09.14.09

Why is Microsoft’s Management Getting Out of Microsoft?

Posted in Finance, Microsoft, Vista, Vista 7, Windows at 5:22 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz

“[W]e’re not going to have products that are much more successful than Vista has been.”

–Steve Ballmer, less than a year ago

Summary: Craig Mundie sells about a third of his Microsoft shares in just one day

WHEN a company’s Board of Directors gets smaller and smaller, it indicates that there is a problem. Microsoft’s CFO is selling MSFT shares and so do Bill Gates and Microsoft’s COO, as reported at the beginning of this month and in August. Perhaps they all know what is coming (or rather, what’s not coming). Are they not excited and enthusiastic about the approaching release of Vista 7? Steve Ballmer seems like the last cheerleader left for this overly hyped second incarnation of Vista. If Microsoft’s pitch (not deeds, such as trade of stocks) was to be believed, Vista 7 would be the most wonderful thing since sliced bread.

Microsoft’s Craig Mundie was put in a position where he impacts government policy [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6] despite his well-documented hostility towards Free(dom) software. Craig Mundie once said: “This viral aspect of the GPL poses a threat to the intellectual property of any organization making use of it.” There are worse quotes from Mundie regarding the GPL — ones that we covered before. Mundie’s group is very badly affected by the recent layoffs (further layoffs are still ongoing, albeit quietly) and it should therefore not surprise that Mundie dumps almost a third of his shares.

Craig J. Mundie, chief research and strategy officer, sold 70,000 shares on Sept. 8 for $1.7 million, an average price of $24.48 each. After the sale, Mundie owned around 184,900 shares, down from around 254,900 shares.

He sells a almost too much for a single day and it’s his employer’s stock. Is there no regulatory issue here? Are laws relating to inside-trading not being applied to everyone who is managing Microsoft? How about Robbie Bach for example [1, 2, 3]? Are these people still above the law? █

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Microsoft is Sued for Another Technical Failure in Xbox 360

Posted in Courtroom, Microsoft at 4:33 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz

Summary: Another blow for Microsoft’s division that loses billions of dollars

MICROSOFT’S failure with Bungie is one that we last mentioned a fortnight ago. More broadly, Xbox 360 and Microsoft’s gaming business have been a total disaster financially. After many lawsuits over Xbox 360 (e.g. RRoD, scratched discs, patent violations) comes yet another one. Wired reports:

Halo 3 players are suing the game’s publisher Microsoft and the developer Bungie, claiming that Halo 3 doesn’t work properly with the Xbox 360 console.

To make matters worse for Halo, a month ago Microsoft tried to deny that its Halo film had gotten cancelled, but this new report tells a different story.

…Microsoft’s major plan to make a series of games built around the Halo movie fell apart.

Microsoft leveraged its press to create extraordinary Halo hype; but this type of hype is not built to last, as Microsoft found out after it had spent hundreds of millions of dollars hyping up Windows Vista (and currently Vista 7). █

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Eye on Microsoft: Failures of Windows Mobile, Windows Vista, and Vista 7

Posted in Microsoft, Security, Vista, Vista 7, Windows at 3:59 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz

Summary: Weekly overview of news and Op-Eds

• Does Microsoft Windows Mobile Have A Future?

Name Change = Desperation
Even Microsoft seems to know it is in trouble. One clear sign of a failing product line is a name change. After using Windows Mobile since the operating system’s launch at the turn of the millennium, the company decided that phones running version 6.5 of the operating system will be known as Windows phones, a subtle but telling distinction.

So where will Microsoft go from here? The company has put a lot of time and money into its mobile OS. Because of its tight connection with Microsoft Office desktop applications, the operating system has had significant appeal to small and medium businesses. But that integration also carried a price in terms of ease of use and performance. And the market seems to be saying Office compatibility may no longer be enough to compete with faster, sexier, and easier-to-use smartphones running on other operating systems.

• Microsoft Desperate For Windows 7 Success

Microsoft’s clout in the computing world is slipping fast. New competition is moving in from nearly every side with companies like Google and Apple starting to take chunks out of their market share, and the increased presence and continually growing quality of open source software provides pressure too. The recent economic downturn has encouraged more people and businesses to explore those other alternatives, and Microsoft is feeling the pain. These latest moves seem almost desperate to me, and right now it appears that the only thing Microsoft is reluctant to try is improving their software.

