05.16.08
Posted in Europe, Open XML, ISO at 3:34 am by Roy Schestowitz
We have already seen street protests in a few places including Norway (photo above; here is a video and the full story). The BSI (UK) came under legal fire as well. The European Commission is dealing with several investigations as complaints continue to come (more recently from BECTA, whose formal complaint was added to the pile).
As we emphasised before, over two weeks remain until finalisation and now comes Denmark with a complaint that’s very revealing.
The city of Aarhus has posted an official complaint to Danish Standards regarding the result of the Danish YES-vote.
The complaint is regarding the fact that *all* non-profit votes in Denmark asked for a NO. Only commercial pro-Microsoft participants voted YES.
The original article is in Danish, but it will probably reach the English-speaking press fairly soon.
Denmark’s clear division among voters (only Microsoft’s friends voting “yes”, just like in India) is not news, but the complaint is definitely new. Also mind the following serial denial [1, 2], which is utterly disgusting. To quote one who is familiar with the matter in Denmark specifically:
“37 letters with exactly the same words. Some of the senders didn’t even care to remove the ‘Type company name here’ text.
Simular letters has been circulating in Denmark as an e-mail from the Danish MD Jørgen Bardenfleth to customers and business partners.
I call it fraud, cheating and disgusting. If I wasn’t anti-Microsoft before, I am now. Disgusting !”
–Leif Lodahl
More information about the fiasco in Denmark you’ll easily find if you search this Web site. Previous posts that partly cover OOXML in Denmark include:
Not even a thousand template-based carbon-copied denials can write history guiltlessly. █
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Posted in Microsoft, DRM, GNU/Linux, Novell, Patents, Europe, America, Patent Covenant, Vista, FOSS at 1:16 am by Roy Schestowitz
At this current pace, the USPTO will be falling down the wastebasket pretty soon (Grand Implosion™), so it remains important to ensure it does not take the EPO down along with it [1, 2]. Here are some highlights from the news.
All Your Typos Are [sic] Belong to Us
VeriSign got criticised out of this planet for profiteering from typos. Now it get the nerve to get a software patent on it.
VeriSign wins patent for Internet typo redirection
[…]
If VeriSign tries to demand licensing fees from others, patent lawyers could claim that similar services existed before Verisign’s was patented. In fact, VeriSign had cited those pre-existing services in justifying Site Finder.
All Your Curve Balls Are [sic] Belong to Use
Will you have a look at this one? It relates to Bilski [1, 2, 3, 4].
So is a curve ball patentable? No one really seemed to want to answer Judge Bryson’s question, and when they did answer the question there was not a lot of intellectual honesty. The answer, of course, should be that a “curve ball” is not patentable because it is still a baseball. There has been no transformation of the baseball in a physical way, so there is nothing new and/or nonobvious.
Microsoft’s Crusade for Intellectual Monopoly
It’s always rather amusing to find articles which speak of “export” when referring to imaginary things that they try very hard to characterise as “property”. All it deserves to be called is a “monopoly”, which in this case applies not to a complex process or a physical product but to human thought — imagination even. The other day we mentioned and commented on Microsoft’s latest patent deal. A day later, Microsoft lovers take their shot at it as well, seemingly trying to create some fear (just what Microsoft needs). Here comes CNET to market some more patent deals:
With Microsoft’s announcement of yet another patent cross-licensing deal this week, it would seem nearly everyone has a deal with Redmond.
CNET has just been acquired, but it also has some promotional arrangements with Microsoft and you must be careful when reading anything from Ina Fried because it’s filled with bias. The reporter is apparently (almost evidently) close to Steve Ballmer. Mary Jo Foley, by contrast, can’t get anywhere near him because she occasionally ‘dares’ to criticise Microsoft (she told me so). Microsoft plays ‘reward and punishment’ with journalists, thereby encouraging them to say positive things, i.e. have more of that existing Microsoft bias. It’s just something to bear in mind, making it a rule of thumb. If you thought that press control in Russia was bad…
Hypocrisy at its finest, yet again.
From Digital Majority
Gratitude goes to Benjamin who has accumulated some good new finds. Here we have what seems like software patent troll du jour.
# May 12
# Fotomedia Technologies LLC vs. American Greetings Corp. et al
# Fotomedia Technologies LLC vs. Fujifilm USA Inc. et al
Plaintiff Fotomedia has filed two separate complaints for patent infringement against 50 different defendants.
