Bonum Certa Men Certa

”In Europe Microsoft Have Been Putting Significant Resources in Backing The Setting Up Of the European Patent Office“

"It is not the policy of the EPO to require or examine source codes […]. Moreover, given the length and complexity of source code listings, which can often stretch to hundreds of pages, it would be quite impossible to examine them." —European Patent Office brochure



Summary: How Microsoft lobbies to change public policies such that they discriminate, intentionally, against software freedom

THE BRAND "Microsoft" may only be a scapegoat; it's not the brand which corrupts systems, it is the highly-influential sociopaths who accommodate the corporation who view themselves as having infinite entitlement, to the point where they are allowed to bribe whoever necessary to change the laws. One self-serving law-changer is Bill Gates, who shelters himself behind a foundation which spends about $1,000,000 per day just buying the press (they call it "advocacy"). Other major lobbyists work behind the scenes and many of these activities are undisclosed.



The situation in New Zealand as far as software patenting goes is not encouraging and Daniel Reurich explains how Microsoft uses legal instruments (as mentioned yesterday) to make things worse for GNU/Linux and software freedom. It's like barbwiring the market to protect Microsoft's status quo, finding new ways to label the competition "illegal". As Reurich put it (NZICT is a Microsoft-backed lobby, it's nothing to do with "NZ" interests):

Sounds to me like Microsoft is resurrecting it's FUD campaign. Of course Chapman Tripp have in the past provided council for Microsoft in NZ and given that Microsoft used it's power over NZICT to try and slip in a secret Supplementary Order Paper, I'd figure this is Microsofts next step.

It seems that Microsoft are franticly purchase the law that allows them to maintain their monopoly on computer systems right across the world.

[...]

In Europe Microsoft have been putting significant resources in backing the setting up of the European Patent Office.



Europe's similarity to New Zealand in that regard is a subject we addressed before (the likes of Microsoft use "device" as a syntactic trick). Microsoft's Marshall Phelps gloated about the EPO not being able to "distinguish between hardware and software so the patents get issued anyway." That's just what Microsoft wanted and later on it got its way with FAT patents in Europe. As part of the thread above we have:

They are never going to stop. They have a lot of money, they have a lot of influence, they have a lot of friends in very high places all over the world. It's going to take an eternal vigilance to keep them at bay.


Microsoft is a very major player among the software patents lobby. Then we have the patent lawyers, who are desperately defending the acts of patent trolls, too (who are themselves part of the litigation pipeline that feeds lawyers). It's all just a big pile of propaganda. Even Gates himself once admitted that “[i]f people had understood how patents would be granted when most of today’s ideas were invented, and had taken out patents, the industry would be at a complete standstill today."

Microsoft has no qualm about lying if it helps pass laws that forbid software freedom and make Microsoft patent boosters like Nathan Myhrvold and Bill Gates a lot richer (they both accrue power and money using patents these days, including their patents on nuclear technology that they jointly lobby for).

Recent Techrights' Posts

Michael “Monty” Widenius: It Started in 1983 With Richard Stallman (RMS)
The other co-founder of MySQL is a bit notorious for confronting RMS rather viciously
For the Second Time in a Few Weeks Microsoft Lunduke Makes False Accusations Against Senior Red Hat Staff to Incite a Despicable 'Troll Army'
Nothing that Microsoft Lunduke claims of says can be trusted
 
Links 03/10/2025: Lawyers Caught Using LLM Slop Explain Why They Did It, LibreSSL 4.1.1 and 4.0.1 Released
Links for the day
FSF Board Grew 50% Since Last Year, Has New President, Turns 40 in Two Days
It's a good move for the FSF and - by extension - for software freedom
Links 03/10/2025: Conflicts, Death of TypePad, and TikTok/CheeTok Gives a Boost to Far Right Groups in Europe
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Thursday, October 02, 2025
IRC logs for Thursday, October 02, 2025
Slopwatch: Linux Journal, Google News, and LinuxSecurity
They carry on polluting the Web with fake articles
Gemini Links 02/10/2025: Kubernetes With FreeBSD and robots.txt
Links for the day
Links 02/10/2025: 'Open' 'AI' Resorting to Gimmicks and Fake Funding, Europe’s ‘Drone Wall’ Discussed
Links for the day
Links 02/10/2025: Brave Passes 100M Users Milestone, Kodak Selling Its Own Film Again
Links for the day
su lisa && rm -rf /home/ibm/power
Novell was ruined by another person from IBM, Ronald Hovsepian
A Record Demand at Microsoft: Demand to Cancel
What we're witnessing is a very ungraceful destruction of XBox
Microsoft is Losing Europe
Hence all the "support" and "discount" offers that are limited to Europe
The Free Software Foundation Starts Fund-raising for 40th Anniversary
New pop-up 2-3 days ahead of the 40th anniversary event
Systemd Breaks Networking in Debian and Microsoft Staff Rushes to Make Face-Saving Excuses in LWN
Microsoft's bluca is already there in the comments, his Microsoft money pays for LWN to let him leave comments early
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Wednesday, October 01, 2025
IRC logs for Wednesday, October 01, 2025
What the End of XBox Will Look Like: a Fiery Crash
XBox is the next Skype. It won't last much longer. Expect many more layoffs.
Richard Stallman is Going to Finland to Give a Talk Next Thursday
A day later he speaks in Sweden
Gemini Links 02/10/2025: SMTP Pipelining and End of ROOPHLOCH 2025
Links for the day
Slopwatch: Plagiarism, Fake Articles, and FUD About Linux
not a day goes by without Google News feeding FUD from slopfarms
Gemini Links 01/10/2025: Chat Control and End of Life
Links for the day
Links 01/10/2025: Long Covid Risk Reiterated, "Bitcoin Queen" Caught
Links for the day
Links 01/10/2025: EA $55 Billion Deal is Debt and Slop "Raises Vishing Risks"
Links for the day
Bluewashing at Red Hat Means Redundancies
The man who sold Red Hat to IBM meanwhile became a Microsoft Mono booster
After Killing OpenSource.com, IBM ('Red Hat') and OSI Told Us OpenSource.net Would Replace It (But That Didn't Happen)
Now it's time to move on, perhaps tarnishing the "Open Source" label some more (for whatever sponsor wants this)
Linux is Not a Community Project, It's a Wall Street Product
The core goal should be freedom
Bad Actors Abusing the Free Software Community, Vandalising It Using Rogue Politics and Old Tactics
Oil giants have long attempted to do this; now, the digital equivalent of Big Oil does this in technology
Social Control Media Isn't the Future, The Federation or Fediverse Isn't Growing, People's Accounts Vanish for Good
users' accounts will get deleted, not just become inactive
IBM is Failing, This Helps Show Wall Street is Entirely Detached From Actual Commercial Performance
IBM is unable to grow, it's just constantly shrinking
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Tuesday, September 30, 2025
IRC logs for Tuesday, September 30, 2025
Clerical Aspects of Publishing and Development
In Free software, the management aspects are considerably reduced
Slopwatch: Fake Articles and Google News Promoting "Linux" Spam or Bot-Generated Fear, Uncertainty, Doubt (FUD)
These slopfarms help misplace blame
Third Wave of Microsoft Layoffs in September, This Time Many in Liverpool Affected
Be ready for more waves of layoffs ahead of the so-called "results" in late October