Bonum Certa Men Certa

Indian Activists Fight Back Against Microsoft Patents as Jeremy Allison Repeats Warning, Cites Mono as Patent Trap



Summary: The LUG of the Indian Institute of Technology Delhi complains about attempts by Microsoft to poison Indian standards with software patents; LCA receives a wakeup call regarding Novell's malfunctioning Mono

Microsoft is trying to impose software patents on India, despite these patents being against the law (Indian patents exclude software). Microsoft behaves the same way in South Africa; it is so desperate to illegalise its competition that it breaks the law in order to change or overcome the law. Under a saner system, Microsoft would possibly be put before courts across the world. Microsoft deliberately ignores the law.



“Under a saner system, Microsoft would possibly be put before courts across the world. Microsoft deliberately ignores the law.”Indian citizens understand suppression fairly well because stories about the British are not so distant in their history. They too are some of the most active when it comes to resisting the invader, whose patents are being used as a tool to tell locals that they are not permitted to write their own software. Instead, they must rent software from a company that was found guilty of tax evasion in their country -- a company which was actually found guilt of monopoly abuse in many other parts of the world. It really takes some nerve, does it not?

The GNU/Linux Users Group of the Indian Institute of Technology Delhi has just responded to the latest round of lobbying for software patents in Indian standards. To quote a portion:

This document examines the Draft Policy on Open Standards for e€­Government v2.4 dated 25.11.2009 and the process followed in adopting the same. You can download from http://fosscomm.in/OpenStandards .

If v2.4 is adopted as official policy, it will result in:

1. The legitimization of proprietary standards that entail the payment of royalty fees and huge foreign exchange outflows. This cost will be paid by Indian taxpayers and pocketed by monopolistic vendors located in foreign countries, since most proprietary standards are controlled by entities outside India. Unlike royalty€­free open standards, the usage of proprietary standards will mean that users will, directly or indirectly, pay a royalty to a private entity for the privilege of communicating with the government. 2. Reduce e€­Government in India to a mess of incompatible systems that cannot communicate with each other, thus defeating the very purpose of e€­Government, if multiple standards for the same purpose are allowed.


Further away near Australia, LCA takes place and it seems to be spectacularly well organised based on press coverage.

Jeremy Allison, a Brit, has just given a talk at LCA and he repeats his warning about Mono [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6]. ITWire reports:

LCA 2010: Allison warns of patent traps in Mono



Patents are the only threat that Microsoft can brandish against free and open source software and that is exactly why people should be wary of the Mono project, free software advocate and Samba hacker Jeremy Allison told a packed auditorium at the 11th LCA today.

Allison's presentation, titled "Microsoft and free software: the elephant in the room" was held in the second largest auditorium but it was difficult to find standing room once he got going.

Sporting a T-shirt with the Samba logo on the front, and "opening windows to a wider world" on the rear, Allison presented a meticulously prepared set of arguments to show that patents were the only way which the word's largest software company had left to attack FOSS.

Mono is an attempt to create an open source clone of Microsoft's .NET development environment; the project was begun by Novell vice-president Miguel de Icaza who claims this will pull Windows developers over to GNU/Linux.

Allison said the patent war would be a never-ending conflict. "All the patent promises about Mono count for nothing," he said. Other methods of harming FOSS had not borne the expected fruit.


It's worth remembering that Jeremy Allison used to work for Novell, where Mono is being developed for Microsoft to enjoy. Allison quit Novell right after it had signed the deal with Microsoft. He did an interview with Boycott Novell.

Here is more coverage about the points made by Jeremy Allison:

Microsoft to declare patent war on iPhone/Android?



A key Linux developer has predicted Microsoft will use its huge patent portfolio to cripple smartphone competitors and boost its woeful Windows Mobile market share.

Microsoft will increasingly utilise its patent library to try and stifle any competition for netbook OSes and reassert itself in the mobile phone space, a prominent open source developer has argued.

[...]

That strategy is likely to be particularly prominent in the market for non-PC devices such as netbooks and smart phones, where Windows doesn't enjoy the same strength of market share. While co-marketing schemes have seen former Linux supporters such as Asus largely shift to Windows, maintaining overall share and eliminating new competitors is critical to Microsoft's survival, Allison said.


Canonical/Ubuntu is hopefully paying attention to this. As for Mono, it possibly imitates a dying technology based on the Microsoft choir itself. This one is new:

Connecting the dots, however, I'm tempted to push this a little forward. Contrary to what Microsoft envisioned or hoped or simply told us, the Windows ecosystem is not moving towards a .NET centric solution, but .NET is only a powerful and sophisticated execution and development environment on top of Windows .


The #1 framework or language is Java, based on data from those who track programming.