According to the original complaints, Fotomedia owns the rights to three patents:
U.S. Patent No. 6,018,774 for a Method and System for Creating Messages Including Image Formation, issued Jan. 25, 2000.
U.S. Patent No. 6,542,936 B1 for a System for Creating Messages Including Image Information, issued April 1, 2003.
U.S. Patent No. 6,871,231 B1 for a Role-Based Access to Image Metadata issued March 22, 2005.
The first complaint names two dozen defendants that offer photo sharing Web sites which the plaintiff alleges infringe the patents, including American Greetings, DotPhoto, Phanfare, PictureTrail, BetterPhoto.com, Kaboose, BubbleShare, Printroom, Scripps Networks, Photogra, Fotki and Zazzle.
Reading further you’ll also find continued attempts to change patent laws in Europe. Typically, reappointments play a role and Sarkozy comes to mind as an example [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6]. The OOXML scandal was filled with such examples, as was last mentioned yesterday. At the moment in fact, Microsoft appears to be playing a similar card in a proxy fight against Yahoo’s board. But anyway, watch this from the news: (our highlights are in red)
Despite the hard work put into reforming the intellectual property landscape during its presidency of the EU in the first half of this year, Slovenia has admitted there won’t be a breakthrough under its stewardship.
[…]
The only country to oppose this idea is Spain, which has fought hardest against plans to simplify the linguistic requirements of the patent system. The country argues that Spanish is a more important language than both French and German, two of the official languages of the European patent system (the other being English), because of its use in Latin America. It fears that if patents aren’t available in Spanish, then Spain will become an economic backwater.
Spain to the rescue?
But the arrival last month of a new Spanish minister in charge of science and innovation, molecular biologist Cristina Garmendia, gives reason to hope for a change in the Spanish position, Konteas said.
“The Spanish government seems ready to change the focus of the economy from tourism and construction towards innovation-led pursuits. They seem to be going in the right direction.”
Talk about ‘agents for change’. The term is typically used with a positive connotation, unlike “crusader”, which is more imperialistic.
Lastly, have another look at these recent moves in the UK [PDF]. It’s not news, but it’s summarised thusly:
The Intellectual Property Office has revised its guidance on claims relating to computer programs, reflecting the more permissive stance taken by the High Court in the recent Astron Clinica case. The High Court has made a further pro-patentee ruling, this time in the case of Symbian’s application for an improved method of accessing a dynamic link library.
As reported in our last technology update, the practice of the UK Intellectual Property Office (UKIPO) of flatly rejecting patent claims to computer program products has recently been overruled. The case law in the area, formulated in the 2006 Aerotel and Macrossan decisions (see our Internet & E-Commerce Update of November 2006) was clarified in January 2008 by the decision of the High Court in Astron Clinica & Ors (see coverage in our last Updated dated February 2008).
It is without doubt that the United States will relentlessly continue trying to ruin the European system until it’s ‘equally ruined’, which passes US disadvantage onto competing economies. To use the hypothetical analogy Peter Gutmann made up to explain DRM in Windows Vista, it’s like cutting off the legs or Olympic athletes and seeing who hobbles best on crutches. Still, better than having the Olympic games delivered via the DRM-crippled Silverblight/Silverbullet/Silverfish, right?
Need it be mentioned that Microsoft has many software patents on this technology? And if Mono’s patron and Microsoft partner Novell likes it, should everyone else accept it also? You ought to see the ‘warm’ welcome Moonlight receives at Digg (mind the comments in particular). █
“One Free Software Foundation-backed group–aptly called the End Software Patents Project–is using the [Bilski] case as a platform to argue that no form of software should ever qualify for a patent. Red Hat also argued that the “exclusionary objectives” of software patents conflict with the nature of the open-source system and open up coders to myriad legal hazards.”
–Court case could redefine business method, software patents
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05.15.08
Posted in Microsoft, Windows, Office Suites, Europe, Antitrust at 9:28 pm by Roy Schestowitz
Secret deals, intimate relationships
BECTA, the British Educational Communications and Technology Agency, should be considered among those who are largely responsible for turning an entire nation into a Microsoft workshop [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8]. We mentioned its [cref complaint 3420] several days ago (further mentioned in [1, 2]), but at the end, unsurprisingly, it gave up to what the following article calls “the convicted software monopolist.”
Becta, the UK quango governing technology spending in education, swept the licensing issue under the carpet in order to sign a new three-year deal with Microsoft, the convicted software monopolist, last month.
