Text 13709, 117 rader
Skriven 2006-11-04 11:49:06 av Rich Gauszka (1:379/45)
  Kommentar till text 13705 av /m (1:379/45)
Ärende: Re: Novell-Microsoft: What They Aren't Telling You
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From: "Rich Gauszka" <gauszka@hotmail.com>

http://www.cio.com/blog_view.html?CID=26338

"Excuse me while I go throw up," wrote Pamela Jones, editor of the Groklaw.net
blog, which tracks legal issues in the free software community. "I gather
Microsoft no longer thinks Linux is a cancer or communism. Now it just wants a
patent royalty.

"This is actually really bad news," said Bruce Perens, a well-known Linux
advocate. "It sets up Microsoft to assert its patents against all commercial
open-source users. The deal is going to be, 'You have to buy Microsoft-licensed
Linux distribution from Novell or there is an implicit threat that Microsoft
will assert their patents against you."


"/m" <mike@barkto.com> wrote in message
news:qnrok2dbhc590tdj9fd38gc9gdo72l993i@4ax.com...
>
> http://technocrat.net/d/2006/11/2/9945
>
> ===
> Today Novell and Microsoft announced a partnership in which Microsoft
> has made some unlikely-seeming promises regarding Linux. What aren't
> they telling you? First, you can be sure that Microsoft's not out to
> help a competitor. This announcement paves the way for Microsoft to
> implement significant control over commercial customer's use of Free
> Software. And it has significant negative implications for Open Source
> in general.
> There are two significant announcements. First, that Novell and
> Microsoft are entering into a patent cross-license, and second, that
> Microsoft is promising not to assert its patents against individual
> non-commercial developers. The bad part is that this sets Microsoft up
> to assert its patents against all commercial Open Source users. There
> are also some little bonuses for Microsoft, like Novell will help
> Microsoft turn back the Open Document Format and substitute something
> Microsoft controls.
>
>
>
> When we say "commercial", it's interesting to note that there are really
> few non-commercial users: people who only use their computer for a
> hobby. Buying something on a web site, for example, is a commercial use.
> Most individuals use their computers in some aspect of making their
> livelihood. There will now be a Microsoft-approved path for such people
> to make use of Open Source, an expensive subscription to Novell SuSe
> Linux that costs as much or more than Microsoft Windows and that comes
> with a patent license.
>
> So, the protection of non-commercial individual contributors means that
> you can make Open Source, but if anyone actually uses it for something
> other than a hobby or a non-profit organization, there is an implicit
> threat that Microsoft can bring a software patent lawsuit against them -
> unless they are a customer of Novell.
>
> One of the questions yet to be settled is whether Novell will violate
> the GPL, the license of the Linux kernel and other important software,
> by offering patent protection that is exclusive to Novell customers. The
> press release pretty much stated that. On that topic, the preamble of
> the GPL says it best:
>
>  We wish to avoid the danger that redistributors of a free
>  program will individually obtain patent licenses, in effect
>  making the program proprietary. To prevent this, we have made
>  it clear that any patent must be licensed for everyone's free
>  use or not licensed at all.
>
> Novell has clearly accepted that license. But it appears that they are
> now out to make patent protection a business differentiator.
>
>
> Even if everyone were to be protected regarding software that Novell
> distributes, there's the tremendous collection of Free Software that
> they don't distribute. A logical next move for Microsoft could be to
> crack down on "unlicensed Linux", and "unlicensed Free Software", now
> that it can tell the courts that there is a Microsoft-licensed path. Or
> they can just passively let that threat stay there as a deterrent to
> anyone who would use Open Source without going through the
> Microsoft-approved Novell path.
>
> With this agreement, Microsoft also secures Novell's assistance in
> pushing a pro-Software-patenting agenda in Europe and elsewhere. On a
> panel that I led at the AlwaysOn conference this summer, Novell's
> president made clear their support for software patenting - a policy
> that works to the detriment of any Open Source developer who wants to
> have users without Novell's blessing. You can be sure they'll be at
> Microsoft's elbow now in meeting with legislators and asking for
> increases in patent protection.
>
> The timing of this agreement is significant. Microsoft and Novell are
> said to have been working on this agreement for some time, and sped up
> its announcement to take attention away from Oracle's recent
> announcement and to further depress Red Hat in the stock market. The
> timing of the SCO case is also significant. Recent testimony in that
> case revealed that Microsoft offered to "backstop" VC firm Baystar's
> investment in SCO, essentially asking Baystar to be a front through
> which Microsoft funded SCO's attempt to... charge a royalty to users of
> Linux. SCO's case is foundering, so here's Microsoft's next scheme to
> charge a royalty to users of Linux, and to make Novell into the next
> SCO. Groklaw, a widely-respected journal of technology law, probably
> said it best with their headline on this story: Novell Sells Out.
>
> This entire agreement hinges around software patenting - monopolies on
> ideas that are burying the software industry in litigation - rather than
> innovation. If we've learned one thing from the rapid rise of Open
> Source, it's that intellectual property protection - the thing that Open
> Source dispenses with - actually impedes innovation. And the
> Novell-Microsoft agreement stands as an additional impediment.
> ===
>
> Here's a link to Groklaw: http://www.groklaw.net/
>
>
>  /m

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