Bonum Certa Men Certa

Microsoft: It's an "Intellectual Property" Deal

As the saying goes, there are two sides to every story.

Novell has said, over and over, that their deal with Microsoft is an interoperability deal, with the IP considerations and Patent Covenant being a minor aspect of the deal.

Of course, we know that Microsoft sees the deal much differently, and the companies have agreed to disagree to date over the significance of the deal.

In an interview with Computer News Middle East, Microsoft's Bill Hilf provided more on Microsoft's perspective on the deal:

CNME There have been looming questions for years if Microsoft would file lawsuits over intellectual property contained in Linux. What is Microsoft's motivation with Novell?

Hilf: This is an intellectual-property deal. There will be an overlap at some point between our intellectual property and open source that we have to resolve. We knew that. It was going to happen. It was just a question of when.

We said let's put in place something that allows us to a) establish a process for how we can work with an open-source company on our intellectual property, b) do it in such as way that it can still work within the [GNU] GPL [general public license] and c) how do we do this in a way where we can clearly draw the line between the community developer, the non-commercial open-source community guy writing code and the commercial developer who is using open-source code.

CNME: What is the overlap between what Microsoft does and what the open-source community does?

Hilf: We have the largest software patent portfolio in the world. With open source we needed to have something in place where we knew that if our intellectual property was infringed upon we had a framework in place to resolve that in an effective way. The terms of the agreement that relate specifically to what we call covenants for Novell customers are related to the fact that those customers will be deploying a variety of open source.

We said there is a way we can cover that customer and still have value for our intellectual property. The second part is there is a large class of people in the community who are writing software for free and are not selling it and who may either intentionally or inadvertently step into that footprint of our intellectual property. What we are trying to do is draw the line between people who make money from this and people who don't.

It is a relatively short, but pointed, interview relating almost entirely to Microsoft's open source and intellectual property philosophies, and how the Novell deal relates. Interestingly, the word interoperability never arises, but then again like Mr. Hilf said, it's an intellectual-property deal.

One thing that Microsoft and Novell apparently do agree upon is the exclusion of 'commercial' developers from their patent covenant, here is Novell South Africa country manager Stafford Masie at the recent CITI Forum Q&A:

Let me address 'the only SUSE and why?', I think its because we... because of the SUSE acquisition, the OpenSUSE distribution is within our fold, so we represent that distribution and this agreement with Microsoft, again, wasn't just an openSUSE agreement, that's part of the covenant exception for Linux but that covenant extends... it overarches all of our patent portfolio, so its the proprietary patent portfolios and its the open source innovations, etc so its both areas covered - so lets not make it agreement only for opensuse, it was an interoperability agreement with Microsoft this covenant is in place from a patent protection perspective for our entire range of technologies as far as that interoperability is concerned in Linux, so...

Secondly is, this is not exclusive, this is not an exclusive arrangement with Microsoft and we are encouraging Red Hat, Ubuntu, etc to consider a similar agreement, if it makes sense to them, with Microsoft. We, we are encouraging that, especially from a, y'know, patent perspective...

Not for commercial gain? Yes. Those that are hacking, the participants, we are protecting. People that are making a career out of it, people... this covenant does not protect those people, but everything else that we do protects you. We've got the OIN, we've got indemnification, there are so many other vehicles that have not been nullified by this agreement that you can gain access to.

So, again, make sure that you don't look at it as an only OpenSUSE thing, it is a broader Microsoft-Novell interoperability that addresses SUSE, because SUSE is ours, and those that are doing it for commercial purposes, they're covered by, I believe, the other vehicles we have in place, OK?

So, will Novell claim that Hilf's comments have been taken out of context as well, or will they admit that Microsoft has had a different agenda from the very beginning?

Of course, perhaps Novell truly believes they can handle their agenda, whatever it may be.

Recent Techrights' Posts

Red Hat QA Team "Had Shrunk by Half Over the Past Year." (After IBM Divestment)
If Red Hat's workforce is being moved to the East, then RHEL can become a national security problem
 
