05.05.09

Intel’s Co-Founder Spills the Beans on the Great Patent Lie

Posted in Hardware, Patents, Quote at 3:16 pm by Dr. Roy Schestowitz

Summary: Intel’s Andy Grove compares patents to toxic loans

Setting aside Intel's many market-bound crimes for a moment, here we have another abusive monopolist saying what he really thinks about intellectual monopolies:

• Andy Grove: Patents Are Like Mortgage Backed Securities

It’s an interesting comparison and one that does seem apt the more you think about it. In separating out the “security” from the underlying asset, we tend to distort things. It was that distortion that resulted in the financial crisis, as it enabled those who wanted to sell risky things to obscure the actual risks and pretend that their securities were safer than they were.

• Grove Says Patent System May Have Same Flaws as Derivatives

Andy Grove, who oversaw Intel Corp.’s emergence as the world’s largest chip company, says the U.S. patent system suffers from the same kind of flaws that brought about the global financial crisis.

Patents have evolved to a point where they often aren’t developed into products, and instead are instruments traded by speculators looking for the highest possible profit, Grove said May 2 at an event in Mountain View, California. Similar to financial derivatives, the link between patents and the products they protect is getting more tenuous, he said.

• Intel’s Grove: Something foul in Silicon Valley

Speaking to a diverse Silicon Valley audience that included Gordon Moore (founder of both Fairchild Semiconductor and Intel); Ted Hoff (co-inventor of the microprocessor); Carver Mead (VLSI concept); Intel CEO Paul Otellini; and Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak, Grove said the patent system is slouching toward the model that precipitated the financial crisis in the U.S.

Isn’t it sad that while Intel’s origins insist that patents are toxic, Intel is also accused (in China for example) of being an abusive monopoly which is endlessly using its patents to terrorise competitors? It’s sincere hypocrisy. █

“If people had understood how patents would be granted when most of today’s ideas were invented, and had taken out patents, the industry would be at a complete standstill today.”

–Bill Gates (when Microsoft was smaller)

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Microsoft Cuts 5,000 Staff, More Likely to Come

Posted in Finance, Microsoft at 11:51 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz

Summary: Overview of the coverage regarding Microsoft’s latest round of layoffs

WE WROTE about this yesterday and it turns out to be true. The company which relentlessly attacks GNU/Linux and also suppresses Freedom is down for the count (again).

Cringely said 50,000, but Microsoft may make it another 5,000 — for now.

• Microsoft starts second round of layoffs. More to come?
• Report: Microsoft Won’t Rule Out More Layoffs
• Microsoft Announces Second Wave In 5,000 Job Cuts Plan
• Microsoft moves forward on plan to lay off 5,000
• Microsoft completes staff cuts faster than planned
• Microsoft Announces Another Round of Job Cuts
• Microsoft cuts thousands more jobs
• More layoffs at Microsoft today, says company e-mail from Steve Ballmer
• Microsoft Enters Phase 2 with Plan to Cut 5,000 Jobs
• Microsoft cut more jobs in their operations
• Microsoft starts next job cuts, hints at more
• Microsoft Announces Round Two of Layoffs
• More pink slips go out at Microsoft
• Fargo’s Microsoft begins second round of job cuts this year
• Microsoft layoff buzz intensifies

UK coverage:

• Microsoft confirms 5 per cent of UK jobs to go
• Microsoft to cut 150 jobs in UK
• Microsoft carries out second round of planned job cuts
• Ballmer email kicks off second round of Microsoft layoffs

More details will come soon. It will also be realised which products/services/divisions get reduced or altogether axed.

The company’s shares are down today. Well, obviously they are. The company’s earnings are down 32% and GNU/Linux is partly responsible. █

“[If I ask you who is Microsoft's biggest competitor now, who would it be?] Open…Linux. I don’t want to say open source. Linux, certainly have to go with that.”

