12.05.15
Posted in Deception, Europe, Microsoft, Patents at 9:16 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz
The EPO is now buying ‘megaphones’ in the corporate media
Summary: A look at EPO-leaning media coverage and a response to it, clarifying the EPO’s real worry, which is a public that’s properly informed by the media about the EPO’s rogue management
AT THE end of last month we leaked evidence of media manipulation by the EPO. This hasn’t been getting media attention, whereas the EPO’s SLAPP actions against critics quickly became mainstream news [1, 2] (it reached the British press the day before the Dutch protest, whereupon we got contacted by journalists, the latest being from the BBC). The EPO now spends, on average, €2444 per day on reputation laundering alone. Think what they can do with such an obscene budget! And for a supposedly ‘public’ body. What a total waste of money, which goes to a shady company in the US. One would expect the media to at least say something about it (some try to inform journalists); a French politician did (Pierre-Yves Le Borgn’).
“Think what they can do with such an obscene budget! And for a supposedly ‘public’ body.”On Tuesday there was a massive EPO staff protest in the Netherlands and on Friday there was an even bigger protest in Munich, the EPO’s main site. There is a lot to be angry about and now that the biggest ever protests take place (there is at least one more next week) we can expect more media coverage.
Based on this update from European authorities, secrecy will prevail. As IP Kat put it yesterday: “This is frustratingly vague and adds very little to what the Unitary Patent Regulation prescribes in Article 13. What the IPKat was hoping to find out is what percentage each country is planned to receive. Is this going to be revealed, or will it remain a secret?”
“Well, they already confirmed that the E-mail itself (the one which made them go ballistic) was authentic.”What kind of democracy is this? It often seems like large corporations are the main beneficiaries here, at the expense of people. The media isn’t helping in getting this point across. A week ago we saw an article titled “Microsoft Corporation Does Not Receive Special Treatment: EPO” (the previous headline said “EPO Rejects Accusations of Special Treatment for Microsoft”, so we assume the editor changed it). Well, that’s what they say, but leaked evidence contradicts them. Here is what the article said: “The European Patent Office (EPO) is now giving out legal threats, in response to recent allegations made against it, regarding maintaining a special cooperative relationship with Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT). The agency denies such accusations and says that it will not accept its staff being subject to such accusations. EPO is shifting to a more offensive strategy from the defensive one that it previously practiced.
“In October, Roy Schestowitz, along with his site Techrights, was the first to claim Microsoft was getting preference in its patent applications by the EPO. He published a leaked EPO internal email from February 16 that lists Microsoft’s submitted patent documents, and asks examiners to give the applications top priority as soon as possible. The email’s author and a senior member at the agency, Grant Philpott, mentioned of a “close cooperation project” with the software giant in the message.”
Well, they already confirmed that the E-mail itself (the one which made them go ballistic) was authentic.
“They try to blame the messengers who speak out instead.”The article continues: “Now that the agency has defended its position in the matter, it is aiming to go after the people who started allegations of this nature. Since the issue was sparked by Mr. Schestowitz, other blog posts made numerous accusations about the EPO tossing out patent applications submitted by small European businesses. The patent authority said that these allegations were not only false but detrimental to its reputation as a public servant.”
Rightly so. If they have a reputation issue, it’s because of the management. They try to blame the messengers who speak out instead. How pathetic is that?
“There’s a good reason why we now call the EPO the European Private [sic] Office.”Well, based on the EPO’s actions as of late, it’s now better aligned for corporate objectives, not public objectives. The public interest is hardly even something at the corner of the room, it’s hardly a consideration, much like in Europe’s copyright ‘debates’ (dominated by conglomerates, foreign monopolies/oligopolies, and their lobbyists).
The article correctly states: “The patent authority did not hesitate to issue legal threats to Mr. Schestowitz and his long-time running website. Some bloggers, who closely follow the patent and intellectual property industry, did not hold back to express their opinion of how they felt about the EPO’s action and its legal threats to Mr. Schestowitz.”