Slopwatch: Scams, Fake Articles About "Linux", Plagiarism, and Worse
Perhaps some time soon the LLMs or the "Big LLMs" will run out of money (to borrow) and go offline, leaving those slopfarms in a tough place
Gemini Links 04/09/2025: Means of Production and Rusting Out
Links for the day
Links 04/09/2025: Science, Hardware, and Eyes on China
Links for the day
Gemini Links 04/09/2025: Digital Minimalism and Social Control Media
Links for the day
IBM's GNU/Linux Divestment, Based on Hard But Anecdotal Evidence (IBM Fails to Recognise How Much Money It Made and Can Still Make From "Linux")
Love us or hate us, a lot of what we've been saying about Red Hat under IBM turns out to be rather accurate
Links 04/09/2025: Massive Microsoft Staff Cuts (Barely Reported), "Strange Conspiracy Theory Is Reportedly Spreading Inside OpenAI"
Links for the day
Activists Can Win, But Keep an Eye on the Ball and on the Trophy
GitHub is dying, it was a loss-making trap, not free hosting
Gemini Links 04/09/2025: Katrina Remembered, Distracted Driving, and Virtual Economics
Links for the day
At This Point It's No Longer Matthew Garrett But People Who Fund Matthew Garrett (or Companies That Fund His SLAPPs Against My Wife and I)
The only thing worse than misogynists are misogynists who fail to respect other people's right to go on holiday
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Wednesday, September 03, 2025
IRC logs for Wednesday, September 03, 2025
The UEFI 9/11 - Part VI - This Serious Harm Was Planned for Over a Decade, Not an Accident or Merely Some Misfortune
The term "Serious Harm" is legally meaningful here
GNOME Unfit for Diversity and Inclusion
GNOME's leadership is using "bad words"
Brodie Robertson Addressing the Recently-Discovered Comments
Most people probably knew nothing about this until he wrote a response
Slopwatch: "Open Source" and "Linux" News Faked, Made by Bots and Entered Into Google News
Spam combined with slop about "Linux" has entered Google News
Links 03/09/2025: Microsoft Causes Mass Layoffs Outside Microsoft Also, "Google Can Keep Paying for Firefox Search Deal"
Links for the day
Gemini Links 03/09/2025: calendar.txt, Alhena 5.3.1, and ROOPHLOCH
Links for the day
The Theory That the Man From McKinsey, Whom Red Hat Took From Microsoft a Month Ago as Executive, Wants 'Efficiency' (Lower Salaries)
So far... no "official" word
When Your Site's Articles Are Being 'Cheapened' by Slop as Feature Images
Dr. Farnell should become an advisor to The Register MS
Certificate Authority Let's Encrypt Drops to Only Half a Dozen Capsules and 0.2% of the Whole in Geminispace, Self-Signed is the Way to Go
It used to have hundreds, according to Lupa
Doing to Red Hat What They Already Did (and Still Do) to IBM
there seems to be a drive to hire cheaper staff, and it may be led by somebody Red Hat hired from Microsoft
Links 03/09/2025: Salesforce's Latest Mass Layoffs, 93% in Large Poll at The Register MS Say UK Government Should Dump Microsoft
Links for the day
Preparations for Our 19th Anniversary Have Already Begun
When we get back we'll probably sort out some balloons and venue for the next party
Pleased After 2 Years With team.blue
Moving from a Content Management System (CMS, dynamic) to a Static Site Generator (SSG) was a wise decision that made life so much easier
The Free Software Foundation (FSF) is Being Attacked by Organisations Jealous of Its Principled Stance and Longevity
Nobody is perfect, but imperfection does not instantaneously imply sinister intent
If You Reject the Google Verdict in the US, Then You Should Also Reject the "Modern" Web (Do Something About It)
Gemini Protocol is still open; it cannot be hijacked or subverted because it's frozen by design and by intention
Open Source Initiative IRS Filing: Almost All the Money is Corporate, Stefano Maffuli (Executive Director) Takes About a Quarter of That Money for Openwashing of "AI" Ponzi Scheme
OSI is currently little but a PR/marketing agency of Microsoft
Many People Are "Leaving" Red Hat, Even High-Level Managers
Something is definitely going on at Red Hat
Techrights Has Been Subjected to Calls of Violence (and Death Threats), It Never Condoned Violence
I have no sympathy for people who call violence "free speech" and then get in trouble
Condoning Violent Behaviour and "Free Speech"
perhaps Microsoft Lunduke lost touch with what constitutes violence
Takeaway From the Google Verdict: GAFAM Has Too Much Control (Even Over the US Government and Courts With Government Appointees)
Many people feel disappointed but hardly surprised by the verdict
The Free Software Foundation (FSF) Turns 40 in One Month
As noted a few days ago, several times in fact, many people now recognise the importance of the FSF's mission, even if most people don't know what the FSF is
Many Microsoft "Assets" Are Fabricated Baloney (to Game the Numbers)
At times it seems like what we deal with are many weak patents (on algorithms), valuations or speculations based on hype ("hey hi"), and stocks held by Microsoft and its own staff
"Voluntary" Layoffs at Microsoft (to Game the Numbers, Sugar-Coating a Crisis)
"Employees interested have until the end of October to volunteer."
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Tuesday, September 02, 2025
IRC logs for Tuesday, September 02, 2025