Rolling the Cheese
On the Internet, they say, no one knows you're a dog. After the start of this week, I can safely add, no one knows you are sick as a dog, either.
Such was the fun going on in the global headquarters of Linux Today for the first half of this week, as your editor fought off a case of the flu to keep LT up and running... and nothing more. Being sick is never fun, but it was especially frustrating this week, because Microsoft opened its corporate big mouth again and I had some things to say in response.
Since I am feeling much better now, I'm going to take a stab at why Microsoft is trying such a strange tactic.
I am a big believer in cause and effect (or effect and cause, for you quantum physicists out there). When people do something, they are often responding to something else, some other stimulus. We take out the trash because we don't want our house to stink. We build a new application because we have a solution to a certain problem. And so on. Certainly not all of our actions are a direct result of stimuli, but I think it can safely be said that most of them are.
So when I read about Microsoft's General Counsel Brad Smith telling Fortune magazine about the 235 Microsoft patents upon which Linux is supposedly infringing, my first question was why? My next question was, why now?
The timing of this bit of FUD has me very curious. As in comedy, timing can be very important in business. So why is it that, after trying this exact same line of FUD in 2004, Microsoft is trying again?
I am not exaggerating, by the way. Steve Ballmer made nearly the same exact comments to attendees of Microsoft's Government Leaders Conference in Singapore in November 2004. One key difference: Ballmer cited 228 patents then. Apparently in the 30 months since that 2004 allegation, Linux and open source software has "picked up" seven more infringements. Oh, those naughty, naughty open source coders.
So here we are, in the year 2007, enduring the same allegations. What has changed since then? Certainly the biggest legal change has been that SCO has essentially lost its legal battles with IBM, Red Hat, and Novell. I hate to short-circuit jurisprudence, but after years and years of no proof and silly legal measures, the end results seem obvious.
What else has happened recently? If I were a pie-in-the-sky-cheerleader type, I could point out the big news about Linux and Dell. And while I disagree with the whole "it's for enthusiasts only" line of reasoning, even if I conceded that point, it still means that for the first time in a long time, Microsoft is not getting 100% OEM from an major Intel-based vendor.
In pool, specifically Nine Ball, there is a phrase known as "rolling the cheese," where you hit one ball into the nine ball and hope that the nine ball actually ends up in a pocket. Microsoft is rolling the cheese by threatening customers and developers alike with these allegations, but that is not their real goal. Their nine ball is Red Hat.
I believe the big reason why Redmond is trying this stale tactic again is to get one specific thing: a cross-licensing or covenant agreement with Red Hat, similar to the one they have with Novell. That is the real goal here--anything else, like customers fleeing Linux for Microsoft, would simply be a bonus.
Microsoft has not made it a secret that they would welcome other open source companies to join them in such a covenant, and indeed in this most recent round of hot air, they have reiterated that litigation is not their desire, but instead they want to work with open source "infringers" to set up cross-licensing arrangements.
It's the "why now" question that leads me to the "Red Hat" answer. I don't know when Smith was interviewed, but you can be darn sure Microsoft's PR firm Waggoner Edstrom knew approximately when the article would come out: at or around the time of the Red Hat Summit and the Open Source Business Conference. What better way to deflect the momentum from these two events than casting a cloud of FUD?
More specifically, Red Hat is set to make some major moves in the next couple of years, if they stick to their announced plans. Red Hat Exchange offers a fast way for businesses to try out full application stacks (OS and all), and the online desktop model promoted at this year's Summit would beat the snot out of Microsoft's release-whenever-we-feel-like-it development cycle. If Red Hat's plans come to fruition, Microsoft could find itself in a world of hurt in the enterprise.
The timing of this déjà FUD also works out because of another ball Microsoft has already sunk into the pocket: Novell. Somehow, nobody quite knows for sure how, Redmond was able to convince the owners of SUSE Linux that a patent/technology covenant was just the thing Novell's customers need to be safe from the patent bogeyman.
With this in mind, Microsoft must certainly be trying to get Red Hat in the same pocket with this FUD, caroming the patent ball off the Red Hat ball to try to indirectly place Red Hat in a position what signing a similar agreement looks better than litigation or losing customers.
The good news is, while the pool analogy works to a certain extent, Red Hat, Linux, and Linux customers are not inanimate objects without decision-making capabilities.
Red Hat has seen what is happening to Novell (which must be frustrated beyond belief about what its partner is saying) and wants no part of it. I spoke to several people from Red Hat last week, and the general consensus was that Novell has basically made a deal with the devil and Red Hat has no intention of going down that same path.