One person who seems to be EPO staff wrote sarcastically that “they just want to protect staff and their families…Ooohh, I see… ” (that’s their convenient excuse).
“This whole institution of just a setup of some few magnates and plutocrats, designed to perpetuate their power and wealth in Europe and beyond.”Regarding the leaning to private interests, commenters who are likely not working for the EPO (just commenting on the above article) wrote: “The patent regulations are more business these days than an authentic public service [...] I think that they will get away with it. The authorities and the big companies always get away with it” (the EPO is turning private).
There’s a good reason why we now call the EPO the European Private [sic] Office. It’s run for private interests. In the coming weeks we are going to show that the EPO’s roots are also poisoned or tarnished by private interests. This whole institution of just a setup of some few magnates and plutocrats, designed to perpetuate their power and wealth in Europe and beyond. They only need to pretend, in order to appease the masses, that they protect the ‘little guys’ or the lone inventors. █
“Religion is what keeps the poor from murdering the rich.”
–Napoleon Bonaparte
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Posted in Microsoft at 6:25 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz
Summary: Why we are writing less about Microsoft these days and some recent news regarding Microsoft’s dysfunctional business
BACK in the days, more than half a decade ago, we wrote a great deal about Microsoft, after we had focused on Novell. Microsoft was a big threat to software freedom. It still is, but there are now other threats, some of which more potent than others. Microsoft is now buying back its own shares to artificially elevate the share/stock price (fewer stocks available for the public to buy means higher price per share). Microsoft also lays off a lot of employees and moves into small offices. We know this based on insiders. There’s a serious cost-cutting process inside Microsoft. Some people may then say, Microsoft is now a “cloud” company (or “cloud first”). These are just marketing-oriented buzzwords for servers/hosting. Microsoft servers are going down [1] and Microsoft is jacking up the price of servers with Windows on them, according to Microsoft Peter [2]. It’s a poor strategy which will most likely drive away customers even more quickly (quicker migration) to GNU/Linux, in the form of AWS, Red Hat, IBM, Rackspace and so on.
Microsoft is in a free fall.
“Focusing on issues rather than brands ensures we will stay on target all along, even when companies like Novell die.”Vista 10, the common carrier, is reportedly a massive failure (growth already flattens) despite Microsoft’s many dirty tricks, which included force-feeding Vista 10 (to further be escalated next year). The trends matter, not the absolute numbers, as media reports typically cite Microsoft-linked firms’ figures (like Net Applications), not legitimate or independent figures. The fact remains though, not only on the server but on the desktop too (not to mention mobile) Microsoft is struggling. We are therefore not as interested as before in Microsoft’s business. We shall focus more on patents in the coming months or years. Focusing on issues rather than brands ensures we will stay on target all along, even when companies like Novell die. █
Related/contextual items from the news:
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MICROSOFT HAS CONFIRMED that Office 365 is back up and running after suffering downtime across Europe on Thursday.
The downtime left users, including us here at The INQUIRER, unable to access their Exchange email account via a web browser.
At the time, Down Detector showed that Microsoft’s cloud service has been stuttering since 9.17am on Thursday, and confirmed that the outage is affecting users across Europe.
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Windows Server 2016, not likely to arrive until the second half of next year, is going to shake up the way Microsoft licenses its server operating system, moving away from per socket licensing to per core. The change was first spotted by Wes Miller who is, for his sins, an expert on Microsoft licensing policies.
Windows Server 2012 introduced a great rationalization in the way Microsoft licensed its server operating system. The two main editions, Standard and Datacenter, had identical features, and differed only in terms of the number of virtual operating system instances they supported. Standard supported two VMs (in addition to the host OS); Datacenter was unlimited. Beyond that, they were identical. The licenses for both editions were sold in two socket units; one license was needed for each pair of sockets a system contained.