–Steve Ballmer (Microsoft’s CEO), February 28^th, 2008

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Consumer Watchdog Funded by the Rose Foundation, Which is Funded by Exxon, Banks, Others…

Posted in Deception, Finance, Google, Microsoft, SCO at 8:29 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz

Following the anti-Google grant…

“…Microsoft wished to promote SCO and its pending lawsuit against IBM and the Linux operating system. But Microsoft did not want to be seen as attacking IBM or Linux.”

–Larry Goldfarb, Baystar, key investor in SCO

Summary: Consumer Watchdog, formerly hosted by an AstroTurfing firm, has its Google attack funded ($100,000) by the Rose Foundation, which in turn has other funders

YESTERDAY’S POST about Consumer Watchdog brought the attention of those involved, who mostly defected the questions we asked.

Here is slightly tidied-up log from a conversation that took place over the past hour.

There is some more in yesterday’s IRC log. This is where the subject, like many others that we cover, originally came up. █

“[Microsoft's] Mr. Emerson and I discussed a variety of investment structures wherein Microsoft would ‘backstop,’ or guarantee in some way, BayStar’s investment…. Microsoft assured me that it would in some way guarantee BayStar’s investment in SCO.”

–Larry Goldfarb, Baystar, key investor in SCO

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IRC: #boycottnovell @ FreeNode: May 4th, 2009

Posted in IRC Logs at 4:56 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz

Enter the IRC channel now

Read the rest of this entry »

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OIN Explains TomTom’s Settlement with Microsoft (and Other Patent News)

Posted in America, Europe, GNU/Linux, IBM, Kernel, Microsoft, OIN, Patents, TomTom at 4:24 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz

Summary: TomTom may reveal the details of its FAT settlement, Topolanek escapes the room, and an IBMer might become the next PTO Director

IAM Magazine, a site by lawyers for lawyers (i.e. patent maximalism), has just published an interesting entry (free subscription to read) whose heading heralds: “Microsoft invites TomTom to reveal settlement terms after OIN chief’s claims”

Speaking in a session based on the EPO’s Scenarios for the Future project, Bergelt explained that under Dutch law, a company only has to reveal how much it has paid to settle a dispute if the amount exceeds a certain percentage of its market capitalisation. According to Bergelt, in TomTom’s case the sum would have had to have been over $500,000. As TomTom has not made any figures public, Bergelt claimed, the settlement amount must have fallen below the threshold.

This pretty much answers the question about the amount TomTom was required to pay. It was already discussed in [1, 2]. Digital Majority found this interesting part of a thread about FAT in Linux (TomTom effect): “Steve, can you please stop the bullsh**ting? From the complete lack of technical arguments it’s pretty obvious that this seems to be some FUD fallout from the MS vs TomTom patent lawsuit.”

The Linux FUD blog, which debunks Linux FUD on a routinely basis, has just written about Microsoft’s strategy with patents and lawsuits against Linux. Here is just a portion:

Microsoft vs. Linux

Microsoft has claimed that Linux violates approximately 235 patents. The company has reportedly “chosen” to not sue, and the rationale for this choice has been the topic of much speculation. Microsoft has not revealed the details of the violations, including the identifying numbers of the violated patents.

Lack of merit in the claim is probably the reason most people believe Microsoft has not filed – in other words, Microsoft is bluffing. Perhaps Microsoft knows that the patents are not enforcible for one reason or another, but it also knows fully that it retains power derived from fear so long as it can make threats that sound credible. If the claim does lack merit, that power would diminish rapidly once a case is brought against the first defendant. Either the patents would be found to be unenforcible (e.g. prior art would be proven), or legal action against one defendant would prompt the Linux community as a whole to adapt quickly. Details of the suit would provide the vital information required to ensure that Linux complies with all patents going forward.

Many Linux supporters and advocates disapproved when Novell and XandrOS succumbed to this fear when they signed their now famous “peace treaties” with Microsoft.

