updated
---> Package boo.i586 0:0.8.1.2865-6.fc11 set to be updated
--> Processing Dependency: mono(NAnt.DotNetTasks) = 0.85.2478.0 for package: boo
--> Processing Dependency: mono(NAnt.Core) = 0.85.2478.0 for package: boo
---> Package gnome-sharp.i586 0:2.24.0-3.fc11 set to be updated
---> Package gtk-sharp2.i586 0:2.12.7-4.fc11 set to be updated
---> Package mono-addins.i586 0:0.4-6.20091702svn127062.1.fc11 set to be updated
---> Package mono-core.i586 0:2.4-19.fc11 set to be updated
--> Processing Dependency: mono(monodoc) = 1.0.0.0 for package: mono-core
--> Processing Dependency: mono(System.Configuration.Install) = 1.0.5000.0 for package: mono-core
---> Package mono-data.i586 0:2.4-19.fc11 set to be updated
---> Package mono-data-sqlite.i586 0:2.4-19.fc11 set to be updated
---> Package mono-web.i586 0:2.4-19.fc11 set to be updated
--> Processing Dependency: mono(System.Design) = 2.0.0.0 for package: mono-web
---> Package mono-zeroconf.i586 0:0.7.6-8.fc11 set to be updated
--> Processing Dependency: mono(avahi-sharp) = 1.0.0.0 for package: mono-zeroconf
---> Package ndesk-dbus.i586 0:0.6.1a-4.fc11 set to be updated
---> Package ndesk-dbus-glib.i586 0:0.4.1-4.fc11 set to be updated
---> Package notify-sharp.i586 0:0.4.0-0.6.20080912svn.fc11 set to be updated
---> Package podsleuth.i586 0:0.6.3-2.fc11 set to be updated
---> Package taglib-sharp.i586 0:2.0.3.2-2.fc11 set to be updated
--> Running transaction check
---> Package avahi-sharp.i586 0:0.6.25-1.fc11 set to be updated
---> Package mono-extras.i586 0:2.4-19.fc11 set to be updated
---> Package mono-winforms.i586 0:2.4-19.fc11 set to be updated
---> Package monodoc.i586 0:2.4-19.fc11 set to be updated
---> Package nant.i586 1:0.85-27.fc11 set to be updated
--> Processing Dependency: mono(nunit.util) = 2.2.10.0 for package: nant
--> Processing Dependency: mono(ICSharpCode.SharpCvsLib) = 0.35.3721.507 for package: nant
--> Processing Dependency: mono(nunit.core) = 2.2.10.0 for package: nant
--> Processing Dependency: mono(log4net) = 1.2.10.0 for package: nant
--> Processing Dependency: mono(NDoc.Core) = 1.3.3344.0 for package: nant
--> Running transaction check
---> Package log4net.i586 0:1.2.10-5.fc11 set to be updated
---> Package mono-ndoc.i586 0:1.3.1-4.fc11 set to be updated
---> Package mono-nunit22.i586 1:2.2.10-9.fc11 set to be updated
---> Package mono-sharpcvslib.i586 0:0.35-9.fc11 set to be updated
--> Finished Dependency Resolution
Dependencies Resolved
================================================================================
Package Arch Version Repository
Size
================================================================================
Installing:
banshee i586 1.4.3-3.fc11 fedora 3.0 M
Installing for dependencies:
avahi-sharp i586 0.6.25-1.fc11 fedora 35 k
banshee-musicbrainz i586 1.4.3-3.fc11 fedora 40 k
boo i586 0.8.1.2865-6.fc11 fedora 810 k
gnome-sharp i586 2.24.0-3.fc11 fedora 327 k
gtk-sharp2 i586 2.12.7-4.fc11 fedora 819 k
log4net i586 1.2.10-5.fc11 fedora 96 k
mono-addins i586 0.4-6.20091702svn127062.1.fc11 fedora 484 k
mono-core i586 2.4-19.fc11 fedora 12 M
mono-data i586 2.4-19.fc11 fedora 1.5 M
mono-data-sqlite i586 2.4-19.fc11 fedora 158 k
mono-extras i586 2.4-19.fc11 fedora 1.5 M
mono-ndoc i586 1.3.1-4.fc11 fedora 304 k
mono-nunit22 i586 1:2.2.10-9.fc11 fedora 148 k
mono-sharpcvslib i586 0.35-9.fc11 fedora 502 k
mono-web i586 2.4-19.fc11 fedora 3.1 M
mono-winforms i586 2.4-19.fc11 fedora 3.0 M
mono-zeroconf i586 0.7.6-8.fc11 fedora 60 k
monodoc i586 2.4-19.fc11 fedora 7.3 M
nant i586 1:0.85-27.fc11 fedora 637 k
ndesk-dbus i586 0.6.1a-4.fc11 fedora 52 k
ndesk-dbus-glib i586 0.4.1-4.fc11 fedora 11 k
notify-sharp i586 0.4.0-0.6.20080912svn.fc11 fedora 14 k
podsleuth i586 0.6.3-2.fc11 fedora 48 k
taglib-sharp i586 2.0.3.2-2.fc11 fedora 188 k
Transaction Summary
================================================================================
Install 25 Package(s)
Update 0 Package(s)
Remove 0 Package(s)
Total download size: 36 M
Is this ok [y/N]: Exiting on user Command
Complete!