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12.04.15
Posted in GNU/Linux, Microsoft, Patents at 5:25 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz
‘Peace’ with Microsoft does not ensure peace with its satellites
Summary: An update regarding Canon’s débâcle with Intellectual Ventures, the world’s largest and most abusive patent troll, created and funded by Microsoft and Bill Gates
TECHRIGHTS has been writing about the world’s largest patent troll, Intellectual Ventures, for many years. The strong links to Microsoft are impossible to ignore and the attacks on Linux are not at all surprising.
“…Microsoft continues to attack Linux using software patents, often via its patent troll, Intellectual Ventures.”Last month we wrote about this troll's attacks on Canon (which uses a lot of Linux in its products). We used that to make the case that even with a Microsoft patent deal, one cannot be defended from Microsoft’s trolls. Well, the Microsoft patent troll is said to have just ‘settled’ (means extortion money extracted after Canon thought it had peace with Microsoft). As IP Hawk put it: “Looks like IV and Canon have settled. Seeing stay pending dismissals on the dockets.”
Does anyone other than parasites actually believe that Intellectual Ventures is worth existing?
According to the EFF (as of this week): “It’s easy to file a patent complaint. All a patent owner has to do is say that they own a patent and that the defendant infringed it. The patent holder doesn’t even need to identify which product of the defendant’s they believe infringe the patent, or specify which claims of the patent they’re asserting. It’s an absurdly simple process, and unscrupulous patent tolls routinely take advantage of that fact.
“That might have changed this week—the Judicial Conference of the United States has instituted a rule change that includes eliminating the form that’s been used for patent complaints for decades. We hope that the change makes it harder for patent trolls to hit defendants with information-free complaints, but we’re not breaking out the Champagne yet.”
Well, as we have shown here before, Microsoft continues to attack Linux using software patents, often via its patent troll, Intellectual Ventures. Companies are even sued in bulk, in conjunction, with very broad claims. Anyone capable and eager to defend this status quo with a straight face is either working for Microsoft (if not a similar patent aggressor) or some patent lawyer who profits from patent lawsuits. Monopolising the market by abusing the system is still Microsoft’s expertise. █
“Children are often taught “computer skills” that are really “Microsoft Windows skills” – how to use Microsoft’s operating system and its Office suite (its two monopolies) – rather than the possibilities of making computers do what you want. As such, children are being equipped to be uncreative office workers, just as those at the end of the 19th century were equipped for the routine of adding up huge lists of numbers in the accounts departments of big companies.”
–The Guardian
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Posted in Microsoft, Vista 10 at 3:39 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz
No ‘new Microsoft’…
“In the last several days Microsoft has shown that despite claims of acquiring a newly found respect for open principles and technology, developers should be cautious in believing promises made by this “new” Microsoft. [...] There is one other fact clear from this case. Microsoft does not appear to be a leopard capable of changing its spots. Maybe it’s time developers go on a diet from Microsoft and get the FAT out of their products.”
–Jim Zemlin, Linux Foundation Executive Director
Summary: The company which respects nobody’s secrets now openly promotes what some consider the equivalent of SOPA, revealing double standards and malicious ambitions
The so-called ‘new Microsoft’ is still very evil, but usually behind closed doors (secrets). The media strategy of Microsoft has been to portray itself as “open” and reformed, but what is Microsoft really doing?
Well, based on reports such as “Microsoft, US senators want to grease wheels of trade secret theft cases” or “Microsoft promotes the value of trade secrets as senate committee discusses new bill”, not much has changed. Microsoft takes the lead in an assault on society’s collective interests.
“The media strategy of Microsoft has been to portray itself as “open” and reformed, but what is Microsoft really doing?”To quote The Stack: “A spokesman for the Microsoft On The Issues website has expressed the company’s support for new legislation that would reform the legal framework for companies wishing to protect their trade secrets in a cloud-centric world where such information is frequently forced to reside on networks.
“In the post Microsoft’s Assistant General Counsel of IP Policy & Strategy Jule Sigall rallies behind business and academic concerns supporting the proposed Defend Trade Secrets Act 2015 (DTSA), which goes before the United States Senate Judiciary Committee today.”