There is another interesting entry in IAM Magazine. Some time ago we wrote about the Microsoft-sponsored presidency from the Czech Republic and its role in lobbying for software patents in Europe [1, 2]. It is doing a lot of damage and now we find this hilarious report:

Patent change in Europe is unlikely if business leaders remain silent

[...]

With all that that in mind, Topolanek claimed that he was confident that the Czech Presidency of the EU had enabled progress which could now be built on by the Swedes, who assume the presidency at the end of June. It all sounded very impressive, I have to say – a national leader talking eloquently about the importance of patents to Europe’s future. Who’d have thought it? Then he was asked to explain what the Czechs had done in concrete terms to take things forward. He paused for a very brief moment before saying: “I do not know, this is not my area.” He then got up and left.

Priceless.

So on behalf of large multinationals, those politicians seem to be promoting more fences and barriers to competition. Then they are surprised that no support is received from local businesses, except the fake ones (AstroTurfers for monopolies).

Other patent news this week:

• Bits and Bytes: Patent Reform
• Bad Patent Advice from the Wall Street Journal
• Patent Litigation Weekly: Upstairs, Downstairs in Marshall

It turns out that the next PTO Director might sadly enough be coming from a company which is in favour of software patents (IBM).

Much of the job of PTO director involves employee relations, and Kappos continues to successfully lead one of the largest private patent departments in the world. His current and former employees are loyal to him as a leader and praise his creativity and genius. The IBM IP office is known for its spirited and open debates on policy and direction. In my view, this corporate management experience and patent prosecution experience are more relevant to running the PTO than – say – running litigation teams at a law firm, managing a congressional committee, or even teaching a group of law students.

The FSF is already taking its fight against software patents up a notch:

End Software Patents today launched en.swpat.org, a wiki to document the case against software patents. Over 100 articles have already been started to give an idea of the scope and structure of the wiki.

Any contributions to that Wiki would of course be valuable. █

“Small enterprises generally adopt a rather negative position towards the current increasing granting of patents for software and algorithms because they fear that these will hamper or eventually even impede their work (more than 85%).” —German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF), Study of the Innovation Performance of German Software Companies, 2006, p. 86

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Is Jupiter Broadcasting’s Linux Action Show Anti-GNU/Linux?

Posted in FUD, GNU/Linux, Microsoft, Mono, Novell at 3:37 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz

Just “Linux” without the rest, except Mono maybe

Summary: Familiar talking points promote bashing of GNU/Linux

THIS subject is not exactly new, but it is something that we never wrote about before. Vicious attacks on Richard Stallman have already come^* from the “Linux” [sic] Action Show (Jupiter Broadcasting), so it is clear that the mentality over there is a little different from some.

While we see no need to produce a link to the vicious attacks on Richard Stallman and other things in GNU/Linux, surprise surprise here comes another new attack.

One of our reader asks, “just who is doing the talking?”

Here is this video of the who was giving the talk. Our reader/informant asks, “what kind of fan opens a talk with ‘Linux Sucks’, trashes 64 bit Linux (a ‘question’ from the audience), trashes Gimp, and uptalks Mono?”

Speaking of Mono, here is a new post about it:

Re-spinning famous quotes: Linux and Cancer.

[...]

The strange thing is, replace just one word in the quote and it makes perfect sense to me:

Mono is a cancer that attaches itself in an intellectual property sense to everything it touches.

On goes our reader, connecting the talk also to “Linux Hater” (of whom Novell's de Icaza is a fan):

That whole blog seems to be designed to put people off. Imagine Novell trashing their own OS on their own website. In the referenced video the first speaker talks of lets not go at this from any sort of morality or open freeness or anything like that. But from ‘Linux sucks’.

You don’t fix issues with Open Office, you report them to the developers who fix them !!