• Why Microsoft Will Continue To Fail

Microsoft has turned into a marketing and legal machine, aimed at taking down it’s competitors in any under-handed way possible. I’m not naive enough to believe they’re alone – I know that other big software companies use some of the same tricks. But the problem is the lack of focus on quality new products. I have been trying very hard to reserve judgement on Windows 7 until it was released. I’ve been fairly impressed with the release candidate I’ve been test driving. But a lack of anything really new, plus recent news of huge security issues already being uncovered have shaken my faith.

Microsoft is not currently a software company, and unless they find a way to re-focus on developing software that people actually want to use, their competition will continue to grow faster and take their market share until Microsoft is no longer relevant.

• CAFC Gives Microsoft Word Stay, and I HATE Vista!

Then someone pointed out to me in a comment that it was on PACER, just indexed under the filing date of Microsoft’s request for the stay rather than the date it was granted, which is ridiculous enough, but then things took a much weirder turn for me. I HATE VISTA!!!!!

Like virtually everyone that owns a Vista machine, my primary computer, which is a laptop I carry with me everywhere in my travels, has seen its better days. This particular machine is the ripe old age of 6 months old, and as near as I can tell its better days were those days prior to the loading of Vista, which as far as I can tell is a computer virus! Nothing operates properly on a Vista machine, not even Internet Explorer. Oddly enough, Mozilla Firefox is more stable on a Vista machine than IE, go figure.

• Security experts warn of possible worm hitting Vista

A group of top security analysts and researchers say the latest Windows security hole, for which there is no patch, leaves hundreds of millions of Windows Vista PCs wide open for infection by a Conficker-like Internet worm.

• Microsoft flaw could open PCs to Conficker-style attack

Microsoft has just raised a red flag about a recently discovered security flaw in Windows Vista and Windows Server 2008 PCs for which no patch yet exists. This affects all Vista PCs used in the home and workplace, and computer servers running Windows Server 2008 operating system.

• Be sure to get Microsoft Office updates

This week includes the second Tuesday of the month — “PatchTuesday,” as it’s come to be known — the day when Microsoft issues “patches” to fix the latest security and operational flaws that have been found in its products. Most prudent computer users, one way or another, access these patches through the Windows Update Web site.

• Attackers target Microsoft IIS; new SMB flaw discovered

• Microsoft Fixes Eight Security Flaws

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Microsoft Runs Away from the Press After Trying to Have GNU/Linux Sued by Proxy

Posted in Free/Libre Software, GNU/Linux, Microsoft, Mono, Novell, OIN, Patents at 3:35 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz

Summary: Microsoft cannot deny trying to “screw Linux” by proxy; Miguel de Icaza’s new role at Microsoft revisited

Microsoft’s shameful behaviour may not be a violation of American law, but for this despicable pattern of behaviour, an embargo or a boycott would only be reasonable. Microsoft got caught trying to sue its competitor, GNU/Linux, by proxy [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6]. This is not some so-called “conspiracy theory” and Microsoft, which got caught red-handed, is doing everything it can to avoid and to distract. It is possible, as we argued yesterday, that the CodePlex Foundation announcement was made specifically as a strategic tool for altering the centre of debate. This also comes shortly after a leak showed Microsoft attacking GNU/Linux in retail [1, 2, 3, 4].

Information Week has apparently attempted to reach Microsoft for a comment. Surprise, surprise… everyone at Microsoft must be on a September vacation because the company arrogantly refuses to reply to important questions.

Microsoft did not respond to a specific question about whether it had labeled some of the patents as “Linux-focused.” It didn’t respond by press time to a follow up question on whether its marketing material included suggested targets for patent claims.

[...]

Microsoft acquired the 22 patents several years ago in a larger deal with SGI, the former Silicon Graphics Inc., and the patents have been labeled by some sources as only concerning 3D graphics. OIN CEO Bergelt said that’s not correct. The patents are more valuable than that. Some of them affect core Linux operations, he said.