“Microsoft takes the lead in an assault on society’s collective interests.”The ‘new Microsoft’ is apparently so ‘open’ that it lobbies for an especially nasty pro-secrecy bill. That’s the real Microsoft. There is another article titled “Why legal experts are up in arms over the trade-secrets bill Microsoft loves”.
The article from Noyes says: “At a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on Wednesday, lawmakers heard arguments over a bill that has garnered passionate support from Microsoft but been compared by others to the controversial SOPA copyright act.”
“Cortana makes any device with Windows a listening device or a bug.”Microsoft has even gone public with this move: “Their view was echoed in a blog post by Jule Sigall, Microsoft’s assistant general counsel of IP policy and strategy, who described the importance of trade secrets in the development of Cortana.”
Cortana makes any device with Windows a listening device or a bug. It’s a nasty antifeature. Vista 10 in itself serves to prove that Microsoft goes deeper into the surveillance business, amassing people’s secrets (this is apparently what Microsoft’s interest in trade secrets is really about).
“Due to anti-class action clauses, it’s not likely that class action against Microsoft (over Vista 10) would be successful.”According to recent reports, users of Vista 10 (usually just people who were forced to use it because they bought a new computer and Microsoft had pressured OEMs to bundle Vista 10) consider class action over Vista 10 (“others can’t even get the Start menu working after upgrading from Windows 7 and 8.1,” says this article). This so-called ‘operating system’, which is basically a keylogger (sending every single event over the network, broadcasting it to ‘mother ship’) and hence very inefficient too, is a reminder of how much Microsoft respects secrets. Microsoft wants to snoop on everyone while keeping its own secrets. Due to anti-class action clauses, it’s not likely that class action against Microsoft (over Vista 10) would be successful.
There are many other problems with Windows, including back doors. What does that really say about Microsoft’s approach to secrets? There are back or bug doors in all versions of Windows (some say since 1999 when Microsoft first built these back doors, perhaps in order to appease the US government amidst antitrust disputes) and not only governments but all sorts of other groups still take advantage of it, sometimes to extort people using their data. Remember Stuxnet and also note that Conficker is still alive, making botnets out of Windows-running PCs. As The Inquirer put it the other day: “Conficker feeds a botnet, and Check Point said that the malware was found in 20 percent of all attacks anywhere and can enable the smooth passage of other types of infection. Check Point reckons that there were 1,500 malware families in action in October.”
The bottom line is, Microsoft lobbies for secrecy and something which is akin to SOPA, revealing hypocrisy in the sense that Microsoft does not at all respect secrecy. The company has done enormous damage not just because of its back doors (which made Windows easy to remotely take over) but also its extreme data collection practices in Vista 10. How can this company honestly lecture the world on trade secrets or generally about secrets? █
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11.30.15
Posted in Europe, Microsoft, Patents at 7:38 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz
Summary: An important discussion regarding the role of IAM (Intellectual Asset Management) in the debate about EPO abuses
TWO days ago we wrote two articles which mentioned how IAM had put at risk a source, despite repeatedly being asked not to do so. It didn’t exactly shock us because we generally view IAM as a pro-patent Establishment (USPTO, EPO management, software patents, large corporations) site. Sharing evidence with them is unwise. There was an article earlier this month (from AOL) titled “Innovating In A World Of Patent Lawsuits”; well, in the view of the likes of IAM, it’s all about “Profiting In A World Of Patent Lawsuits”. The more, the merrier. That’s how they make money.
Why do we write this article? It’s just a word of warning to anyone who deems IAM trustworthy. The EPO is now spending of nearly a million dollars on the media. IAM writers already have a history of receiving money from the EPO, by their own admission.