[…]
During 2007, when the 2004 MOU extension was operating, Becta complained about Microsoft’s licensing practices and technology to the UK’s Office of Fair Trading, and advised schools not to upgrade to Vista and Office 2007, Microsoft’s latest software.
Yet Becta had no choice but to sign a new agreement with Microsoft, said Ian Lynch, who campaigns for open source software in schools with the Open Schools Alliance.
“In the sense that Microsoft has a monopolistic presence, Becta [still] has a remit to get the best discount it can,” he said.
“In the short term they might get the best pricing, but in the long term they might think, ’sod this, we are going to take them to the Office of Fair Trading’,” he said.
As we stressed at he start, BECTA, like many other loyal Microsoft customers that thrive in taxpayers’ money (e.g. The British Library), is just trying to save face with its complaint. Had it wanted a solution to the problem, it would have easily found one. It’s total disinterest in change and blind obedience that continue to stand in the way and make children more dependent than ever on this “convicted software monopolist,” which locks them in using personal data (technical barrier) and skills (getting children ‘addicted’, having them memorise menu layouts). █
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05.14.08
Posted in Microsoft, Patents, Europe, FOSS at 11:03 pm by Roy Schestowitz
Yesterday we alerted about the latest attempt to shove software patents into Europe. It’s a back-door technique and Benjamin has more on this subject in the following slideshow. He has also been pointing to articles such as this one because Microsoft’s appeal in Europe, he believes, is more than it seems on the surface.
At the EC’s behest, Microsoft makes such information available to competitors, but on terms that the EC argues are unusable by open source software projects. Microsoft argues that the licensing terms demanded by the EC violate its intellectual property rights.
Benjamin opined that the appeal from Microsoft has its eyes on taxing Free software. Microsoft has meanwhile signed another patent cross-licensing deal, this time with Hoya Pentax.
Monday morning, Microsoft Corp. (MSFT) revealed that it has signed a patent cross-licensing agreement with Hoya Corp. PENTAX Imaging Systems division. Pursuant to the deal, the companies have agreed to enhance technological innovation in the field of consumer products including digital cameras. Though the companies have agreed that Microsoft will be compensated by Pentax, no financial terms were disclosed. The deal would help each company in developing their current and future product lines to enhance technological innovation and to boost overall customer and consumer experience. The deal will cover the entire product line manufactured and sold by both the companies, particularly the digital cameras made by Pentax.
Quick search queries seem not to reveal any use of Linux by Hoya Pentax. █
“Linux is a cancer that attaches itself in an intellectual property sense to everything it touches.”
–Steve Ballmer, Microsoft CEO
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Posted in Microsoft, Office Suites, OpenDocument, Europe, Interoperability, Open XML, OpenOffice at 10:49 pm by Roy Schestowitz
To those who think that Microsoft’s OOXML scandals are over, looking a little further is recommended.
Microsoft Penalises ODF
There are several examples of situations where Microsoft not only promotes OOXML but also actively works against ODF [1, 2]. By its very nature in fact, OOXML is a case against ODF and it’s anti-competitive. But there’s more to it. Watch this analysis which seems to confirm that Microsoft makes ODF look bad, whether deliberately or not [1, 2].
Can someone explain to me why Microsoft Office needs almost 10 minutes to load an ODF file that OpenOffice can load in 14 seconds?
Microsoft Plays Politics Against ODF
You might still recall the maddening situation in France. Groklaw has a little update (translation) on it. The article is here and it’s in French. Part of Groklaw’s translation (from Sean Daly):
The article explains how the head of the DGME in charge of editing the RGI was sacked and replaced following that visit and this letter. Lemaire points out numerous errors and omissions in the document and points out in particular how Microsoft claims to have always been neutral:
“Microsoft, in the name of pluralism and technological neutrality of the State, has requested that OpenXML, open standard, rights-free and documented, in the sense of Article 4 of the LCEN, be recommended also alongside the standard called ODF. Microsoft has always presented a position which is balanced and neutral, asking that equal treatment be respected.”
Speaking of sacking & replacing, be sure to learn how ISO got sort of shuffled and other people met the wrath of Microsoft. Examples include:
Referring to the scandal from France, watch what a government delegate had to say.
Microsoft Won’t Inter-operare
BECTA’s complaint has already been mentioned in [1, 2], but here is another decent article covering this latest debacle, which generated a lot of press coverage.
ODF on the Rise
In this interview with Louis Suarez-Potts it turns out that ODF is doing pretty well indeed, despite all of the corruption we have been tracking for over a year. Microsoft not playing by the rules is bound to make OOXML look bad.