I’m very disappointing in de Icaza that he would associate with stuff like this. See the latest from linuxhaters.blogspot.com. He links to a Novell blog post about Linux being ok for ‘fun and experiments’ but not for serious professional use. A lot of I like Linux except it lacks x-feature fud. They would of course pick the the most high end intensive application they could find.

“you will have problems. I think that Linux apps will be different and will have less functionality… but you should have free time”

Then they point to a “Linux Sucks” presentation, that recommends Mono…

The problem with this kind of ‘support’ is that while it is legitimate technical criticism, it will be taken up by the astroturfers to trash the platform. As in this case being referenced on a blog referenced by Linux Hater. Well, well, well; what do you know the Novell blog references the Linux Hater blog. And now we get a classic troll of the form of appealing to authority. As in you can believe my credentials but not me. As even me wouldn’t believe me.

“I’m a professional video editor… I would never try to use linux for professional video editing. There are two reasons for this”

[...]

“Apparently Linux is bad at some video and audio tasks”

This type of trashing is already being picked up by Internet publications like ECT, for example, which has just come up with the headline “Does Linux Suck?” These insulting headlines are being defended by self-procolaimed “Linux people” who trash the platform. █
________
^* We would rather not link to examples, but they are easy to find. Ridiculing the very same person who is the genesis of what their show is about is a step too far. In fact, these people are some of the most offensive anti-Free software broadcasters I’ve come across recently and they also promote Novell/SUSE. That’s why I decided never to link them and their show, although I may have done this before.

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European Internet Falls Ill

Posted in Europe at 2:50 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz

Summary: Europe’s Internet is under attack freedom-wise and bandwidth-wise

ABOUT HALF of Boycott Novell’s readers are located in the United States, but two of our readers from Europe wanted to pass on timely information. Given the nature of such information, this medium seems more or less suitable.

An anonymous reader wrote:

I suppose you are aware of this campaign: “European Emergency!: on May 6th some of the Europarlamentaries intend to finish with the freedom of the Internet.” Blackout Europe says, ““The European open internet is under imminent threat.”

Our reader explains: “You might consider writing to the MEPs so that they can vote for amendments that would assure no disconnection or Web censorship is executed upon the citizens without a judge ordering it. I saw a video of a MEP, Nigel Farage, and he seemed quite honest on the in favor for a referendum, I know he is a right-wing euroskeptic, but maybe he would be receptive to an e-mail. (I am probably wrong, just an idea). In case the telecom package gets approved without any modification that guarantees our civil rights and freedoms, we will be a great step closer to 1984. Let’s hope not.”

A separate reader complains about Internet speeds being stifled in the UK. He went on about a BBC program which covered 100 MB fiber link to people’s homes, explaining that:

The BBC had a program on last night about fiber-to-home in parts of London near a football stadium. They fired it up and then went to the iPlayer site, only it stuck at 32 MB a second. They then went to an Ubuntu download site and downloaded an ISO at 7.76 MB. Finally they recommended the 100 MB link for a number of client PCs.

[...]

Well, it’s interesting as to what it says about the state of broadband in a ‘developed’ country in mid 2009. iirc from the show, ***Korea*** has better broadband than the UK. There was also an interview with a (BT?) telecom rep explaining as to how people don’t want fiber to their homes or it wouldn’t be worth it, which is why it stops at the street and then goes copper.

They then do a demo of iPlayer at 100MB, which is chocked off by the BBC at 32MB. The point being that the demo, on the BBC, of iPlayer at 100 MB, demonstrates that it don’t work. This is a consumer program, presumably designed to enthuse us to upgrade to fiber (at great expense), and it demonstrates that there isn’t a service out there that works at 100 MB !!

My comment is, why should the consumer upgrade to 100 MB broadband when there isn’t any services to handle that kind of traffic? And the media providers won’t supply rich-fast services as the link to the consumer won’t yet carry it.

It is worth adding that USENET too is under attack, but Internet freedom is not our focus here. █

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