“It’s just a word of warning to anyone who deems IAM trustworthy.”We already saw IAM relaying EPO management’s talking points. That was a month and a half ago, only two weeks after the EPO had passed around the contract involving the million-dollar contract. The article that IAM published at the time was basically a sort of EPO ‘damage control’, replying to my allegations about preferential treatment of selected large corporations. That was very shortly before the EPO sent me nastygrams — something which IAM dropped hints of (days before it actually happened). The EPO spokesperson said something which only served to insinuate “defamation”. Remember that what I wrote at the time wasn’t inaccurate, it was just strongly-worded. This whole EPO program was created for Microsoft because of Microsoft (EPO effectively, on the balance of probabilities, changed its rules in exchange for Microsoft paying a lot more money in the form of patent applications).
I asked someone in the legal community if IAM was likely doing all of this internationally or even maliciously. “Although you may be right,” I was told, “I’d be personally a little surprised if IAM betrayed a confidential source; Joff Wild is no lover of TechRights, which is a matter of common knowledge…”
Regarding evidence that we shared with IAM (potentially but not necessarily including details about a source), we made some further inquiries as well. We were asked: “Can you be sure that IAM has not received the original documents via another source?”
“It effectively served material to Team Battistelli, on a silver platter, by publishing what I repeatedly told them must not be published.”The item that the EPO was bullying me (with legal threats) over was definitely not provided by another source. I can’t tell for sure if IAM was acting as some kind of courier for the EPO’s management here, but it’s not impossible. It effectively served material to Team Battistelli, on a silver platter, by publishing what I repeatedly told them must not be published.
For those who wonder what this was all about, the gist of the blog post in dispute is as follows:
- Microsoft uses patent extortion — or racketeering as per RICO Act — to coerce companies (at least 4 companies so far this year) into Microsoft’s Linux-hostile agenda. There are threats of litigation or actual litigation at hand (with conditional settlement) to achieve this. It’s a subject Techrights has been covering extensively since 2006.
- Microsoft pressured the EPO into the whole preferential treatment farce. We know this for sure.
- An EPO employee is shown in his (leaked) E-mail pressuring those below him to concentrate on granting patents to Microsoft (before all others), thereby helping Microsoft against European companies like TomTom (see the 2009 lawsuit and ‘settlement’).
- This EPO employee has been publicly promoting the UPC, despite his job being the granting of worthy patent monopolies (proper, thorough prior art search, never too rushed), not setting or lobbying on matters of law.
That’s all stuff that we can support with concrete evidence, hence I stand by what I said. They just caught me off guard at (almost) midnight on a Friday. My solicitor’s response explains why that’s an act of trickery.
It will be interesting to see if IAM has something to say on this matter. Judging by the many tweets they sent our way yesterday, they still don’t have a very effective rebuttal. █
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Posted in FSF, Microsoft, Patents, Red Hat at 6:56 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz
Photo source: Professor Conrad Johnson
Summary: Founder of Free software and author of the GPL (respectively) comment on what Microsoft and Red Hat have done regarding patents
WE FINALLY GOT some feedback regarding the baffling patent agreement which seemingly affects every user of GNU/Linux. We got this feedback from Stallman and (indirectly) Moglen, two of the Free software world’s most prominent individuals, especially when it comes to the GPL (GNU Public Licence/License).
Coverage of the Red Hat-Microsoft patent agreement can be found in [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13]. We sought feedback from Red Hat and spoke to low(er) level people for weeks, without ever hearing back from high-level management. After weeks of trying and waiting we ended up asking legal professionals to examine whatever legal contracts — even if under NDA or some other secrecy clauses that legally-binding deals may have — were involved. We first wrote to the FSF as follows:
Dear FSF licensing folks,
As discussed earlier in IRC (freenode), I have been pursuing answers from Red Hat regarding an urgent matter. I previously interviewed their CEO regarding patents and last week I spoke to a fairly senior person from Red Hat (unnamed for his own protection), for the third time this month. I wrote about 10 articles on this subject and it led to others writing about it as well, including some prominent bloggers.