Q: How has the OOXML’s approval affected ODF’s penetration?
Louis : Zero.
[…]
Q: What do you see for the OOo and ODF community in the years to come?
Louis : Glory. I mean it. What is the future, I could ask, of Firefox? Will IE7 kill it? No. People appreciate freedom and what it brings, for it brings innovation and the possibility of it. And it brings, implicitly, community—by which I mean a coming together of interests that are not only generated by and dependent upon marketing agendas.
Call for Real Standards (Like ODF) in Europe
Several large European nations have already decided to ignore OOXML and more backlash ensued. Now comes openparliament.eu where you are encouraged to drop your signature if you live in Europe. It can be summarised thusly:
Citizens and stakeholder groups should not have to use the software of a single company in order to communicate with their elected officials or participate in the legislative process.
All companies should be given the chance to compete freely for contracts to supply ICT services to the European Parliament.
Under the shadow of imbalanced press it may be difficult to see the full picture, but ODF is doing pretty well. Declining sales of Microsoft Office, according to Microsoft’s latest quarterly report could — just could — be an indicator of this. As we last stressed yesterday, Microsoft is playing financial game. █
“Unregulated, and illegal, monopoly domination of IT technology that affects virtually every sector of society is a VERY BAD THING, and worth taking a stand in opposition.”
–Linux Today comment
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Posted in Microsoft, Novell, Patents, Security, Europe at 8:11 am by Roy Schestowitz
Plague alert
A couple of days ago we included a link to this exploration of Douglas Goodyear and that connection to Microsoft. We have also been exploring Microsoft’s use of the United States government to push software patents into the European Union.
Earlier came some warnings about McCreevy. He is backed by the French president, Nicolas ‘Microsoft MPAA’ Sarkozy — another dangerous character to keep an eye on [1, 2, 3, 4, 5].
Now comes the following, thanks to our reader who E-mailed a headsup that says “Most Important: Software Patents in the EU through the back door tried again.” Here is the urgent message from FFII:
Brussels, 13 May 2008 — European Commissioner McCreevy is pushing for a
bilateral patent treaty with the United States. This Tuesday 13 May in
Brussels, White House and European representatives will try to adopt a
tight roadmap for the signature of a EU-US patent treaty by the end of
the year. Parts of the proposed treaty will contain provision on
software patents, and could legalise them on both sides of the Atlantic.
“TEC talks are the current push for software patents. The US want to
eliminate the higher standards of the European Patent Convention. The
bilateral agenda is dictated by multinationals gathered in the
Transatlantic Economic Business Dialogue (TABD). When you have a look
who is in the Executive Board of the TABD, you find not a single
European SME in there”, says Benjamin Henrion, a Brussels based patent
policy specialist.
The Transatlantic Economic Council (TEC) which comprises EU and US high
level representatives put a substantive harmonisation of patent law on
its agenda. Substantive patent law covers what is patentable or not. The
attempt to impose the low US standards on Europe via the Substantive
Patent Law Treaty (SPLT) process utterly failed at the World
Intellectual Property Organisation. Also progress in the WIPO B+
subgroup (without development nations) could not be reached.
This is why it is so important to watch the movers and to keep abreast of those who set trends. Novell is among them, but let’s not forget Microsoft’s own patent trolls.
Techdirt repeats what we wrote a couple of days ago about Myhrvold getting too much attention (this post won’t help, will it?). It concludes with some harsh words
Nathan Myhrvold [formerly of Microsoft] may not have done much of note yet with Intellectual Ventures, but he sure is good at getting press attention.
[…]
And here Myhrvold is either outright lying or he’s ignorant (he can let us know which one). First of all no one has ever said that patent litigation is threatening to stop all innovation. They’ve just said that it is slowing the pace of innovation. And there’s plenty of evidence to support that, despite Myhrvold’s claim that there’s none. James Bessen and Michael Meurer just came out with a whole book detailing much of the evidence, and David Levine and Michele Boldrin also have a book with even more evidence. Did Myhrvold simply not know about these? Or is he lying to PC World?
[…]
I’m sure Myhrvold is a smart guy — and he may truly believe that he’s helping inventors and changing the world — but he’s either being purposely misleading or he’s ignorant when it comes to patents and how they interact with the economy.
Also of interest: watch what Microsoft patent application Bruce Schneier wanted to share with his readers, as well as some initial responses to it.
