05.18.10
Microsoft: Embracing and Extending Python, Excluding the GPL
Summary: The latest Microsoft moves which are intended to redefine “Open Source” and turn it into free labour for Microsoft’s benefit
Python’s creator Guido van Rossum is working for Google and Microsoft wants a share of his action? What does it do then? It throws some money at the problem, as always. Earlier today we showed how Microsoft people were taking more control of a Ruby company, having already embraced and ‘extended’ the language with IronRuby [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14]. Similarly, Microsoft wants more control of Python and there is already IronPython [1, 2, 3], which is used to spread Silver Lie and other such proprietary software.
Python ought to beware an “embrace and extend” here because Microsoft’s goal is to help sell proprietary software from Microsoft at the expense of GNU/Linux. Now, watch this from the news. Very typical Microsoft maneuver.
Microsoft sponsors first Aussie Python conference
[...]
“Microsoft hasn’t had a great relationship with the open source community, but that’s not to say it isn’t doing good things with open source,” Ansell said. “And we are not the only open source conference to have Microsoft as a sponsor.”
“At some conferences the keynotes are sponsored, but ours are really technical. It’s not Microsoft selling the technology, but about the work done at Microsoft on language interoperability.
That’s an interesting choice of headline and it appeared in other IDG sites.
The reason Microsoft is interested in Python is because it hopes to change the project’s direction and make it help the convicted monopolist. In the same way, CodePlex is intended to disrupt and redefine “Open Source”. Watch this new press release and be aware that Microsoft has a CodePlex ‘press tour’ in Microsoft blogs and elsewhere these days. Microsoft is trying to sell an image of Microsoft as a friend of open source (it even sends a female, which better shields it from criticism). In reality, Microsoft is the biggest enemy of "Open Source", although anyone who produces evidence of this will be called something along the lines of “irrational hater” [1, 2, 3, 4] (religions too use this as a suppressor of criticism). How many times need Microsoft sue and bribe against “Open Source” before more people wisen up and realise what’s going on? There is the reality, and then there is the PR.
“How many times need Microsoft sue and bribe against “Open Source” before more people wisen up and realise what’s going on?”Microsoft is promoting proprietary software using opposite terms like “Open Source” and in Techflash, Microsoft continues to further deceive the public. Microsoft’s Paula Hunter says: “The other thing that’s different about us — you know, there’s plenty of other open-source foundations out there — is, we’re license-agnostic, so we’re not trying to force-feed a particular license.” To which Groklaw replies with: “I’m sorry, but that simply is not true. Codeplex doesn’t allow you to use GPLv3. I wouldn’t call that license-agnostic.”
Of course. At Microsoft they want software patent traps, leaving developers scared and ensuring they will be at Microsoft’s mercy at all times.
To be fair, Microsoft is not the only company which fakes open-source (“open minus source”;here is a new example) but it is by far the biggest faker and it is also an aggressor against real “Open Source” (going as far as suing with software patents, even racketeering [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7]). There are always those who try to change what open source means, but at least they are not actively attacking Open Source or Free software, unlike Microsoft.
Those who try to be compatible with Microsoft seemingly get burned [1, 2]. As a Microsoft partner put it last year, Microsoft “destroys” partners. Is this a company worth trusting and working with? █
“I’d be glad to help tilt lotus into into the death spiral. I could do it Friday afternoon but not Saturday. I could do it pretty much any time the following week.”
–Brad Silverberg, Microsoft