“We need to understand what Red Hat agreed on with Microsoft on as Microsoft can use this behind closed doors against other companies, for pressure/leverage.”To put it concisely, Red Hat signed a deal with Microsoft which not only involved technical work but also what they call patent “standstill”. Who is this “standstill” for? Apparently Red Hat and its customers. I strongly doubt, especially in light of Alice v. CLS Bank, that a “standstill” should be needed. Red Hat does not threaten to sue Microsoft, whereas Microsoft did in the past threaten Red Hat (even publicly). This leaves those outside Red Hat in an awkward position and ever since this deal I have taken note of at least two companies being coerced by Microsoft using patents (over “Android” or “Linux” [sic]) or sued by one of its patent trolls, e.g. Intellectual Ventures. This isn’t really a “standstill”. It’s more like the notorious “peace of mind” that Novell was after back in 2006.
Red Hat has also admitted to me that it is still pursuing some software patents in the USPTO — a fact that does not surprising me, especially given the soaring market cap of RHT and the growing budget. This serves to contradict what people like Rob Tiller say to the courts; it shows double standards and no principled lead by example.
“The analysis and the voice of the FSF may be needed at this stage.”I have asked the FSF’s Joshua if it had looked into the patent agreement between Red Hat and Microsoft. Their lawyers in this case, Mr. Piana and Mr. Tiller (probably amongst others whom we don’t know about yet), would probably claim and even insist that it’s GPL-compatible, but the wording in the FAQ make it look exclusionary and there’s no transparency, so one cannot verify these claims.
We need to understand what Red Hat agreed on with Microsoft on as Microsoft can use this behind closed doors against other companies, for pressure/leverage. I am genuinely worried and fellow journalists who focus on GNU/Linux (Sean Michael Kerner for instance) tell me that they are too.
The analysis and the voice of the FSF may be needed at this stage. I have politely urged Red Hat for a number of weeks to become more transparent, whereupon some in the company said they had escalated these requests, but evidently nothing is being done, hence I feel the need to turn to the FSF.
I would gladly provide additional information that I have upon request.
With kind regards,
“In concrete terms,” Stallman responded, “what did they agree to do?”
“It is effectively a technical collaboration,” I told him, “which also involves a ceasefire regarding patents.”
“It is impossible to discuss whether it is good or bad,” he said, “until we know what it is.”
“We know too little about the patent aspects,” I explained.
Referring to Red Hat’s FAQ, Stallman said that I “seem[ed] to be talking about text I [Stallman] have not seen.”
To quote the relevant part for readers:
4. Does the new partnership address patents?
Red Hat and Microsoft have agreed to a limited patent arrangement in connection with the commercial partnership for the benefit of mutual customers.
The heart of the arrangement is a patent standstill that provides that neither company will pursue a patent lawsuit or claim against the other or its customers, while we are partnering. Neither company acknowledged the validity or enforceability of the other’s intellectual property; it is not a patent license or a covenant not to sue and no payment was made or will be made for intellectual property.
The partnership is between commercial companies related to their common customer offerings, spurred by customer demand. Both parties carefully designed for FOSS licensing compliance in building the arrangement and each party’s relationship to the FOSS community stands on its own.
“Covering only customers and not downstream users,” Stallman said, “it is not a good thing, but it may not do a lot of harm.”
“Covering only customers and not downstream users is not a good thing, but it may not do a lot of harm.”
–Richard StallmanI responded by saying “I hope that a thorough look into it will help remove uncertainty and get some hard answers. Right now it’s too vague or me and some fellow developers to conclude anything from.”
Days ago I asked whether “there been any progress on this case” because “I just want[ed] to be sure that licensing is looking for answers regarding the matter.”
Stallman, by that stage, seemed to have already spoken to a colleague and friend. “Eben Moglen,” he explained, “told me it doesn’t violate GPLv3. Other than getting that information, I don’t know what progress we could hope for.”
Well, as GPLv3 co-authors, their take on this sure counts. We therefore got an answer without taking a look at the contract itself (they had made access to it highly privileged information).
