03.06.13

Microsoft Fine is Fine, But What Else Will be Done? (Updated: FSFE Says EU Fine Not Enough as Punishment for Microsoft’s Abuses)

Posted in Antitrust, Microsoft at 8:36 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz

Summary: A $730,000,000 fine for Microsoft’s Web browser abuses and refusal to obey the law (or comply with penalties)

AS EXPECTED, a fine for Microsoft to pay for its abuses was to be announced today, as even the state media (in the United States) stated today:

On Wednesday, the European Union is expected to impose a large fine on Microsoft for failing to give users of the company’s Windows software a choice of Internet browsers. It would be the first time that European regulators had punished a company for neglecting to comply with the terms of an antitrust settlement, and it could signal a tougher approach to enforcing deals in other antitrust cases, including one involving Google.

Microsoft and officials at the European Commission reached an antitrust settlement in 2009 that called on the company to give Windows users in Europe a choice of Web browsers instead of pushing them to Microsoft’s Internet Explorer. But Microsoft failed to offer users such a choice for more than a year — apparently without anyone at the company or the commission noticing.

The fine is now known, and it’s less than a billion dollars, far less than Microsoft has gained owing to this illegally-obtained monopoly:

Europe hits Microsoft with $730M fine over browser choice ‘error’

Microsoft was naughty and got caught, and now it has to pay handsomely. Here’s the rundown on what happened, why it mattered, and why it may not happen again in quite the same way.

Be prepared for Microsoft apologists and PR folks to vilify the European authorities over it. As a little bit of background, consider reading:

As justice is too slow, the fine is too little and it’s too late. Just watch this decades-old antitrust case still going on, as Groklaw noted the other day:

A date for oral argument in the WordPerfect antitrust battle, Novell v Microsoft, has been set. It’s May 6, at 9 AM in Courtroom II at the Byron White US Courthouse in Denver, Colorado.

Yes, long after WordPerfect had been made virtually dead judges failed to rule indefinitely and no justice was ever restored. Microsoft has made many billions using the office suite monopoly it illegally obtained. And Novell has been robbed naked by Microsoft since then, rendering one side in this legal battle a lot less potent.

The moral of the story is, if you are a big corporation like Microsoft or Goldman Sachs, the cost of committing crimes is just a minor cost of doing business and it pays off in the long run. Crime is like an investment and nobody ever goes to jail if you are “too big (or groomed) to fail”. The following caricature (no attribution known) expresses this well. █

Monopoly

Update: Linking to reports like this one about the fine, the FSFE’s president says:

Microsoft just can’t avoid getting into trouble with competition watchdogs.

Today, the European Commission slapped the company with a fine of EUR 561 million (ca. USD 731 million) for breaching a 2009 settlement over the bundling of Internet Explorer with Windows. Under this agreement, Microsoft promised to display a “browser choice” screen on Windows installs in Europe, inviting users to choose other browsers besides the company’s own program.

[...]

Faced with a blatant breach of the agreed settlement, the Commission had no choice but to act decisively. The alternative of doing nothing, or imposing a minimal token fine, would have made European competition regulators look like paper tigers.

As Microsoft has now, again, learned to its cost, the EC demands to be taken seriously on such things.

Yet while large in absolute terms, the fine amounts to 1% of the company’s revenue in 2012. There is a danger that companies of this size see regulatory interference as a mere cost of doing business, rather than as an impulse to mend their ways. To achieve this, more forceful measures may be necessary, such as excluding offenders from public procurement for a limited amount of time.

A punishment “such as excluding offenders from public procurement for a limited amount of time” may be an interesting option, but still, it is too soft on people who knowingly abuse the law. Why not suggest jail terms? Is it too radical a suggestion to put white-collar criminals in prison in the age of rampant financial abuses and illicit wars? Have we lost a sense of moral by putting only poor people in jail (class incarceration)?

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03.05.13

Links 5/3/2013: Chromebook Pixel Raves, IBM Wants FOSS in Fog Computing

Posted in News Roundup at 10:08 pm by Dr. Roy Schestowitz

GNU/Linux
- Distributions
- Devices/Embedded
Free Software/Open Source
Leftovers

GNU/Linux

GlusterFS: First impressions
Desktop
- Linus Torvalds really likes Google’s Chromebook Pixel
- Chromebook Pixel Supports Linux and Android
  
  When Gus looked over the Chromebook Pixel recently, he liked the design but didn’t think much of the Pixel’s productivity potential. It’s feasible to take a Pixel and run other operating systems on it, including Ubuntu and Android.
- Linus Torvalds may consider Chromebook Pixel as his primary laptop
  
  Linus Torvalds is a huge fan of Nexus 7, he wrote on his Google + stream how much he liked it. He was, however, not that excited about the early Chromebooks, but he did use one in kitchen (as a common PC to check calender etc).
  
  Despite being the creator of the Linux kernel, he is a huge admirer of Apple’s Macbook Air due to it’s sleek design. He criticized PC vendors for using low res screens and cheap material in laptops.
- On the Chromebook Pixel, the Multiple OS Future Takes Shape
- Chromebook Pixel: Does this device herald Android and Chrome OS’s wedding?
  
  Pretty much everyone agrees that Google’s Chromebook Pixel is too expensive to just run the Chrome OS Web browser. But what if it could run Android tablet apps as well?
Server
- IBM To Make Its Cloud Services and Software Open Sourced-based
Kernel Space
- Advocating for Linux on the Front Lines and in the Kernel
  
  “I hate that Microsoft has so much power in the Trusted Computing debates and how that plays out in new hardware,” said Slashdot blogger yagu. The kernel “should be about being an OS. It’s a fine distinction what constitutes ