p2pnet - rss feed: Microsoft versus GPLv3
p2pnet.net news:- If Bill and the Boyz get their way, free software won’t be free for very much longer.
Says Computerworld:
In an e-mail received by Computerworld late Sunday night, a Microsoft spokesman said the company was motivated to speak over concerns that the latest draft of the General Public License version 3, which governs distribution and use of Linux and many other open-source software, “attempts to tear down the bridge between proprietary and open source technology that Microsoft has worked to build with the industry and customers.”
“The Free Software Foundation’s efforts with GPLv3 while not harming existing contracts can harm the desired interoperability and open exchange that we have increasingly seen between proprietary and open source over the past several years,” he wrote.
The “Redmond behemoth” claims one of the reasons free software, “is of such high quality” is because it, “violates more than 200 of Microsoft’s patents,” says Fortune magazine.
“Microsoft claims that free software like Linux, which runs a big chunk of corporate America, violates 235 of its patents. It wants royalties from distributors and users,” says the story, going on:
The conflict pits Microsoft and its dogged CEO, Steve Ballmer, against the “free world” - people who believe software is pure knowledge. The leader of that faction is Richard Matthew Stallman, a computer visionary with the look and the intransigence of an Old Testament prophet.
Caught in the middle are big corporate Linux users like Wal-Mart, AIG, and Goldman Sachs. Free-worlders say that if Microsoft prevails, the whole quirky ecosystem that produced Linux and other free and open-source software (FOSS) will be undermined.
“Quirky” obviously means non-corporate.
Definitely stay tuned.
Also See:
Fortune - Microsoft takes on the free world, May 14, 2007
Computerworld - Microsoft demands royalties for open-source software, May 13, 2007
If your Net access is blocked by goverment restrictions, try Psiphon from the Citizen Lab at thIs the endSurvey: How Did Copyright Infringement Become Equated with Robbery? (of the Net) nigh?zze University of Toronto’s Munk Centre for International Studies. Go here for the official download, here for the p2pnet download, and here for details. And if you’re Chinese and you’re looking for a way to access independent Internet news sources, try Freegate, the DIT program written to help Chinese citizens circumvent web site blocking outside of China. Download it here.
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May 14th, 2007 at 11:30 am
This whole idea of patenting software is totally insane. Thousands of software application routines were published in books long before Microsoft came onto the scene with MSDOS. In fact, before the Apple-II came around, many of us were developing software for the CP/M operating system (S100 ring a bell ?). When the Apple-II came around, a company called Microsoft developed the Z80 Softcard which allowed Apples to run the CP/M operating system. A few years later, when IBM was looking for an operating system, Microsoft was picked after Bill Gates purchased an operating system from another company. MSDOS was so close to the likeness of CP/M that it made it easy to transition over to IBM. When multi-tasking applications were introduced, each task was considered to be operating within its own task “window”. Interesting that Microsoft claims ownership to many software applications that were produced by other companies. If Microsoft does indeed sue for software patent infringement, I believe many of their patents will be disqualified due to “prior art” or for “obviousness” reasons. I also feel Microsoft let us down when it introduced the infamous “lock down” OS called Vista. Terminating the availability of XP simply put the “icing on the cake”. Goodbye Microsoft.
May 14th, 2007 at 1:35 pm
Microsoft would have to nutts to go down this road. If they do and has been made public Microsoft will have patent suit coming in left right and center. I dont think Microsoft are that silly.
May 14th, 2007 at 6:47 pm
“Same thing we try and do every night Pinky, TRY AND TAKE OVER THE WORLD!!!”
Well, as long as MS opens up their code, ALL their code so their claims can be verified then that’s just peachy…