Assuming the case won’t go any further than this, we believe it helps set the record straight on the Microsoft-Red Hat situation. █
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11.29.15
Posted in America, Europe, Microsoft, Patents at 5:50 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz
Summary: Lessons from US media, which focuses on the dire situation in Texas courts, and how these relate to the practice of granting patents on software (the patent trolls’ favourite weapon)
OUR primary concern about the EPO has always been the effort to expand the scope of patents to software (so as to make more money and help multinational oligopolies which constantly lobbied Europe for it).
“At the start of the 1980s, federal policy remained so hostile to patent monopolies that it refused even to grant patents for software. But then came a series of Supreme Court decisions and acts of Congress that vastly expanded the scope of patents and the monopoly power granted to patent holders.”
–The AtlanticIt has always been pointed out, on numerous occasions in fact, that patent trolls rely mostly on software patents. These trolls already knock on Europe's door, having been extremely damaging to the economy of the US, where they crushed a lot of small businesses. This new and very long article from The Atlantic recalls how things changed more than three decades ago, with so-called inventors like Martin Goetz. The article speaks of “dramatic changes in the treatment of what, in the 1980s, came to be known as “intellectual property,” combined with the general retreat from antitrust enforcement” (to benefit oligopolies).
The article says this “had the effect of vastly concentrating the geographical distribution of power in the technology sector. At the start of the 1980s, federal policy remained so hostile to patent monopolies that it refused even to grant patents for software. But then came a series of Supreme Court decisions and acts of Congress that vastly expanded the scope of patents and the monopoly power granted to patent holders. In 1991, Bill Gates reflected on the change and noted in a memo to his executives at Microsoft 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.””
Well, how ironic it must be that Microsoft is now the world’s biggest patent bully (in some respects) and it even managed to make the EPO more megacorporations-leaning.
“Well, how ironic it must be that Microsoft is now the world’s biggest patent bully (in some respects) and it even managed to make the EPO more megacorporations-leaning.”Public complaints in the US are mostly over patent trolls these days. The complaints rightly focus on East Texas, the trolls' docket. Another new article says: “East Texas is known for its Piney Woods, Caddo Lake, maybe for sweet potatoes. It’s also the patent lawsuit capitol of the country. More patent infringement cases are brought to Eastern District courts than anywhere else. There’s pressure to root out the so-called “patent trolls”.”
Published on the same day, this new article rightly observes that “software technology is becoming a treasure trove for Patent trolls.” To quote in context: “In furtherance to my recent post on Patent trolls or the Non Practicing Entities (NPEs), I would like to discuss here in this post about how software technology is becoming a treasure trove for Patent trolls. Cloud based business products are one of the major business fields today. Software-oriented platforms such as C (SaaS) providers are primary targets for the Patent trolls.”
It is vital to realise the strong correlation between software patents (patents on abstract concepts) and patent trolls in order to ensure that the failings seen in East Texas don’t reach Europe as well. █
“Americans learn only from catastrophe and not from experience.”
–Theodore Roosevelt
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11.27.15
Posted in Dell, Microsoft, Vista 10, Windows at 6:18 pm by Dr. Roy Schestowitz
“What we’re really after is simply that people acquire a legal license for Windows for each computer they own before they move on to Linux or Sun Solaris or BSD or OS/2 or whatever.”
–Bill Gates
Summary: A conceited corporation, Microsoft, shows not only that it exploits its botnet to forcibly download massive binaries without consent but also that it vainly overrides people’s privacy settings to spy on these people, sometimes with help from malicious hardware vendors such as Dell or Lenovo
THE topic we have neglected as of late is Vista 10, which is still doing pretty poorly in the market. Its whole purpose seem to be data collection and Microsoft will not tolerate barriers to: 1) adoption of Vista 10 and 2) data collection from each Vista 10 user.
Microsoft is aggressively trying to impose downloads of Vista 10, even without consent from users. One ought to wonder, when will there be class action lawsuits? Microsoft pretended this was done in error, but later it became clear that this was not an accident. Microsoft is really desperate to make everyone adopt this malicious spyware, which acts as a keylogger with a lot of other nasty features.