At Ziff Davis (Microsoft partner [1, 2]), Darryl Taft is yanking many repetitive messages to already move away to another superficial topic. Check out his latest proportional headlines:

1. Microsoft: The Great Open-Source Advocate?
2. Microsoft Open-Source Efforts to Go ‘Mainstream`

The CodePlex Foundation is a Windows-oriented farce, accommodating those whose interests are not GNU/Linux. “Perfect timing,” writes Pamela Jones about the CodePlex Foundation announcement. “[It's] about the The same week Microsoft gets caught trying to secretly torpedo Linux with patent trolls, it opens and funds its very own “open source” foundation, where all those stupid enough to trust Microsoft can go and get eaten alive, like the jury just said that i4i was. And all that sharing should be just perfect for new patents for Microsoft. Hey. Gotta innovate, ya know. And do you think Microsoft cares if code is open source, as long as it’s patented, by Microsoft, so you have to pay them to actually use it? Only Miguel can imagine this can possibly work out, and sure enough, there he is, on the Microsoft-heavy board. Sam Ramji gets to explain the patent troll thingie, I guess, since he’s heading up this totally unnecessary “open source” entity. I can’t wait to hear him explain exactly what Microsoft had in mind. Good luck, fellas, and may it work out for you just as I imagine it will. Mind if I ask you a question? Just how stupid do you think we are?”

“And do you think Microsoft cares if code is open source, as long as it’s patented, by Microsoft, so you have to pay them to actually use it?”
      –Pamela JonesIt was shortly afterwards that Jones discovered Ramji was leaving. Considering the fact that Ramji was put in the board ahead of time and announced his resignation shortly afterwards (duty in absentia), it seems likely that all those recent events — ones where Microsoft brutally attacked Free software — led him to this decision. But not to worry; Microsoft has already found people who are more than keen on trashing GNU/Linux, people like Miguel de Icaza. In my conversations with him in USENET he seems happy enough to say that GNU/Linux has a “minuscule” market share (it hasn’t, that’s just a Microsoft talking point) and he’s all cool with words like “freetard”.

Had de Icaza not been associated with some FOSS history, it would be easy to mistake him for a Microsoft technical evangelist. His latest, so-called ‘contribution’ to FOSS is a Microsoft patents-ridden framework that makes Microsoft stronger — one that seems to be adopted by former Microsoft employees like MindTouch and Collier. Both users and developers of GNU/Linux reject Mono and it’s easy to see why. Here is the latest:

Sometimes automake is no good… Mono projects

[...]

It’s not that I just don’t like the way the Makefiles are written, but factoring in the fact that automake does not support C#/Mono natively, you get to the point where:

* the support for dependencies is just not there;
* automake is designed to support language where a source file is translated into an object file, and then linked; C# does not work in that way since all the source files are given when building a single assembly;
* the support for various flags variables is just pointless with the way the compiler work.

I guess there are mostly two reasons why autotools are still used by C#/Mono based projects, the first is that it integrates well when you also have some native extensions, like F-Spot has, and the latter is that it provides at least some level of boilerplate code.

Followers of de Icaza will hopefully realise that they are following a worker of Microsoft, a company that merely attacks GNU/Linux. █

“We could refresh the look and feel of the entire desktop with Moonlight”

–Miguel de Icaza

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IRC: #boycottnovell @ FreeNode: September 13th, 2009

Posted in IRC Logs at 2:31 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz

Read the log

Enter the IRC channel now

To use your own IRC client, join channel #boycottnovell in FreeNode.

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Links 14/09/2009: Best Buy Backlash, Many New GNU/Linux Releases

Posted in News Roundup at 2:24 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz

Digital Tipping Point: Clip of the Day

Jim Hogg teaches GNU Linux to high school kids 01 (2008)

Digital Tipping Point is a Free software-like project where the raw videos are code. You can assist by participating.

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09.13.09

Symantec Fails to Understand Security?

Posted in FUD, Google, Security, Windows at 7:24 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz

Summary: Symantec almost accuses Google of merely hosting USENET content that may contain arbitrary binaries

BACK in April we wrote about the ongoing battle against USENET. Some companies wish to eliminate USENET because it enables Free speech, being a decentralised medium like P2P or torrent. Others worry that it negatively impacts their artificial scarcity-based business models.

“Some companies wish to eliminate USENET because it enables Free speech, being a decentralised medium like P2P or torrent.”Either way — and although it is probably unrelated to any of the above — one informant/reader shows us this warming, remarking that it’s a “slow day at Symantec”. Yes, Symantec titles it “Google Groups Trojan.”

“This is BS,” he writes. “Who in their right minds downloads and runs a DLL from Usenet?”

