Bonum Certa Men Certa

RAND Mobbyists, Lobbyists, and Microsoft AstroTurfers in IP 2010 (Brussels)

The Rand Pauls of RAND

Rand Paul portrait by Gage Skidmore
Photo by Gage Skidmore



Summary: Rough tactics used to promote Microsoft's scheme wherein Free software gets taxed by Microsoft, even in places like Europe where software patents are in principle not legal

THE CONSENSUS that Microsoft is decreasingly a technology company (far fewer products) and increasingly a patent troll and political movement is gradually getting a foothold. As more and more Microsoft products get axed, the company will qualify as a patent troll (non-practicing entity) in more areas where it's just extorting its competition which won.



In order for Microsoft to become more effective as a patent troll, Microsoft will need to modify some laws. Microsoft cannot do this directly as it would get blasted for attempting it. So Microsoft hires and bankrolls several front groups that do he lobbying. We wrote well over a hundred posts giving examples of this type of activity as we hope to document and to map the vectors of lobbying (which in turn weakens them or sometimes forces them to nymshift).

The Microsoft agenda du jour is pushing RAND into Europe. Microsoft apparently failed to do this in India. Simon Phipps, a Brit, has just explained why RAND is "Not So Reasonable". It's a decent new essay on this old subject:

Fair, Reasonable, Non-Discriminatory - surely that all has to be good stuff? RAND sounds so good, and it's been showing up in all sorts of news lately. It's a key part in the negotiation of licenses for patents that apply to standards, and it stands for "Reasonable And Non-Discriminatory", excellent words that it's hard to criticise. Sometimes it shows up as FRAND, with "Fair" in front making it sound even better, or as RAND-z, with the Z indicating that whatever the license terms are they will have a zero pounds price ticket attached.

RAND appears in the rules and procedures of most standards organisations and actually does a great job in most of them. It's far better than the alternative, which is for patent holders to be able to either license their patents at whatever price each victim will pay, or to make the standard almost impossible to implement by anyone they don't want to be able to by selectively withholding a license. You can understand why a standards group would want to mandate RAND, FRAND or RAND-z, given the alternatives.

Of course, there is the obvious question of why any standards body would allow something to become a standard in the first place if one of the companies contributing to it holds a patent on a technique essential to implementing it.


Simon Phipps tells Carlo Piana (another person who stands for Europe's interests, not Microsoft's): "Want to make any bets on how long it will be before I get a troll comment?"

Well, guess what? Yes, it didn't take long for mobbyist Microsoft Florian to hit this piece with a troll comment promoting RAND, as usual. His position on this subject is virtually identical to that of Microsoft lobbyist Zuck (and his fellow minions). How predictable it must have been for Simon Phipps. He probably knew exactly who it would be with the "troll comment". Just mention RAND and this mobbyist will soon show up. Just about any piece against RAND is being heckled/trolled by Microsoft mobbyists other than him, but that's what we ought to expect given the billions of dollars Microsoft has at stake. Professionally speaking, Florian is all about Microsoft (.NET developer, never using GNU/Linux, proudly using Vista 7 while pretending to be a FOSS person who opposes software patents). We'll come to more of that in a moment.

“RAND describes a superset of behaviours. Some RAND requirements lead to RF terms. The existence of trivial counterexamples where RAND standards have GPL implementations allows trolls to thus discredit this position.”
      --Simon Phipps
Glyn Moody gets involved in this debate as well (in Identi.ca). He tells Bradley Kuhn (FSF) for example: "generally, yes, but it [RAND] an be crafted in abnormal ways to be compatible." Kuhn does not quite agree. To Phipps he writes: "I may have misread. My take-away was: "sometimes, #RAND works out for FLOSS, but usually doesn't." I don't agree w/ nuance." To Phipps and Moody he later writes: "It's tough to get FLOSS hackers to follow patent licensing nuances, so simplifications help, ala "#RAND = #problematic" [...] my 1st yr CS teacher said: "We must lie a little here" b/c the nuances required prereqs we didn't have. Similar here." Phipps tells Kuhn: "RAND describes a superset of behaviours. Some RAND requirements lead to RF terms. The existence of trivial counterexamples where RAND standards have GPL implementations allows trolls to thus discredit this position."

The mobbyist has already resumed badmouthing Android, spreading misinformation about a Vertical lawsuit against Samsung and LG (he closed all the comments in his blog after he had been exposed repeatedly by commenters, so nobody can correct him where he leads journalists whom he mass-mails). He characterises it as an anti-Android lawsuit even though it is slightly more complex than that. But never mind accuracy. The mobbyists are supposed to confuse people who don't know better, making absurd statements that may capture gullible bystanders who curiously pass by.

Watch what the mobbyist did with Nancy Gohring, who covers a lot of Microsoft since years ago. She took this one assignment/story for IDG and was possibly fed by one of Florian's pseudo-personal E-mails (he personalises identical messages which he pushes to many journalists while presenting himself as an opponent of software patents). Gohring wrote:

Android faces a new threat with a lawsuit that Vertical Computer Systems filed Monday against Samsung and LG.