For Tomboy:
Loaded plugins: downloadonly, refresh-packagekit
Setting up Install Process
Resolving Dependencies
--> Running transaction check
---> Package tomboy.i586 0:0.14.1-2.fc11 set to be updated
--> Processing Dependency: mono(gdk-sharp) = 2.12.0.0 for package: tomboy
--> Processing Dependency: mono(Mono.Addins) = 0.4.0.0 for package: tomboy
--> Processing Dependency: mono(mscorlib) = 2.0.0.0 for package: tomboy
--> Processing Dependency: mono(Mono.Posix) = 2.0.0.0 for package: tomboy
--> Processing Dependency: mono(gtk-sharp) = 2.12.0.0 for package: tomboy
--> Processing Dependency: mono(Mono.Addins.Gui) = 0.4.0.0 for package: tomboy
--> Processing Dependency: mono(NDesk.DBus) = 1.0.0.0 for package: tomboy
--> Processing Dependency: mono(gnome-sharp) = 2.24.0.0 for package: tomboy
--> Processing Dependency: mono(pango-sharp) = 2.12.0.0 for package: tomboy
--> Processing Dependency: mono(gconf-sharp) = 2.24.0.0 for package: tomboy
--> Processing Dependency: mono(NDesk.DBus.GLib) = 1.0.0.0 for package: tomboy
--> Processing Dependency: mono(System.Xml) = 2.0.0.0 for package: tomboy
--> Processing Dependency: mono(Mono.Cairo) = 2.0.0.0 for package: tomboy
--> Processing Dependency: mono(gconf-sharp-peditors) = 2.24.0.0 for package: tomboy
--> Processing Dependency: mono(glib-sharp) = 2.12.0.0 for package: tomboy
--> Processing Dependency: mono(Mono.Addins.Setup) = 0.4.0.0 for package: tomboy
--> Processing Dependency: mono(System) = 2.0.0.0 for package: tomboy
--> Processing Dependency: mono(gnome-panel-sharp) = 2.24.0.0 for package: tomboy
--> Running transaction check
---> Package gnome-desktop-sharp.i586 0:2.26.0-1.fc11 set to be updated
---> Package gnome-sharp.i586 0:2.24.0-3.fc11 set to be updated
---> Package gtk-sharp2.i586 0:2.12.7-4.fc11 set to be updated
---> Package mono-addins.i586 0:0.4-6.20091702svn127062.1.fc11 set to be updated
---> Package mono-core.i586 0:2.4-19.fc11 set to be updated
--> Processing Dependency: mono(System.Web) = 2.0.0.0 for package: mono-core
--> Processing Dependency: mono(monodoc) = 1.0.0.0 for package: mono-core
--> Processing Dependency: mono(System.Configuration.Install) = 1.0.5000.0 for package: mono-core
---> Package ndesk-dbus.i586 0:0.6.1a-4.fc11 set to be updated
---> Package ndesk-dbus-glib.i586 0:0.4.1-4.fc11 set to be updated
--> Running transaction check
---> Package mono-extras.i586 0:2.4-19.fc11 set to be updated
--> Processing Dependency: mono(System.Windows.Forms) = 2.0.0.0 for package: mono-extras
--> Processing Dependency: mono(System.Transactions) = 2.0.0.0 for package: mono-extras
--> Processing Dependency: mono(System.Windows.Forms) = 1.0.5000.0 for package: mono-extras
---> Package mono-web.i586 0:2.4-19.fc11 set to be updated
--> Processing Dependency: mono(Mono.Data.Sqlite) = 2.0.0.0 for package: mono-web
---> Package monodoc.i586 0:2.4-19.fc11 set to be updated