There is another curious article in Wired Magazine which somehow connects Da Vinci Code (the book, nothing to do with source code) to Windows malware. It turns out that lovers of the book may find themselves in trouble, but only if they use Microsoft Windows and search the Web.

But on Wednesday morning the top Google search result for “death star research” — the logical query — would bring you no closer to unraveling the Lost Symbol mystery. Instead, it produced a malicious website that uses pop-ups, mouse-trapping and a well-executed fake virus scan to trick you into installing a Windows executable that will screw up your computer pretty badly.

If Symantec calls Google Groups (or USENET) a threat because it may contain some downloadable malware (added by posters of zeros and ones), then why not generalise and say that this whole “Internet thing” is a massive case of malware? Let’s just throw the baby out with the bathwater, right? █

“Our products just aren’t engineered for security.”

–Brian Valentine, Microsoft executive

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OIN Receives Thanks from Many, CodePlex Foundation Receives Thumbs-Down from Many

Posted in Free/Libre Software, GNU/Linux, Microsoft, OIN, Patents, Windows at 6:52 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz

Summary: Putting in perspective some of Microsoft’s latest attacks on GNU/Linux and an apparent deflection

SHORTLY after the OIN had intercepted Microsoft’s attempt to float anti-GNU/Linux patents [1, 2, 3, 4, 5], many responses were posted. Among them there is one from Eben Moglen. who wrote that “Our community—including all developers, distributors and users—owes Keith Bergelt of OIN, and the companies on his board of directors, a round of serious thanks for interrupting this arms trade, and calling attention to a bad business practice.” He also wrote:

An announcement by the Open Invention Network has disclosed publicly for the first time another, previously-secret front in our community’s efforts to protect itself against anti-competitive aggression by Microsoft. OIN’s transaction with Allied Security Trust to buy patents, supposedly reading on free software, offered to the troll market by Microsoft prevented what could have been a very unpleasant experience for the whole free software ecosystem.

Selling patents to organizations that have no purpose except to bring litigation—entities which do not themselves make anything or conduct any research, which do not indeed contribute in any tangible or intangible way to the progress of civilization—is not standard commercial practice. What Microsoft is really doing here is sowing disruption, creating fear, uncertainty and doubt at the expense of encouraging the very sort of misbehavior in the patent system that hurts everyone in the industry, including them.

Jay Lyman posts a superb, concise summary of the responses which matter.

This week, we saw some of the software patent skirmishes that are driving and validating this thinking. There was first news that the Open Invention Network, the consortium dedicated to legal and IP defense of Linux, had bought some software patents that related to Linux, which admittedly is not hard to do these days. It turned out the 22 Linux-focused patents were purchased from Allied Security Trust, which had actually purchased them from none other than Microsoft. This might not have meant a whole lot, with OIN proclaiming a victory and Microsoft stating simply that the patents did not hold much value to them. However, the plot thickened as we heard from FOSS defender Eben Moglen, from Linux Foundation executive director Jim Zemlin and from vendor Red Hat, that Microsoft may have been shopping the patents around to would-be patent trolls who would do the dirty work of FUD on their own.

Here is the follow-on article from Groklaw, which finally relates this alleged trolling attempt to Microsoft’s so-called “Open Source” Foundation. Yesterday we explained why it's a farce, which only comprises the usual members [1, 2].

Microsoft doesn’t control it. What it used to be able to do in the dark now falls out of its noxious bag of tricks into the Internet’s bright light, stage front and center. And there stands Microsoft in the spotlight, with its pants down, and let me tell you, it’s not a pretty sight.

Take the failed patent hustle of a couple of days ago, apparently maneuvering to enable proxy patent trolls to sue Linux. The idea, I gather, was to damage Linux, but without any way to trace it back to Microsoft. Thank you OIN and AST for foiling the plan. And by the way, are courts supposed to be used like this, to attack the competition? The court system is designed for adjudicating conflicts that are real. If you get damaged, you can go to court and try to be made whole. And so far as I know, there is no definition of abuse of monopoly that would exclude what just happened from being part of what antitrust law covers.

Then there is the hypocrisy factor. Ironically, Microsoft’s lead attorney in the i4i patent litigation was sanctioned by the judge in the Memorandum and Order because he persistently argued to the jury that patent trolls shouldn’t be allowed to seek money damages. And yet, out in the back, behind the garage, so to speak, it’s “Psst… trolls, wanna buy a patent?”

