Bonum Certa Men Certa

How Microsoft Florian 'Cooks' Spin

Witch's house



Summary: How mobbyists game the press and patterns for journalists to watch out for if they wish to avoid being deceived and exploited

In my "Inbox" I have over 100 messages from Microsoft Florian. Not all of them are personal. Florian is shy to admit this, but his operation is based on reuse of text for blog comments (he shut down comments in his own blogs after he had found them irritating) and also for E-mails, which he uses to embed his name and his often incorrect claims inside news articles. Maybe he pondered sending it to one zillion reporters, hoping that one in a zillion will give it room in a post/article. Maybe that's how the lobbying industry works, who knows? I sure don't. But what I do know what I was sent and I received admissions too. Here is an example of a message:



From: Florian Mueller To: "Roy Schestowitz" Subject: Bilski decision doesn't invalidate even one software patent Date: Mon, 28 Jun 2010 18:53:58 +0200

(sad story... and this here is an example of my emails to journalists when news break)

Please feel free to use in your reporting on the Bilski decision any of these comments. I'm the author of the FOSS Patents blog (and founder and former director of the NoSoftwarePatents campaign) on the Bilski decision and what it means for the patentability of software.

Here are a few select quotes, and further below the URL of my posting and the complete text.

"Unfortunately, the Supreme Court delivered an opinion that doesn't help the cause of partial or complete abolition of software patents at all."

"[T]he court's majority position is about the most liberal reasoning that it could have been. Only a decision to uphold the Bilski patent could have been any less restrictive.

"Simply put, the Supreme Court's decision does not do away with even one software patent that already exists, nor does it raise the bar for the future."

"The decision announced today makes it clear that a majority of the Supreme Court wanted to give the abolition of even only a small percentage of all software patents the widest berth possible."

"This US decision is even more disappointing when taking into account the global trend." [then mentions political process in New Zealand and court decision in Germany]

"The position that software patents should be abolished isn't nearly as popular among judges and politicians as it is in the free and open source software community."

The upcoming Defensive Patent License (DPL) is recommended at the end of the blog posting.

Here's the URL and the full text:


Then comes ego-surfing. He can show other people how the prior mentions (which he mass-mailed for) supposedly give him credibility. It's a chain of FUD, just like Microsoft with the FAT patent (using prior settlements to discourage re-examination).

It's a typical recipe of "please use my quotes"; "here are samples you can use" (not exact words). I received loads of those, even after pointing out to him that he is mass-mailing while hiding it, which I did not appreciate. In fact, judging by the headers it seems like a personal message, but after a while I could see what he was up to and then he sent me this explanation:

From: Florian Mueller To: "Roy Schestowitz" Subject: EU launches investigation against IBM over mainframe practices Date: Mon, 26 Jul 2010 15:33:54 +0200

(this goes to multiple recipients but I didn't want to use an undisclosed list because of potential problems with spam filters; nor do I use a mailer tool ;-)

[...]


Those "spam filters", eh? They are a hindrance to lobbyists. Florian and his bully friends from Microsoft can try all they want to gag those who explain their 'algorithm' (Florian has not patented this lobbying algorithm/business method yet, has he?), but people deserve to know the truth.

Comments

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
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
 
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
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