--> Running transaction check
---> Package mono-data.i586 0:2.4-19.fc11 set to be updated
---> Package mono-data-sqlite.i586 0:2.4-19.fc11 set to be updated
---> Package mono-winforms.i586 0:2.4-19.fc11 set to be updated
--> Finished Dependency Resolution
Dependencies Resolved
================================================================================
Package Arch Version Repository
Size
================================================================================
Installing:
tomboy i586 0.14.1-2.fc11 fedora 4.6 M
Installing for dependencies:
gnome-desktop-sharp i586 2.26.0-1.fc11 fedora 211 k
gnome-sharp i586 2.24.0-3.fc11 fedora 327 k
gtk-sharp2 i586 2.12.7-4.fc11 fedora 819 k
mono-addins i586 0.4-6.20091702svn127062.1.fc11 fedora 484 k
mono-core i586 2.4-19.fc11 fedora 12 M
mono-data i586 2.4-19.fc11 fedora 1.5 M
mono-data-sqlite i586 2.4-19.fc11 fedora 158 k
mono-extras i586 2.4-19.fc11 fedora 1.5 M
mono-web i586 2.4-19.fc11 fedora 3.1 M
mono-winforms i586 2.4-19.fc11 fedora 3.0 M
monodoc i586 2.4-19.fc11 fedora 7.3 M
ndesk-dbus i586 0.6.1a-4.fc11 fedora 52 k
ndesk-dbus-glib i586 0.4.1-4.fc11 fedora 11 k
Transaction Summary
================================================================================
Install 14 Package(s)
Update 0 Package(s)
Remove 0 Package(s)
Total download size: 35 M
Is this ok [y/N]: Exiting on user Command
Complete!
Some months ago we saw that in OpenSUSE, Evolution depended on Mono. Whether this dependency was a mistake or not is almost irrelevant to the fact that Mono becomes less separable from some GTK applications and Winforms is an even bigger issue.█
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06.08.09
Posted in Ecma, Microsoft, Mono, Patents, Ubuntu, Windows at 4:04 am by Roy Schestowitz
[Updated: Quote in post corrected (partly omitted/crossed out) because Banshee does not depend on Windows Forms.]
Microsoft mono Embrace extend extinguish
Summary: Boycott Novell contributors explain why Mono and Moonlight are real risks
Microsoft is trying to embrace, extend, and extinguish GNU/Linux, largely with the help of Novell. Moonlight is already called "Microsoft Moonlight" in the Novell/Microsoft Web site and one reader wrote to say: “Here is one more proof than Microsoft is backing Moonlight. Go to http://silverlight.live.com/. If you connect from Linux O/S, it will offer you to install Silverlight, click install, you will be redirected to Moonlight page.”
“Mono fans are meanwhile censoring opposers of Mono over in Ubuntu.”Mono fans are meanwhile censoring opposers of Mono over in Ubuntu. Sometimes it's Novell employees and some of those who are responsible (not Novell employees) are writing about proprietary computer games (yes, Windows) at the moment. Those very same people are also pushing hard to put Novell's own Banshee inside Ubuntu, by default, at the expense of other media players.