Microsoft knows this, because I am certain they had preliminary discussions with Red Hat about this topic, and it seems Red Hat is telling them privately what Red Hat is telling them publicly: hit the road.
Faced with an ever-stronger competitor, Microsoft has revived the patent argument once again, hoping to maneuver Red Hat into a partnership agreement. I believe this is the answer to "why," because it's not the customers Microsoft is trying to sink.
It's Red Hat, corner pocket.
The author seems to be an avid pool player. I like the analogy and I guess he's right.
I like Red Hat's response to MS's approaches thus far. MS's mantra in pursuing these deals with Linux vendors appears to be about "improving interoperability". Red Hat's response is simply that all we need to improve interoperability is use open standards:
http://www.computing.co.uk/vnunet/news/2189545/red-hat-sets-limits-microsoft
And they're happy to sign a deal provided it's based on open standards.
It's a great response - one that other vendors should note. So, if you don't need to cross-license patents to improve interoperability, why would you even sign a cross-licensing deal? Well, you'd have to ask Novell that one.
And how is MS going to promote these deals now? Maybe this week's events are the answer to that.
The big question is what MS's next strategy against Red Hat will be.
Novell has shown over the years that what they lack in marketing savvy, they will make for in stupidity (build a network OS completely dependent on their major competitor / buy Unix Systems Labs, do nothing to improve the install procedure, let it wither on the (SCO) vine / make a deal with their major competitor to help sell their product).
RedHat meanwhile, has set their own path (and annoyed many people in the process) but has been steadfast in their loyalty to the principles of FOSS. As a FOSS supporter, you don't have to like RedHat, but you do have to respect them. I hope if M$ goes after RedHat directly, the community cavalry will ride to the rescue. However, I expect (based on the many articles LT has linked to) that M$ is just barking, and there isn't much reason to fear their bite.
And one point that has been hinted at by some is that if M$ tried to take a bite out of a true FOSS company, it could be enough to make the community come together and demonstrate its strength. Talk about bad timing, if Vista sales are in fact the result of OEM purchases and those end up sitting on a shelf, the next several quarters could look really bad for M$. So to have the FOSS community expose their $6 billion patent FUDmill would force investors and customers to reconsider.
Later . . . Jim
It's easy to see what the long term goal is here.
1. make agreements that tie each respective Linux based OS distributers together in an unholy alliance with M$. then buy them all.
2. fight any antitrust action with "we own the IP anyway."
3.????????
4.Profit!
i wonder if the ever building momentum of Ubuntu has anything to do with this as well as the Red Hat situation.
maybe they are not seeing what they expected in the way of selling their Vista OS (which is turning out to be a real pain in the arse).
its like an old man who buys a Porche in a desperate attempt to cling to youth.
Stop using the phrase FUD, you're not even using it in the right context half the time and only encouraging more people to say it.
Good article.
FUD = Fear, Uncertainty, Doubt. How exactly is it wrong to say that Microsoft is using FUD in order to try and get people to pay them/sell to them/settle with them/sign agreements with them. This is EXACTLY what they are doing, because they have nothing else to back it up with.
This is an attempt at extorting from the Linux community (and from those with IP of their own) IP without the need to indemnify the masses. It allows them to get all the IP they desire in these cross licenses and then to pick the bat up to swing again.
This is really an extortion, and it hasn't been working. The community at large sees this as Microsoft claiming we are all criminals and that we belong in jail because we stole something but they won't tell us what we stole nor how long we belong in jail. That's sick. I'm sure there are legal consequences to making these claims without even attempting to prove them. Since most are probably false this is what has everyone upset. They are trying to kill quality projects and to demean solid citizens (most of which are great individuals in their own right for the commitment they have made to the rest of the world).
Microsoft's statements are demeaning, exaggerated lies that are libelous and slanderous. This makes them untrustworthy and also makes them about as evil as a corporation could, be shy being in cahoots with the likes of the Nazi's during WWII.
This is pure extortion. It is not a happy day for Microsoft nor for anyone else involved. It a sick plan to make money off the IP of the open source community. It is trying to steal that technology through other methods. Instead of outright taking it and expecting that they will have to defend in court (and loose as *most* every other case has been lost they are trying to extort it from the community in such a way as to keep from having to litigate after the fact.
IP is cross licensed like a web over the world (I stole that analogy), and Microsoft has only one venue where it can't just make cross license agreements so in an effort to force those agreements it is threatening to make everyone pay.