Recent Techrights' Posts

Slopwatch: Brian Fagioli, Google News, and Other LLM Slopfarms
Why does Google News keep promoting these fake articles?
Links 29/10/2025: Amazon Kept "Data Center Water Use Secret", "Abuse of Power" Against Media
Links for the day
Gemini Links 29/10/2025: "My Hardware Specs" and "Goodbye Debian…"
Links for the day
EPO Cocainegate: Feedback and Clarifications
Part III will come out soon
Links 29/10/2025: "US Military Is Destroying the Planet Beyond Imagination" and Boat Strikes Deemed Unlawful
Links for the day
Quality Comes First (Techrights Search)
It's generally working already, but we wish to polish it some more
Techrights Party Countdown
Late next week we'll be holding a party near our home
European Parliament and Council Directive on Privacy is Vanishing
"edited / censored some time more recently"
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Tuesday, October 28, 2025
IRC logs for Tuesday, October 28, 2025
Slopwatch: The March of Slopfarms, From UbuntuPIT to Linux Journal and to Various Fake Sites Still Promoted by Google News
It's so worrying to see what the Web has become
Links 29/10/2025: CISA, Ukraine, and Amazon Problems
Links for the day
[Teaser] The EPO's Spokesperson, a Cocaine User, Fancies Young Women
How's that for "optics" in the EU and Europe's second-largest institution?
How Will António Campinos Respond to the EPO's 'Cocainegate'?
That's the same thing we saw and still see when the press deals with enablers and partners of Jeffrey Epstein
Join Us Now and Share the News - Part IV: There Cannot be Free Software Without Free Press and Free Information
One day, one can hope, more people will recognise that for Software Freedom we need free press and free thinkers
Join Us Now and Share the News - Part III: Principled Stance Is Never Cheap
Protecting the truth and insisting that the general public is made aware of things that really happened isn't cheap
Join Us Now and Share the News - Part II: Because Scarcity of Accurate Information Breeds Collective Ignorance
we too will strive to share information that's aggressively suppressed
Gemini Links 28/10/2025: More New Arrivals at Geminispace, xkcd on "Document Forgery"
Links for the day
Join Us Now and Share the News - Part I: Defence of the Truth
This year we make a very strong, firm statement for truth, even if that means explaining our work to the top media judge in the country
Links 28/10/2025: Meta and Fentanylware (CheeTok) Age-Restricted Down Under, "Britain Needs China’s Money"
Links for the day
Links 28/10/2025: Mass Layoffs at Amazon and Charter to Cut 1,200 Jobs
Links for the day
The Cocaine Patent Office - Part II: The Person Who Planted Paid-for Fake News for the European Patent Office (EPO) is a Cocaine User, Friend of António Campinos, Now on Record as Having Been Arrested
Background: High-level manager at the European Patent Office caught in public with cocaine, arrested
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Monday, October 27, 2025
IRC logs for Monday, October 27, 2025
Google News Drowning in Slop (and Slopfarms That Hijack About Half the Results)
Google News seems to be drowning in this stuff
Gemini Links 28/10/2025: "How to Maximize Your Positive Impact" and ASCII Art and Artist Attribution
Links for the day
PETA and Activism
Being staff or volunteer in PETA isn't easy
Big Blue, Huge Debt
debt will soar again
Links 27/10/2025: Mass Surveillance Sold as "AI", People Reluctant to Lose Physical Media
Links for the day
Parties and Milestones Again
we've begun putting up about 40 balloons
Techrights' 19th Anniversary: Bronze
Time to go back to preparing for this anniversary
Our Latest European Patent Office (EPO) Series Will Last Several Weeks, Will Ask the EPO Management and the European Union (EU) Very Difficult Questions
If nobody loses a job (or jobs) over this, then the EU basically became no better than Colombia or Nicaragua
Slopwatch: LinuxSecurity, UbuntuPIT, Brian Fagioli, and Google News
We focus on stories that are fake or LLM slop that disguises itself as "news" about Linux
Links 27/10/2025: Wikipedia Vandalism, Bruce Perens Opens up on Childhood
Links for the day
This Site Could Not be Done by LLMs Even If It Wanted to (Because It's Not a Parrot of What Other Sites Say)
LLMs have no knowledge or deep understanding
Microsoft is Disloyal Towards Its Most Loyal Employees
Against its most faithful enablers
19 Years, No Censorship
No factual information is ever going to be removed, more so if it is in the public interest
We Are Not a Conventional Site, That's Why They Hate (or Love) Us
Throughout the week this week we'll be focusing on the EPO
Following the Line of Cocaine All the Way to the Top
Even a million denials and spin-doctoring won't distract from the core issue
The Cocaine Patent Office - Part I: António Campinos Brought Corruption and Nepotism to the EPO, Then Came the Cocaine
High-level manager at the European Patent Office (EPO) caught in public with cocaine, the Office has some answering to do
Purchasing/Possessing Computers Isn't the Same as Controlling Computers
Let's strive to put computers back under the control of their users, no matter who purchased these (usually the users)
Gemini Links 27/10/2025: Alhena 5.4.3 and Fixing Bash
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Sunday, October 26, 2025
IRC logs for Sunday, October 26, 2025
Thankfully We've Made Copies of More Interesting Data From statCounter
If statCounter (the Web site or the 'webapp') vanished overnight, we'd still have something left of it
More Silent Layoffs at IBM/Red Hat
when the media counts such layoffs or presents tallies the numbers are very incomplete