DaemonFC writes: “If Ubuntu uses Banshee by default, they’ll have to ship Windows Forms/System Forms, so unless they have a Microsoft deal in the works, I don’t know how they’d pull this off. Up til now Ubuntu only ships the ECMA standard parts of Mono. Windows Forms is not part of the standard, so only Novell has permission to distribute that. [...] Well, like I said, if they signed an agreement with Microsoft like Novell has, it would be legal, otherwise they’re opening themselves up to be sued. Microsoft doesn’t want to sue, they want to keep pointing at things like this and saying “Nyaaaah!” when companies are considering Linux.” █
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05.25.09
Posted in Ecma, Microsoft, Mono, Novell, Patents at 5:30 am by Roy Schestowitz
Summary: ECMA is seemingly unable to offer answers regarding Microsoft Moonlight and Mono
OVER AT iTWire, Sam Varghese has just published a detailed story about his attempt to acquire a licence for (or information about) Microsoft Moonlight, Mono, and Microsoft patents. It is no surprise that ECMA, which was corrupted by Microsoft throughout (or before) the OOXML scandals, is unable to supply answers.
How difficult or easy is it to obtain one of the much-touted “royalty-free, reasonable and non-discriminatory” licences for Microsoft patents that are part of a technology like Mono?
[...]
He replied two days later, pointing out, “Ecma does not have anything to do with possible licensing of .NET. But Microsoft is one of our members, so I have asked them whom to contact there – if anything is needed, what I just do not know.”
Dr Sebestyn added: “My contact at Microsoft said that you should contact Peggy Moloney there, who would be able to help you.”
I wrote to Ms Moloney on April 28, asking for the same information: “I understand that the terms of the licences to the patents which Microsoft holds on the .NET development platform permit people to obtain a royalty-free, reasonable and non-discriminatory licence to use them. I would be grateful if you let me know exactly how one obtains such a licence.”
I also asked her about the variance in the terms for the licensing of Moonlight, a clone of Microsoft’s Silverlight, using which the company hopes to capture the market that is dominated by Adobe’s Flash. De Icaza is behind this project as well.
[...]
There’s a been a deafening silence since then. There the matter stands after nearly a month. You would think that’s a decent period for anyone to think things through and respond - if the intention of doing so exists.
To me, it looks this licence is as real as the unicorn. Or maybe Santa Claus. I think Mono fans need to think of a fresh defence when people talk about the dangers of patent suits arising over this technology. The licence talk has worn more than a little thin.
When we asked Microsoft for a Mono licence Microsoft was willing to sell one. But what kind of a procedure is this? This is not Free software. To use a term that Slated once coined, it’s “Poisonware” — meaning it’s a patent trap disguised as “open source”.
According to our reader, ushimitsudoki, Microsoft “has changed the Moonlight covenant on their web site. [...] right now the only thing I have noticed is that it mentions Moonlight version 1.0 and 2. Before it was 1.0 and 1.1 and this was a point I had been making in a few places around the web [...] Miguel (or someone claiming to be him) said they were trying to get it changed from 1.1 -> 2.0 in response to me on Ars Technica, so I am not surprised at the change.” █
“I saw that internally inside Microsoft many times when I was told to stay away from supporting Mono in public. They reserve the right to sue”
–Robert Scoble, former Microsoft evangelist
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03.15.09
Posted in Ecma, Europe, FOSS, Microsoft, Open XML at 8:55 am by Roy Schestowitz
Summary: Watching and learning how Microsoft uses its employees and lobbying arms (with intersections) to promote its interests
SOME months ago we mentioned Microsoft’s Martin Bean, who turns out to be also involved in CompTIA, a Microsoft lobbying gun [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6]. Among many other things, CompTIA played a role in the OOXML corruptions and there may be overlap with the BSA, which is also tied to Bill Gates' father.
Probably without awareness of all the above, one reader alerted us that “CompTIA manager buys house.” The article actually says “Microsoft manager” because it’s one of those cases where lobbyists wear multiple hats. For example, Jan van den Beld [1, 2, 3, 4, 5] was working at ECMA while also playing ball for CompTIA (and Microsoft of course).
Anyway, here is part of the new article about Martin Bean:
He has also presented to the U.S. Senate on behalf of the Technology Workforce Coalition, and moderated a town hall meeting for former President George W. Bush. In addition, he was also a board member of Jobs for America’s Graduates, the chair of the CompTIA Public Policy Committee and the president of AIESEC International.
For a Microsoft employee, he sure does a lot of political things. No conflicts of interests there?
