Bonum Certa Men Certa

Wakeup Call to Google, Regarding Software Patents



Summary: Addressing the problem of Google's love affair with software patents; news about Yahoo! and Microsoft, as well as its effects on Hadoop

SOFTWARE patents proponents like IBM and Novell (IBM has a lot of influence on Novell) are almost as much trouble as Apple. But one company which we rarely criticise for supporting software patents would be Google, which pretends to be a friend of Free software (which is hard to dispute) while at the same time doing things that are obviously harmful to Free software. It's not much different from IBM in that regard. Google also plays along with Microsoft's ActiveSync, which makes it spread patents and stifle standards. GNU/Linux doesn't need any of this trouble, as it was put right here yesterday:



With most jurisdictions still lax about violations of software patents by Linux users, who remain a quantatively negligible group, the popularity of products like Fluendo’s may be limited. But as Ubuntu’s user base grows, especially in the workplace, legal solutions for multimedia playback will become more and more important.


Well, actually, in most jurisdictions software patents are simply illegal, not just immoral. Google must be paying for those patents no matter where the buyer of Google products like Android or Chrome OS actually lives. That's a dangerous slope to take.

Google's idea that it can "invent" software algorithms was mentioned here earlier today and now comes this revelation that Google's most important patent is just a reinvention of something which goes back to World War II (if not earlier, just like Hewlett-Packard). [via]

Google's PageRank algorithm was developed in 1998. But a project to trace the history of such algorithms reveals an example from the 1940s.


This is a typical story.

Google was sued by Red Bend for software patent violations that affect Chrome. It's very doubtful that Google will be able to respond with its patent arsenal to a company as small as Red Bend, so the whole excuse about the patents being "defensive" often seems like unadulterated garbage. It does not 'compute' in real-world scenarios.

A month ago we showed that Google had earned a patent (monopoly) that it did not deserve. It's a monopoly on MapReduce. A startup called Cloudera builds a GNU/Linux distribution that offers some very powerful functionality based on Free software (Hadoop). Based on this new interview, Cloudera is aware of the supposed violation in MapReduce, but its response is that "Google has no track record of using patents offensively." Well, Microsoft could also say this until a few years ago; it's only when companies are dying that they become patent aggressors, so no-one can rely on mere promises that are not a legal contract.

I also asked Olson about Google’s recent move to patent the MapReduce algorithm for working with large data sets that underlies Google searches. Hadoop is based on a variant of MapReduce, and there have been suggestions made that everyone using Hadoop or MapReduce is in danger following Google’s patents. As we noted here, Hadoop really isn’t threatened, though. “Google has no track record of using patents offensively,” Olson noted.


The software patent from Google is troubling enough... Microsoft's hijack of Yahoo! withstanding, as it may have an effect on the Hadoop project. It is now finalised that Zimbra is in the hands of former Microsoft executives (Yahoo! gave it to them) and given that the Microsoft-Yahoo search deal is now approved, it might make one wonder if Yahoo! will still require Hadoop for search. Will it be actively maintained and developed? What will be the impact on many Free software projects that depend on Hadoop? That is another example of the poisoning of Yahoo's Free Software endeavours, courtesy of Microsoft's bullying and unwanted intervention.

“What would be the impact on many Free software projects that depend on Hadoop?”One of our readers wrote to tell us that there is a connection between "News International -> Yahoo -> BBC -> Microsoft," as he puts it.

"The BBC Trust has been urged to block the corporation's plans to launch phone apps for its news and sport content. The Newspaper Publishers Association (NPA) said that the corporation would "damage the nascent market" for apps," says this article. "The Newspaper Publishers Association (NPA) is the trade association for British national newspapers and its role is to represent, protect and promote the national newspaper industry. It was founded in 1906 and its current members comprise Associated Newspapers, Express Newspapers, Financial Times, Guardian Newspapers, Independent Newspapers (UK), MGN (Trinity Mirror national titles), News International and Telegraph Group," says this reference page. Microsoft's strong ties with the BBC (and overlapping staff [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6]) were last covered in [1, 2]. But that's another story altogether. It will be treated separately some day.

"The day that the software sector forms a clear front against software patents, as pharma does for a unitary patent system… will be the day our cause comes close to winning." —Pieter Hintjens, Fosdem07 Interview

Comments

Recent Techrights' Posts

Towards GNU World Domination
The FSF led by Geoffrey S. Knauth with his friend Richard Stallman in the FSF's Board [...] Let's encourage people to adopt GNU/Linux. There has never been a better time.
GNOME, Microsoft, and GitHub: The Lack of Reporting on Abusive Colleagues Contributed to Profound Media Vacuum (or Blackout), Now Resorting to SLAPPs
This lack of morality/courage has helped enable further abuse, lining up more victims
Microsoft Already Attacks the BSDs as Well (the E.E.E. Way, as Usual)
Bearers of bad news
The Open Source Initiative (OSI) is in Trouble, May Soon be Out of Business
Openwashing needs to end
Microsoft's Debt Grew Over 6 Billion Dollars in the Last Reporting Quarter (Before Inauguration), Expect Worse Next Week When 'Results' Are Disclosed and Mass Layoffs Resume
Microsoft is bleeding. It does not want people to notice.
Google News is Rewarding Slopfarms, Not Journalism
Don't read junk from chatbots
 