Vertical alleges that certain Samsung and LG Android-based phones infringe two of its patents that describe systems for generating applications. In the suit, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas, Vertical names the LG Ally, four Samsung Galaxy models and Samsung's Galaxy Tab tablet computer as products that use the patented technologies.


She is then linking to the mobbyist, who is mass-mailing journalists to get his version of the story told (and it's Linux-hostile). We don't know for sure if Gohring was fed by the mobbyist, by judging by the way it is written (with his own fake introduction to himself), it's very likely to be the case. He is still pretending that he is against software patents because this is how a lobbyist should present himself to journalists (for credibility, even if it's bogus, like fronting for a monopoly while pretending to speak for small businesses). We do not appreciate his active-aggressive approach towards journalists, wherein he pressures them (with unsolicited mail for the most part) to get his version of the story told, then brags about it as though he was spontaneously quoted for being more accurate or insightful. Then again, that's just how lobbyists in general work. ACT works like this. They are media subvertors, who try to sway public opinion. The mobbyist also copies and pastes a lot, posting identical or nearly identical comments in many sites and forums such as Slashdot, Ars Technica, and LWN. As usual, he received aid from Dana Blankenhorn, whom he met some weeks ago. Blankenhorn mentions us in a negative way because he refuses to listen to many other FOSS proponents who repeatedly explain to him Florian's agenda. He should read his comments more carefully and reflect. Maybe one day he'll realise and admit that he got bamboozled.

Anyway, not only the mobbyists are actively promoting RAND right now. Watch this new schedule for IP 2010 and scroll down to ACT, the RAND lobbyists (with software patents inside). Under "6C Software Patents, Open Source" we found "Jonathan Zuck", who pretends to stand for Belgium (who is he kidding really?).

Glyn Moody says that "EC & EPO want to explore "tensions" between ICT standards and patents" (in reference to this). He rightly asks (in Identi.ca), "isn't it decided?"

You can tell just by its framing: this is "a conference to address some specific issues on patents and ICT standards". ICT is mostly about software, and yet software cannot be patented "as such". So, in a sense, this ought to be a trivial conference lasting about five minutes. The fact that it isn't shows where things are going to head: towards accepting and promoting patents in European standards, including those for software.

That's not really surprising, given who are organising it - the European Commission and the European Patent Office (EPO). The European Commission has always been a big fan of software patents; and the EPO is hardly likely to be involved with a conference that says: "you know, we *really* don't need all these patents in our standards."

Of course, the opposite result - that patents are so indescribably yummy that we need to have as many as possible in our European ICT standards - must emerge naturally and organically. And so to ensure that natural and organic result, we have a few randomly-selected companies taking part.


This sort of fake debate (like the one we find in climate change) is summoning the fake controversy which the mobbyists and lobbyists work so hard to create. They want to distract with questions which ought to be trivial and instead put disinformation at the centre of it all.

Recent Techrights' Posts

Microsoft Windows is No Longer an Operating System, It's Surveillance Project
Why is this even legal to preload on PCs outside the US?
Qualcomm Arduino Takes Aim at Raspberry Pi
Qualcomm is a Microsoft partner
Arduino is Now a Patent Bully (Qualcomm)
Qualcomm has just bought Arduino
Many Years of Microsoft Cancellations and Faked (Acquired) Revenue "Growth"
XBox is basically the "next Skype"
 