Mr. Bean has already invaded the Open University, which sort of vilified Free software shortly afterwards. This appointment may be part of Microsoft's crusade for influence inside education (getting children "addicted" while they are young, even at no cost). Martin Bean is connected to BECTA too because he is mentioned in related documents.
Another Microsoft manager who chalked Free software off the national education agenda recently quit the company. Amid all this, let’s refer back to last month’s post which asks and addresses the question, is Microsoft a "political movement"?
In other news of this kind, <No>OOXML has found out that Fraunhofer Fokus, which is funded by German taxpayers, may in fact be connected to Microsoft; for a fact, it sure serves Microsoft’s corporate interests. The conclusion of the detailed analysis is:
The question is who will trust the research results of Fraunhofer Fokus? And why does the German tax payer invest in a research institution that sells out to companies across the Atlantic regardless of our national public interest in interoperability? For instance Fraunhofer Fokus applauded(!) the ISO adoption of Open XML.
For those who may be interested, we wrote about misbehaviour at the German Institute for Standardization (DIN) in [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8]. ECT has not exactly forgotten the OOXML fiasco and it is being recited in LinuxInsider right now, even though they it tone down a little too much.
Looking ahead, standards organizations “need to sit down and admit there is a problem, and then decide if they want to help or hinder industry progress,” Mack said.
“I’m hoping the ISO recovers from this,” he added. “They have been publicly humiliated by the debacle but refuse to admit anything went wrong. Monty Python’s ‘Black Knight’ imitation would actually be amusing if the stakes weren’t so high.”
ECT is not gutsy enough to say the truth. Contrariwise, another Microsoft lobbying arm, ACT [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8], is now being accused by Sun’s Simon Phipps, who says that “ACT are pretty active advocates of all that makes FOSS difficult or impossible.” Phipps packs it up with the usual IBM-hostile venom.█
“Ten people who speak make more noise than ten thousand who are silent.”
–Napoleon Bonaparte
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12.21.08
Posted in Ecma, Microsoft, Open XML, Patents at 12:30 pm by Roy Schestowitz
SEVERAL MONTHS after the unforgettable OOXML corruptions come out some documents which may confirm OOXML to be a discriminatory software patent trap without satisfying clarifications. Here are the details:
Microsoft excludes competitors with OOXML patent license?
ECMA has just published two documents related to the patent licensing of ECMA376v1 and ECMA376v2. Microsoft promises to give a patent license under so called “reasonable terms”. Reasonable for whom?
[...]
We have requested a commercial patent license in July, but radio silence since then on the Microsoft side. Yet another proof that the patent system does not work.
Is anybody surprised? Of course not. It’s easier to tell the truth now that’s too late. As Tim Bray put it, “What Microsoft really wanted was that ISO stamp of approval to use as a marketing tool. And just like your mother told you, when they get what they want and have their way with you, they’re probably not gonna call you in the morning.” █
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12.17.08
Posted in Apple, Ecma, IBM, ISO, Microsoft, Novell, Office Suites, Open XML, OpenDocument, SUN at 5:11 pm by Roy Schestowitz
Embrace, extend, and everyone knows the rest
SOME readers have sent a few pointers to us, so it’s probably time to comment on Microsoft’s latest step in a long, brutal pursuit where it threw people out of their jobs, bullied them, replaced them, bribed quite a few ballot-stuffers, blackmailed nations and even — on the face — bribed charities. To say that Microsoft engaged in criminal behaviour due to its strong ambitions of making Microsoft ‘the standard’ would be the understatement of this century (which heralds the beginning of another crackdown on massive corruption).
Microsoft doesn’t stop there. Ruining ISO was not enough because nations began ignoring ISO [1, 2, 3, 4]. Microsoft is finding new things to stomp on, as though it has some God-given right to restore its revenues at all costs, no matter the victims involved. Microsoft fought ODF like fire and now it’s pretending to be its friend. It wants to leverage its nightmare to its own advantage.
“Let’s Embrace ODF”
One Microsoft press release and an accompanying blog post turned old news into something that’s seemingly newsworthy. Microsoft funnels crime into embellishing prose like “foster” (in the headline of the press release). This Orwellian attitude must make George flip in his grave.
