Bonum Certa Men Certa

More than 16,000 Stay Out of Court Free Coupons Activated

Microsoft and Novell have announced that 3 large firms have opted to accept Microsoft's stay out of court free coupons: Deutsche Bank AG, Credit Suisse and AIG Technologies.

REDMOND, Wash. and WALTHAM, Mass., Dec. 20 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Deutsche Bank AG, Credit Suisse and AIG Technologies today became some of the first customers to tap the benefits of the recently announced collaboration between Microsoft Corp. (Nasdaq: MSFT - News) and Novell Inc. (Nasdaq: NOVL - News) on interoperability between Microsoft€® Windows€® and Linux.* Under three separate customer agreements, Microsoft will deliver to each company SUSE€® Linux Enterprise subscription certificates, allowing these customers to take advantage of the Microsoft and Novell agreement. Credit Suisse, Deutsche Bank and AIG Technologies, which is a member company of American International Group Inc., highlighted the benefits of interoperability, the patent cooperation agreement and the road map for bidirectional virtualization solutions as the deciding factors in their choice.

Later in the announcement is the tidbit about "To date, more than 16,000 new certificates for SUSE Linux Enterprise have been activated under the Microsoft and Novell collaboration agreement.", just after plugging the co-sponsored survey. It is not specified what percentage of the activated coupons are from these 3 customers.

I should note that during the Q&A session at the CITI forum, Stafford Masie also alluded to Microsoft actively distributing the certificates, so any theories that the coupons were to be "shelfware" seem to be disproven.

We’ve gotten Microsoft to buy $240M worth of Linux, ok, that’s 350K subscriptions of Linux, that’s awesome okay. So, they’re going to distribute that worldwide, and they actvely are in South African marketplace, I can tell you that today, they actually are actively doing it,so its a good thing that’s occurring for Linux…

The widespread adoption of Linux is absolutely great for the community, interoperability is great for the community, virtualization is great for the community; making a self-serving deal that puts you on the "good" side of anti-Linux FUD is detrimental to the community. Right now, the former does not outweigh the latter.

Fix the agreement. Stafford Masie has promised Novell will be GPLv3 compliant, including altering the deal if necessary. Even before that, we had heard that the patent covenant was undergoing review for possible revision.

Do it, and let's move on, this whole thing started over losing a 4800 server deal, so to date it has paid off more than 3-fold for Novell. Stop FUDding and get back to competing on technological merit, rather than using this deal as a competitive advantage:

(Stafford Masie during the CITI Forum Q&A)

So, OK, let me paint the scenario and you tell me if I've got the context of the question correctly.

So, in that big deal, whatever it was - Ubuntu and Novell, and not Microsoft and Novell, and would we then use this agreement as a competitive edge and come up against you. Yes and no, OK?

If the customer does believe that there's issues, concerns, etc because they have Microsoft interoperability stuff, I think the agreement might give us an edge, but its not an exclusive edge, and thats why we want to encourage Shuttleworth and the folks to go and do what we did, investigate what we've done, don't be fanatical about it, but take a look at it.

Now, there are... y'know, I kinda want to say a few things here, and I think we've created the platform for it - we will compete, and I think competition amongst Linux vendors is good, it needs to be there... but we need to be responsible in our competing, lets make sure that we don't compete to the detriment of both of us, because there's someone standing looking over our shoulders wanting that to happen in a certain way. Microsoft is in the Linux game now, but they wouldn't love it more than for this Linux thing to just implode, ok, they'd love that to happen also.



It's kinda win-win for them, so we need to be careful how we compete, now will we utilize this patent portfolio? No, in fact we provide protection related to that. We'll never use it against another Linux company, we never have - you've competed with me in South Africa and I've never utilized my...my legal indemnification, etc etc to outcompete you, we dont do that.



In fact, we've made it pretty clear on the website that we believe competition between technologies shouldn't be based on the potential legal liabilities and FUD, it should be based on the technology merits of those solutions, and that's how we want to compete.

Novell isn't using their patent portfolio against other Linux companies, that is true. By virtue of this deal and their FUD, they are using Microsoft's patent portfolio against other Linux companies, I fail to see the distinction.



Addendum (Roy):

Be sure to read the mind of the skeptics.

Anyway, what I continue to find completely baffling about this is why these companies are getting their SLES licenses from Microsoft. I know that they have an agreement and so they need to feed it, but why would Novell ever want to have its biggest competitor selling its software? And, in particular, why should existing customers now get their SLES licenses through Microsoft? From a purely practical standpoint, it looks a bit daft.


What I cannot help wondering, having come across a worrisome headline, is whether Microsoft will 'pull an Oracle' and offer discounted Linux support one day. You would have to agree that the following raises a brow: "Microsoft names three takers for its Linux support".