Guardian Angel:
[…]
Note that Bill Gates and Ray Ozzie are co-inventers.
[…]
Unless there are details of the implementation in the application, it isn’t very original; there have been many slightly different versions of this in science fiction literature for decades.
Posted by: billswift at May 13, 2008 07:25 AM
What has Bill Gates ever invented? Not sure why he would get an ‘invent’ credit on anything. Acquire acquire. Not that he’s not great at exploiting that, but I don’t know that I’ve really heard of anything he has invented himself.
Posted by: jk at May 13, 2008 07:38 AM
Eternal Vigilance is the Price of Liberty █
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Posted in Microsoft, Windows, Novell, Europe at 6:42 am by Roy Schestowitz
“What is this thing called Lunix?!?!”
Richard Steel, a CIO whom we mentioned on several occasions recently [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7], seems to have something in common with Ron Hovsepian, who fails to keep an eye on the market. Is this deliberate or is someone being pressured to wear blinders? Matt Aslett has a go at it.
During a visit to the KommITS conference in Sweden, Richard discovered the following information: “I note that Novell has a local arrangement with Microsoft, which resells its version of Suse Linux to enable Linux exploitation on a Windows platform!” The exclamation mark is his own, and suggests genuine surprise at hearing the news of Microsoft and Novell’s entanglement.
It would be easy to suggest that any CIO must have had their head in the sand not to have been aware of a small agreement that Microsoft and Novell entered into a little while ago, but also I think one also has to accept that for a great number of senior IT executives this sort of information just isn’t as fascinating as open source followers think it is.
[…]
Conspiracy theory alert: Newham is one of Microsoft’s flagship local government accounts in the UK following its controversial decision to sign a ten-year agreement with Microsoft after ditching plans to move to an open source environment. Clearly, Newham has less reason then to be interested in Linux and Microsoft’s relationship with Novell than other organizations (it also explains why Microsoft’s SLES voucher-wielding sales team hasn’t been breaking down the door).
Many people will tell you that what Newham and Richard Steel have done so far is a shameful disgrace. They turn an entire nation into a Windows workshop and cite their own studies for validation. █
‘Suffolk told Gartner, “I think we have fundamentally failed on a worldwide basis as an IT industry to understand the cost of what we do. And I roundly blame Gartner for this, because you guys are the ones who come up with TCO [total cost of ownership] benchmarking. It has become a self-fulfilling prophecy.’
–Context
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Posted in Microsoft, Novell, Office Suites, Europe, Antitrust, Interoperability, Open XML, OpenOffice at 1:11 am by Roy Schestowitz
We have been citing some output from Digistan recently and Andy Updegrove has just published a good introduction to it. Remember that Digistan does not favour patent-encumbered interoperability that Novell promotes; instead, it’s all about open standards.
That pronouncement has been titled The Hague Declaration by the new international group, called the Digital Standards Organization (”Digistan,” for short), that crafted it. In this blog entry, I’ll talk about what the Declaration is all about, and what it is intended to achieve.
As follow-up to news that we mentioned here yesterday [1, 2], also see the following couple of new articles:
1. Britain complains to EU about Microsoft file system
A British watchdog agency said Tuesday it had complained to European Union regulators that Microsoft Corp.’s new file format [OOXML] for storing documents discouraged competition.
2. Agency says Microsoft hurts student interests
A government agency has told the European Commission that Microsoft Office works poorly with rival software used in schools, hurting the interests of learners, teachers and parents.
Ignore an erroneous report (from IDG) which suggests the EU has declined to deal with this complaint. There is disinformation out there.
It was also IDG that recently measured the capabilities of OpenOffice 3 (beta) using OOXML as a yardstick. This got Neil McAllister added to “The List”. He usually publishes good articles, but that last one was abysmal. █
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« Previous entries ·
Highlight: Novell was the first to acknowledge that Microsoft FUD tactics had substance. Novell then used anti-Linux FUD to market itself. 
Highlight: Xandros let Microsoft make patent claims and brag about (paid-for) OOXML support. 
Highlight: Linspire's CEO not only fell into Microsoft arms, but he also assisted the company's attack on GNU/Linux. 
Highlight: Microsoft craves pseudo (proprietary) standards and gets its way using proxies and influence which it buys. 
Highlight: The invasion into the open source world is intended to leave Linux companies neglected, due to financial incentives from Microsoft. 
Analysis: Xen, an open source hypervisor, possibly fell victim to Microsoft's aggressive (and stealthy) acquisition-by-proxy strategy.