Links 08/10/2025: ‘Death to Spotify’ and Law to Ban Loud Commercials on Streaming (Dis)Services
Links for the day
Links 08/10/2025: Real Innovation and Nina.chat is Dead
Links for the day
Links 08/10/2025: Y2K38 Bug is a Vulnerability, Chat Control in Europe a Threat
Links for the day
How and Why Once-Legitimate Sites Turn Into Slopfarms
Many sites will go offline and many social control networks will shut down once they realise or even openly admit they spend money and time gardening a bunch of bots and slop
UbuntuPIT Became a Slopfarm and Gnoppix Tarnishes Its Own Brand With Slop
It fits all the characteristics of mildly-edited (if at all) slop
Slopwatch: Linux Journal and Other Slopfarms
GAFAM needs to go the way of the dodo
Gemini Links 08/10/2025: "Seek Seek Revolution" and Gradient Backgrounds
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Tuesday, October 07, 2025
IRC logs for Tuesday, October 07, 2025
Stagnation of the Economy and What Free Software Can (or Could) Do For It
If your economic model is based on a pyramid of lies, it won't last very long
Social Control Media is Sinking
it would rightly seem like the era of centralised "social" sites (they're not social, they're about controlling the users) is ending, not overnight but gradually
Participation in Cancel Culture Detrimental to One's Career
A cautionary tale
Passion Wins
we've increased the number of birds we feed to 100+
How Solderpunk and Sean Conner Started Gemini Protocol (and, Collectively, Geminispace) Back in 2019
Based on the "official" history
The Comment TheLayoff.com Has Just Censored for Criticising a Ridiculous Puff Piece of IBM Management
If comments get censored for their "style" rather than their substance, then society will be worse off
The Power of Writing Down Facts
The more we write and publish, the more people will know what happened
Microsoft's Non-Denying Denial About XBox's Death is Already Being Shattered to Pieces
Like Microsoft's 'open' 'hey hi', heralding meaningless non-committing agreements with AMD is little more than vapourware
Slopwatch: UbuntuPIT Joins the Slopfarms Club
Slopfarms gonna slop
Links 07/10/2025: Privacy at Risk, GAFAM Remains Off the Hook
Links for the day
Gemini Links 07/10/2025: Modern Retro Console Idea and Batch vs Bash
Links for the day
Links 07/10/2025: International Criminal Court (ICC) Convicts Ali Kushayb; Moroccan Imprisoned for 'Offensive' Shirt
Links for the day
Links 07/10/2025: EU' Chat Control is Back, US Cracks Down on Democracy
Links for the day
Techrights Pursues Justice and Truth Because, Without Those, Society Descends Into Chaos
most people reject dogma and pseudoscience
Upcoming Talks by Richard Stallman in Helsinki, Göteborg, and Rome
Join with him and share the software
Something Bad is Happening in the Open Source Initiative (OSI)
The latest OSI blog post is from a Microsoft operative and a few weeks ago the Executive Director left
TLS 1.3 Dominates Geminispace (99% of Known Capsules)
it's nowadays safe to assume almost every capsule can handle TLS 1.3
Why soylentnews.org Has Been Having Technical Difficulties Lately
The network has been going up and down quite a lot this past week
A Statement Against Violence
The facts are on our side
They've Run Out of Things to Rebrand or Label as "AI"
The next few years will be interesting because if Microsoft lays off tens of thousands of workers each year, there won't be much left except mountains of debt and dying brands
The Register MS is Still Being Paid to Participate in the "AI" Ponzi Scheme Which Will Crash the Economy
The Register MS is hoping to get lucky by tricking people into a scam
Richard Stallman Confirms His Talk in Göteborg This Coming Friday
"The hosts say that the list will not be given to the state"
Most of the "Linux" Results This Morning in Google News Are LLM Slop From the Same Slopfarm, Plagiarising Phoronix
The main question is, does Google even care at this point?
Gemini Links 07/10/2025: Civil War and "Goodbye Web"
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Monday, October 06, 2025
IRC logs for Monday, October 06, 2025
Evidence Contradicting Microsoft's Non-Denying Denials and Expectation of Many Layoffs Soon
"Microsoft has had this constant drip of layoffs for months."
The "AI Revolution" is Going Very Well, Right?
money that does not exist and alleged potential that is pure fiction
Links 06/10/2025: Scam Altman Himself Admits He Runs a Scam Based on a Bubble, US Administration Adopts “War From Within” Narrative to Crush Opposition/Dissent
Links for the day
Slopwatch: Fake Ubuntu 'Articles' and Google News Helps People Who Plagiarise Phoronix Using LLMs
Michael Larabel can't possibly be happy about that
6,000 Pages/Articles a Year
Today in one month from now the site turns 19
When Things Become So Ubiquitous That They're Almost Nameless
The notion or the concept of software freedom isn't tied to any particular brand or project, so it should still resonate
At Least 3 Richard Stallman Talks in Europe Confirmed So Far, Next Week in Rome There's Another
Dr. Stallman has not announced this yet
IDG Seems to Have Abandoned Sandra Henry Stocker's UNIX/Linux Column
Unless we hear otherwise or see some update/s, this may mark another death blow from IDG
Gemini Links 06/10/2025: Winter Nights and "Virtue Signaling"
Links for the day
Links 06/10/2025: Scientific Awards and Typhoon Matmo
Links for the day
IP Kat Gone Bonkers, Pushing Slop in Patents (Likely Illegal, With Severe Consequences)
AstraZenecaKat: "Last time, this Kat covered some practical steps on how to ensure client confidentiality when using AI tools (IPKat)."
Links 06/10/2025: Grokipedia as Malicious Slop, US 'Martial Law' a "New Normal"
Links for the day
Fake Economics and Clown Computing Circuses
who's gonna pay for these scams?
Nobel Prize in Economics Does Not Exist, It's Propaganda From Sveriges Riksbank
"It is that time of the year when it is important to remind people that there are no Nobel Prizes for professional wrestling, astrology, or economics"
Rust is Eating Linux
That's a recipe for problems
Cindy Cohn (Executive Director of EFF) is a Millionaire, Earned Almost $30,000 Per Month Before Departing While the EFF Lost Money
EFF is "Big Business"
Non-Denying Denial From Microsoft (Again) Regarding the End of XBox Consoles
It's kind of hilarious that even the site chosen by Microsoft to relay its BS, based on past loyalty, isn't quite buying it
Bringing Back Lost Articles From the 1990s: Microsoft Products Leave Door Open to NSA
Nothing has changed since then
When the Slop Bubble Pops People Will Say Richard Stallman Was Right (Again)
What was once known as Computer Science turned into "IT"
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Sunday, October 05, 2025
IRC logs for Sunday, October 05, 2025
Links 06/10/2025: Science, Hardware, and Andrej Babis Making a Comeback
Links for the day