US Government Already Bailing Out OpenAI/Microsoft With "Contracts", As Usual, Back Doors You Cannot Remove Becoming 'a Step Closer' on New PCs (Unless Everyone Acts ASAP)
The next "logical" step towards digital prisons
Microsoft Devises PR Stunts to Distract From Impending Mass Layoffs and Likely Bad Results Preceding Those Mass Layoffs
A "voluntary exit plan"
Gemini Links 22/04/2025: Deaths, HamsterCMS, and More
Links for the day
Links 22/04/2025: FTC v. Meta Trial and Google Remedies
Links for the day
In Turkey, Windows Down Rapidly While GNU/Linux Grows
Although Turkey is in NATO (but not the EU), it cannot quite trust computer systems controlled by the United States
Richard Stallman Has Updated His Article on Why "Free Software Is Even More Important Now"
Richard Stallman is about to give a talk here in the UK in a few hours
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Monday, April 21, 2025
IRC logs for Monday, April 21, 2025
Richard Stallman Gives Public Talk in London in 7 Hours (Need to Register as Venue Limited to 150 Seats), Public Announcements Begin to Appear
These are not announced weeks or months in advance
Gemini Links 21/04/2025: Remembering Pope Francis, Crystal Simulation
Links for the day
Doing Microsoft's Job. On IBM's Payroll.
today's Red Hat cannot recognise threats even after a head-on collision
Teaching GAFAM in Schools is Like Teaching Children to Smoke Tobacco
So suggests an FSF presentation
Richard Stallman, Whose Site is Trusted by Greater Manchester, Has Come to the United Kingdom
He doesn't suck up to the Crown, so he'll never be "knighted"
On Desktops/Laptops in Singapore Does a Fifth of Users Run GNU/Linux?
Probably not, but it's growing fast there
Links 21/04/2025: Fake Ceasefire and Software Patents (Fake Patents) Thrown Out
Links for the day
Companies With Fake Values and a Fake Economic/Financial State (Phony Valuations)
It'll all go up in smoke, eventually
Links 21/04/2025: Microsoft LLM Slop (Plagiarism) Going Out of Control, CT Scans' Cancer Problems Was Underrated
Links for the day
4 Years Ago Freenode Crumbled From Within
there are still hundreds of thousands of users online at any given time
GNOME Has a Long History (Over a Decade) Misusing the Code of Conduct (CoC) to Censor (Cull) Legitimate Technical Criticism
This has nothing to do with manners, it's about control (by cover-up)
Microsoft Has Tainted GNOME, Which Has Key People Acting as a SLAPP Front Against Techrights (Trying to Censor the Site by Extortion and Many Threats)
One common denominator (other than Microsoft salaries) is GNOME, which was led by an actual professional crank until she quit so suddenly months ago
Homeland of Linux Kernel Turning to GNU/Linux?
Adoption of Vista 11 has been relatively low
According to StatCounter, This is What Linux Adoption Looks Like (Based on Web Requests Visible to StatCounter)
How much worse will it get for Microsoft?
Gemini Capsules Still Outsourcing to Certificate Authority Let's Encrypt Now Measured at Less Than 10 (or Less Than 0.3%)
In Geminispace, Let's Encrypt is not commonly used
Twisting Microsoft's Failure (Transmitting Malware) as "SSH Backdoors" and a Linux Problem
Somehow we almost always find that those FUD pieces about "Linux" are based on obvious falsehoods
Vista 11 Has Burned OEMs and Some Move to GNU/Linux
When people can finally avoid Windows (there's no reason to attach it to new PCs) there will be a lot more GNU/Linux users out there
Remember That Microsoft Mass Layoffs Are Imminent Because Its 'Empire' is Falling Apart
European politicians take a long, hard look a Free software
Richard Stallman in the UK This Week, Scheduled to Give Two Public Talks (London and Oxford)
Those talks do not cover the same topics
Gemini Links 21/04/2025: April, Autism, and ASN
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Sunday, April 20, 2025
IRC logs for Sunday, April 20, 2025
Links 20/04/2025: Partly Assorted Scientific and Political Leftovers
Links for the day
Links 20/04/2025: Many Data Breaches and Growing Censorship Wave
Links for the day
Gemini Links 20/04/2025: Canadian Elections and "Use the Best Tools You Have for the Current Environment"
Links for the day
Deja vu: Hitler's Birthday, Andreas Tille elected Debian Project Leader again
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
Links 20/04/2025: Bleeding Constitution and ChatGPT Infuriates Users Some More
Links for the day
Chinese OEMs (and World's Largest) Pave a Path Out of Microsoft Windows
So Microsoft now values (or prices) Vista 11 at just $140?
Gemini Links 20/04/2025: Contradictions of Mark Carney and Blog Questions Challenge
Links for the day
Microsoft's 'Lawsuit Diplomacy' (SLAPPs Riding UK Libel Law and Piggybacking UK GDPR, Inapplicable!) Will Only Give a Worse Image to Microsofters (and Microsoft), Give Exposure to Even More Suppressed Facts and Scandals
Microsoft came to dominate some sectors because of (or owing to) crimes; Microsoft won't just go away without some more crimes.
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Saturday, April 19, 2025
IRC logs for Saturday, April 19, 2025
Five (or Three) Years Without Social Control Media
Glyn Moody quit X (Twitter)
Electronics in People's Bedrooms
Modern technology not only blurred the gap between "functions" of rooms
Why GNU/Linux is Growing
There's growing interest in GNU/Linux right now because people do not fancy buying a new PC just to 'upgrade' (more spying) Windows