We covered this series of developments before:
Someone has already composed a detailed response to Microsoft’s latest PR move, which is — by all means — a PR move. Oh! And a brand-new Web site (documentation is here). Starting at a few dollars for hosting, Microsoft loves creating these new domains to give the illusion of scale and grassroots support with 'independence' from Microsoft (e.g. VoicesForInnovation.org, which is owned by Microsoft).
Some Web site called “Rush PR News” (yes, PR) has already published an interview with Microsoft’s Doug Mahugh. It showed up among the ODF news immediately after the announcement, as though it had been prepared or arranged in advance. The reality if far from this PR (public relations) stunt:
Now you have Microsoft’s bellydancing and basically declaring that they, who sell the “best office suite on the market” (I don’t make that claim) will offer poor support on ODF because of product limitations. Am I the only one here feeling that Redmond is trying -again-to play games? Any additional information would be welcome at this stage, of course, but the market should pay close attention to this issue.
I have hailed and declared myself positively satisfied the inclusion of Microsoft in the ODF committees at the OASIS consortium. I have read the contributions of its employees and they were useful and constructive. This being said, Doug’s blog leaves me with an odd taste in my mouth.
To be frank, I feel that Doug has been looking for a way to tell us that Microsoft’s support of ODF will be crappy and that it was intended to be that way. I realize I have no substantial evidence of what I’m asserting here, but since when does Microsoft speak of the new features of MS Office with a sorry tone?
From The Register:
Even the European Commission questioned Microsoft’s intentions. After all, it had been dogged by less-than-pretty grumbles from a range of opponents about the software giant’s campaign to get its contentious Office Open XML (OOXML) document format approved as an international standard at the second time of trying.
EC regulators said they would investigate whether that announcement really did mean “better interoperability”, allowing customers “to process and exchange their documents with the software product of their choice”.
This latter article also mentions Doug Mahugh without mentioning the disgraceful things he did. These things should not be surprising because he’s coming from the same company that committed white-collar crimes in its pursuits for an ISO rubber stamp. It’s part of a much longer history of crimes and they probably learned not to be ashamed of it. Many people forget the past and the OOXML fiasco too — they reckon and hope — will be a crime that seemingly ‘expired’ due to age. Revisionism began a long time ago.
“Let’s Extend OOXML”
Charles-H. Schulz wrote this humorous post which compares Microsoft's illegal occupation of ISO to the Iraqi invasion (watch the picture). No shoes were being thrown, but some people reportedly lost their jobs.
Those accomplices from ECMA are still raising a toast to celebrate the corruption they were involved in [1, 2, 3, 4]. They do this in a new press release about OOXML. Talk about mixed messages and double standards…
Who covered this thing? Well, we recently found some court documents where Microsoft’s special arrangements with InformationWeek were vividly depicted (Vista advertising back in 2006). As such, we’re never surprised to find this publication peddling Microsoft’s not-so-news, which this time is being pushed forward by J. Nicholas Hoover. In the same set of court documents we find the ugly truth about Microsoft and Rob Enderle, who writes for or contributes to TGDaily sometimes. Well, TGDaily was among those who covered this unimportant ‘news’ as well. The only surprising coverage that we found actually came from Heise, which is a German publication. Since the country as a whole is embracing ODF they went on with the more apprehensive headline, which is “Microsoft details their ODF 1.1 implementation.”
Let’s be very clear here. This whole charade is geared towards one single goal:
To sell more Microsoft Office based on some label that says “ODF” and helps the Microsoft lobbyists/boosters pressure governments against/away from Free software
There are many office suites that support ODF right now and they are hardly proprietary. Lotus Symphony is based on OpenOffice.org and it turns out that another office suite, called PlusOffice, is coming to Apple Macs.
PlusOffice Mac is open-source software, and it shares code with OpenOffice.org.
It features the same applications included with OpenOffice.org - Writer, Calc, Impress, Draw, Base and Math.
Over at his personal blog, Bob Sutor (of IBM) is taking a shot at the “interoperability” nonsense which we wrote about before.