Comments

Recent Techrights' Posts

Richard Matthew Stallman, or rms (RMS), Turns 72 This Coming Weekend
This coming Sunday he deserves a cake
 
Links 13/03/2025: Calculators and Spreadsheets, Returning to a Human Internet
Links for the day
Links 13/03/2025: Further Assaults on Science and Education in the US
Links for the day
Expect XBox to Be Shut Down Like Skype
"hey hi"-washing fools nobody
Truth Hurts (Especially Some Dishonest and/or Greedy People), But Reporting Truth is What Makes Journalism Valuable to the General Public and Helps Protect Society From Abuse by Sociopaths or Pathological Liars
When it comes to reporting, we're on the side of female victims, not the men who strangle them.
New Paper Reveals the Web (and Net) Drowns in LLM Slop, "Linux" is Impacted Too
It will be getting harder to trust anything on the Web
Links 13/03/2025: RIP, Carl Lundström; Tesla (the Company, Not Scientist It Piggybacks) Besieged by Public Backlash
Links for the day
Gemini Links 13/03/2025: MElon "Greek Tragedy" and Going Offline More
Links for the day
Links 13/03/2025: COVID-19 Legacies and "Modern" Cars as Spying Machines on Wheels
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Wednesday, March 12, 2025
IRC logs for Wednesday, March 12, 2025
The Fall of the Open Source Initiative (OSI): Microsoft-Sponsored OSI is Probably Not Even the Real Steward of the Open Source Definition, It's More Like an Identity Thief at This Point (Like "FSFE", a Microsoft-Sponsored Imposter of FSF)
As we'll show later, many people (even inside OSI) are very angry at the OSI right now
Gemini Links 12/03/2025: Cataloging Books, Ramen, and MElon
Links for the day
Links 12/03/2025: Anti-Union Actions and New Efforts at Truce/Ceasefire in Ukraine
Links for the day
Sponsored by Linux Foundation
All the pages are full of 'Linux' Foundation ads that are not about Linux
CodeWeavers Ads Weaved by LLM Slop at BetaNews
How much of this was even touched by a human being?
It's Hard to Dispose or Get Rid of Swasticars Now
'Memecars' only sell as long as people have a 'belief' in them
Springtime Plans
We currently have two long series underway
In Australia, iOS Estimated to be Bigger Than or Equal to Windows
Not even counting macOS
Brett Wilson LLP Does Not Deny Microsoft or Another "Third Party" Secretly Funds the SLAPPs Against Techrights, Bankrolling Despicable People Who Deserve Criticism
Writing about crime is not a crime
Gemini Links 12/03/2025: LLM Slop Lacks a Future, Wordle Clone Comes to Gemini Protocol
Links for the day
Using FUD That Blames "Linux" for Typos, Turning It Into LLM Slop That Blames "Linux" for Typos
It is probably the "leader" at LLM slop (fake 'articles') about "Linux"
Links 12/03/2025: Big Cuts to US Education and Science (e.g. NOAA)
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Tuesday, March 11, 2025
IRC logs for Tuesday, March 11, 2025
Crossbow murders: prevention, missed opportunities
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
This yt-dlp Bug Report Shows Us That the Future of YouTube is DRM and It's Time to Leave (yt-dlp Should Also Leave Microsoft GitHub, Which Censors YouTube Downloaders)
GAFAM traps aren't "free hosting"; they herd us all into a world of tollbooths and locks, surveillance and planned obsolescence (you own nothing, you only rent)
Ukraine Didn't Take Twitter/X Down, Microsoft or Windows Likely Did
There are many debunkings (to likely false accusations), but won't that just be another example of Windows TCO, exacerbated externally in the form of Windows botnets?
The Fall of the Open Source Initiative (OSI): Worse Than What the Media Has Focused on, Losing Sight of Who Owns and Runs the OSI
Members' dues are less than 3% of the income; where does the 97+ percent come from other than Microsoft?
Apple Seems to Have Run Out of Things to Boast About After Apple Vision Pro Failed Spectacularly
With "Apple Intelligence", Apple has finally named a product after what target customers lack
Slopwatch: Reckless FUD and Machine-Generated Spam from LinuxSecurity.com, cybersecuritynews.com, and gbhackers.com (Google Boosts LLM Slop About "Linux")
Google and so-called 'Google News' continue to yield anti-Linux misinformation
Gemini Links 11/03/2025: 'Chainsaw Politicians' and Proprietary Software Hell
Links for the day
Links 11/03/2025: Covid-19 5 Years On and Violence in Syria
Links for the day
Links 11/03/2025: NASA Besieged and "DOGE Has Become What It Claimed To Destroy"
Links for the day
Fresh IBM Layoffs Reported in Europe and North America, Jobs Allegedly Moved to South Asia (Low Salaries)
As usual, IBM does not talk about this
Illuminating Injustice is Critical When Reckless Microsofters and Law Firms Try to Silence Reporters of Violence Against Women
I want to clarify that I'm well within my right (and not running afoul of any rules) by explaining what goes on here
EPO Central Staff Committee: "The Strategy of the Office Lacks Transparency and Cannot be Understood"
Microsoft and the EPO violate data protection laws
Microsoft Has Not Much Left to Show Investors, Shares Fall Almost 20%
It's not even clear how Microsoft makes money anymore
Links 11/03/2025: Spring and Misfin Server
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Monday, March 10, 2025
IRC logs for Monday, March 10, 2025