According to reports from earlier this week, Microsoft’s special ally Dell helps snooping on users in more than one way. Not many reports mention this, but it’s a problem that affects Windows only [1], just like in the case of Lenovo, which took all the blame for Microsoft's bad behaviour.
According to reports from the British media, Microsoft is now overriding users’ preferences not only when it comes to downloading Vista 10. It not only ignores privacy settings, either. Microsoft is now using Windows updates to actually alter privacy settings [2], showing once again that anything privacy-related is a farce under Windows [3]. Remember that Microsoft works closely with the NSA.
One article rightly recalled Microsoft’s hypocritical AstroTurfing against Google and wrote: “Microsoft spent millions portraying Google as a greedy and amoral data marauder. Redmond doesn’t need to read your email, it told everyone. The Scroogled campaign positioned Microsoft itself as the ethical alternative; the occupier of the moral high ground.”
As one person put it in Twitter, “now that they’ve apparently “given away” Windows 10, the die is cast. Vast majority of people have no idea of privacy loss/laws” (it is only a ‘free’ ‘upgrade’, it is not “given away”).
The press will likely find yet more of Dell’s serious privacy violations [4], including this second one [5,6], but rarely will it bother to mention that only Windows is affected. This whole bunch of stories comes to show that Dell and Microsoft Windows are more like NSA incorporated. They are designed to erode privacy. Surveillance is a built-in goal. Just like in the case of Lenovo, however, Microsoft received none of the blame. Lenovo and Dell get all the negative publicity, but it is a Windows issue, not just a Lenovo or a Dell issue.
We wish to remind readers that now is a good time to leave Windows. The decks in the proprietary software world are stacked against privacy. They guard the watchers, not the users. Windows sometimes puts people in prison [1, 2]. █
Related/contextual items from the news:
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News came out on Tuesday that since August Dell computers have been coming out-of-the-box with a root certificate preinstalled that is an “unintended security vulnerability.” The source of the quote, by the way, is Dell itself.
And you thought all you had to worry about was Superfish, the adware Lenovo installed on its computers that left users vulnerable to man-in the-middle attacks — even when running Linux. At least the latest dumb move by Dell seems to be Windows specific, meaning most readers of FOSS Force can breath easy and repeat the official Linux mantra rewritten from an old Dial soap campaign.
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According to Redmond on Tuesday, “when the November update was installed, a few settings preferences may have inadvertently not been retained for advertising ID, Background apps, SmartScreen Filter, and Sync with devices.”
Fair play to Microsoft for shedding light on the blunder. Basically, its operating system allowed apps to access people’s unique advertising ID numbers; the SmartScreen Filter that sends executables to Microsoft servers to analyze was enabled; software was allowed to run in the background; and settings and passwords would be backed up the cloud. If you previously disabled any of those, they would be reenabled by the MCT-derived upgrade over a previous Windows 10 install.
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Microsoft pulled a major update for Windows after it blew away the user’s privacy settings, allowing app developers and advertisers to glean the user’s identity.
But that’s only part of the story, which gets murkier by the day.
We already knew Windows 10 Threshold deleted third-party data monitoring tools and cleanup tools, including stalwarts like Spybot and CCleaner. It even disabled Cisco’s VPN software. Just a bug, said Microsoft.
Two bugs would be a puzzling coincidence – but something else makes it altogether more troubling.
This year Microsoft introduced background tracking services called DiagTrack, or the Diagnostics Tracking Service. It was added to Windows 8.1 installations as well as betas of Windows 10. It arrived without much fanfare in May 14, in the shape of a patch, KB3022345.
It was just one of several slurping enhancements added via the back door.
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Microsoft spent millions portraying Google as a greedy and amoral data marauder. Redmond doesn’t need to read your email, it told everyone. The Scroogled campaign positioned Microsoft itself as the ethical alternative; the occupier of the moral high ground.
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Dell customers have turned up a second root certificate installed on some Dell machines, which could make them easy prey for malicious attacks on public Wi-Fi networks.
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