I often find it amusing when people pull out a very significant sounding, obviously committee-written definition of “interoperability.” If I didn’t know better, I would have thought that the definition was written and then delivered on a stone tablet. Is this necessary, or is interoperability one of those things that you know when you see it?
[...]
With cloud computing becoming more and more important, people are correctly asking questions about standards. My sense is that virtually none of the cloud environments are interchangeable and that interoperability among them is sketchy, at best. Unless one provider ends up being overwhelmingly dominant, interoperability will need to be improved.
The timing of this blog post is probably no coincidence. So IBM is not entirely happy with Microsoft’s move, either; it’s just careful in the way it approaches the subject.
Lastly, speaking of Novell and its followers, they seem not to care about ODF. Those inside OpenSUSE seem to say almost nothing about it because if one works for Novell (as many people of OpenSUSE do), then one can get fired for being too blunt. Microsoft is top partner of Novell now and as was last shown yesterday, Novell had been helping OOXML.
“ISO Extinguished, Next Target Please”
Microsoft did the damage which has helped it so much since. And having ruined ISO (with a eulogy for those who are more cynical about it), they are still working on ruining OSI (ISO in reverse) and ‘extending’ Python with .NET. They move on from raping/changing standards and apply the same tactics to “open source”. We saw more signs of such things only a fortnight ago.
A change in licence to the Microsoft Public Licence moves IronPython out of the Shared Source Initiative and under the remit of an Open Source Initiative approved licence.
Microsoft embraces Python like a python embraces a gazelle and here is another recent explanation. They hope that people will rely on their short memories and they are well aware of people’s weakness for witty use of words.
Meanwhile, the Gartner-Intel-Microsoft axis is pumping up ‘whitepapers’ onto popular Web sites. It would be ‘dangerous’ if people discovered the truth, as opposed to some marketing exercise called a ‘whitepaper’. Whitepapers are notorious as tools for rationalising poor decisions. █
Additional, new & related links of interest:
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10.06.08
Posted in Ecma, Europe, Formats, IBM, ISO, Microsoft, Office Suites, Open XML, OpenDocument, OpenOffice, SUN, Standard at 11:47 am by Roy Schestowitz
When we last looked at the demise of ISO, as expressed by blogs and evidenced through the mainstream press, there was not sufficient feedback from ISO itself. None of this has truly changed and the near-silence is deafening.
The word about ISO is being spread very quickly at the moment, mainly thanks to diplomacy at Norway, which tolerated the corruption less than anybody else (or any other country for that matter). There is a good roundup of the situation over at ComputerWorld (Boycott Novell is referenced as well) and in InformationWeek’s Microsoft blog, which is understandably apologetic about it.
Last week, 13 of 23 members of Norway’s International Standards Organization (ISO) committee resigned. They were resigning in protest to Norway’s official decision to favor Microsoft’s OOXML document format as an ISO standard, despite a “no” vote by 21 of 23 committee members. (Microsoft and Statoil were the Norway committee’s only two “yes” votes.)
A week earlier, IBM voiced dissatisfaction with the OOXML approval process, and threatened to leave ISO if the organization didn’t protect its decisions from “undue influence.” Now there is some concern that Microsoft is trying to take over the Open Document Format (ODF) process in an attempt to control or destroy its document-format competitor.
As always, the bad news for ISO and for OOXML is coupled by further progress for ODF. OpenOffice.org 3 is set to be released next week (October 14th) and tomorrow Sun will release the fourth release candidate. In addition, SoftMaker supports ODF now.
Not only does it happily read or write Microsoft Office documents in all formats up to Office 2003/ XP (even password-protected Word files), but the suite also reads OpenOffice SXW and OpenDocument ODT files for maximum compatibility with other suites.
ODF awards will be coming soon. ODF is mostly in the hands of OASIS at the moment, so ISO’s (and ECMA’s) gutter-level reputation should have little or no influence — for now. █
“This was horrible, egregious, process abuse and ISO should hang their heads in shame for allowing it to happen. Their reputation, in my eyes, is in tatters. My opinion of ECMA was already very negative; this hasn’t improved it, and if ISO doesn’t figure out away to detach this toxic leech, this kind of abuse is going to happen again and again.”
–Tim Bray
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