They've been caught stealing this stuff up front from other companies and have repeatedly been sued and now are looking for ways to get the IP, to maintain the bat for another swing, and keep others from suing them.
Clearly there are more IP violations in Windows than there are in Linux. Are all these IP violations from open source that Microsoft is violating? No, but they are from Open Source providers and so getting blanket coverage for this IP helps to deflect those that are purely open source when the time comes. When that time comes they'll just point us back to their agreements with Novell, etc and hope that'll be it. We can all wallow in our own shit fighting each other about who was responsible for ensuring this didn't happen and they'll be sitting in their mansions sipping their drinks laughing that open source has died.
If Windows underwent as much public scrutiny as Linux does day in and day out we'd see massive violations and theft of other people's code and thus their IP.
Some dope that works for Microsoft outright claimed 2007 is the year of the death of Open Source. He'll be sorely surprised when 2008 comes around and Open Source has made a greater impact on Microsoft than all previous years combined.
They are trying to do this because the high courts have essentially changed the rules regarding what is considered prior art and what is obviousness in patent consideration. These are retro checks. So any patent can be challenged against this change and that has Microsoft worried.
I hope I'm not redundant but Redhat was the initial company to have discussions on a cross licensing deal with Microsoft. Novell heard about this and said wait, wait whatever Redhat will acquiesce to we'll acquiesce to double that. Redhat is beating the pants off of Novell to the point that they are tending to become more and more irrelevant. Right now the pillars of the OS community are IBM, Redhat, Mozilla, OSDL, Ubuntu(took Novell's spot), MySQL and Apache. They are the big names or the big money and more and more money is joining the ship or trying to get on every day. Oracle, Sun and etc... Microsoft came out and said this because they needed to use the credit they bought with their licensing agreement with Novell. Either that or IBM, Redhat, Mozilla, OSDL or Apache have a significant patent that Microsoft infringes upon. Right now the OS community is akin to cockroaches you can kill a few that you may see but a ton more are lurking just waiting for the opportunity to take the spot light. But image if those cockroaches dragged poison into your food, there is only one of you. Microsoft is basically receiving death by a thousand cuts and has no idea what to do. And if someone in the OS community actually has a patent that MS clearly infringes... It could be all over and no one knows it.
Honestly, I just want Microsoft to come out swinging, so they can get knocked out in court, and hopefully take software patents down the tubes with them, so we can all go back to being productive, instead of just talking about this non-sense.
Microsoft, If you want to protect your IP then please name the patents that you think that FOSS is infringing. If this is not possible then SHUT YOUR MOUTH UP.
Something major was left out of your analysis. The fact that it's not mentioned here is indicative of whats going on everywhere and probably makes MS even more nervous. No one is talking about (or installing) Vista. I have a copy still in it's pretty plastic sitting on my shelf. It's gathering dust. Furthermore it's undesirability makes XP all the more pointless. Win2k runs better and faster.
Now is the time to push the game developers into releasing 64bit Linux versions. Nail, coffin.
I've been following this "story" for a few days now and I'm still surprised that I can find no mention of these so called IP infringements on Microsoft's website. I wonder why?
PS: Screw you microsuck.
I've been following this "story" for a couple of days now, and I'm still surprised that there is no mention of these so called IP infringements on Microsoft's website. I wonder why?
"...for the first time in a long time, Microsoft is not getting 100% OEM from an major Intel-based vendor."
Aren't all Macs using Intel-based x86 now?
>>Aren't all Macs using Intel-based x86 now?
Macintoys don't count, thank God. Apple wrote the book on vendor lock-in, DRM, and anti-interoperability. With Microsoft versus Apple, we can honestly, clearly, and definitively say that the lesser of two evils won. Had Apple won, you can guarantee that their OS would run only on obscenely overpriced, underchoiced hardware, as it did until just a few years ago.
However, while the lesser of two evils won, the evil that did win is still one that we need to defeat.
Regards,
mcinsand
Maybe everyone is thinking too small. RedHat is publicly held. Could be the start of a hostile takeover bid, if MicroSludge can scare the shareholders. They can't possibly believe they'll scare RH management.
Love the fog of war......
Redmond should go to hell! I own 3 legit copies of XP! Why 3? Because I reformat every 8 months or so and reinstalling goes bad sometimes,,,great! I love you Bill, I want a refund! you broke your own License agreement...I DID NOT CHANGE HARDWARE!
'However, I expect (based on the many articles LT has linked to) that M$ is just barking' - Jim
I'm still laughing at that. Being from the UK, where 'barking' doesn't just mean making noise.