Here is where Pamela Jones refers to Microsoft’s new foundation:

What won’t Miguel do for Microsoft, I ask myself? I take that as good news, frankly, as the new foundation wouldn’t be needed by Microsoft to “supplement” what others already have in place if they could undermine what the community already has. So Microsoft funds and runs a new Brand X open source foundation which will be entirely under Microsoft’s thumb. Now do you see the purpose of the GPL? Why the F in FOSS is so vital? If all that matters is viewing the code or excellence of code or whatever that concept was in the longstanding debate, look what you get: Microsoft’s Brand X open source foundation to sell you patent licenses to proprietary code. An offer they hope you can’t refuse. How do you like it?

Richard Adhikari of ECT correctly points out that “FOSS fans” (yes, the real ones) are not buying Microsoft’s story. From the summary:

The CodePlex Foundation, according to Redmond, enables the exchange of code and understanding among software companies and open source communities. Those OSS communities, however, aren’t entirely trustful of Microsoft’s intentions.

Sam Ramji still has 3 months to go at Microsoft; one has to wonder who he shall work for next. Experience suggests that departing Microsoft employees become an HR issue. Ramji’s job has been — to a great extent — lying to the press on Microsoft’s behalf; it was not easy, especially while Microsoft was attacking GNU/Linux behind closed doors. Microsoft is still lying without any qualm. According to David Williams, Microsoft says that CodePlex is accepted by Linux and the open source community. “According to [Microsoft's] Sara Ford,” he writes, “the site is accepted and welcomed among the fans of open source and Linux software.” Utter nonsense. Maybe it’s this type of people who endorse it.

He [Ramji] will serve as president of the CodePlex Foundation for at least the first 100 days but is also departing Microsoft before the end of the month for another software vendor.

The Microsoft-sponsored blog called the whole thing a “soap opera”, thus trivialising serious issues. That’s funny. When Microsoft attacks GNU/Linux from multiple directions — potentially breaking some laws in the process (depending on location) — and then further abuses the “Open Source” brand, all it can be called is just a “soap opera”? On the other hand, positions are at least provided from the other side of this story:

Bergelt said he suspects that strategic agenda was to stall or slow the growth of Linux by seeing the patents ultimately fall into the hands of organizations that would use them to pursue lawsuits against people who use or distribute Linux. Microsoft has said that it believes Linux and other open-source programs violate more than 200 of its patents.

Here are all the recent events sorted contextually. One has to wonder if the CodePlex Foundation announcement timing was intended to quell the storm over Microsoft’s attempt to sue GNU/Linux vendors by proxy. It was mas perhaps intended to change the focus of debate in the press; that would not be the first time Microsoft deliberately does this.

“One has to wonder if the CodePlex Foundation announcement timing was intended to quell the storm over Microsoft’s attempt to sue GNU/Linux vendors by proxy.”Over at the Mono-Nono Web site, one commenter argues that “The whole “microsoft opening up to open source” things reminds me of this movie:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n3bI71P_8O8

“We come in peace”.

“Do not run! We are your friends!”

Yeah… right!”

There is already some FUD out there, such as the essay titled “Will Microsoft’s Open Source Initiative Kill Linux?”

This comes from Ken Hess, who has gone ahead with a lot of trollish anti-Linux rhetorics recently. He once invited Microsoft to hire him in one of his columns. Apart from the headline, however, the body of arguments seems rather reasonable.

In other patent news that we shall write about later, Microsoft has managed to overturn a patent judgment regarding Alcatel-Lucent’s claims. From Reuters:

A U.S. court of appeals on Friday overturned a $358 million damages award against software maker Microsoft Corp in a long-running patent dispute with French telecoms equipment firm Alcatel-Lucent.

The United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, which handles many patent and trademark cases, held that Microsoft did indirectly infringe Alcatel’s patents, but said the damages awarded against the firm were not justified and must be retried.

We wrote a lot about this case in the past [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]. It’s seemingly never-ending. Then again, that’s the nature of intellectual monopolies; those with deeper pockets can endure the test of ‘justice’ for longer, file more motions, and thus ‘win’. █

“The Company believes that existing copyright law and available trade secret protections, as opposed to patent law, are better suited to protecting computer software developments.” —Oracle Corporation, IBiblio: Oracle Corporation’s position paper on software patents

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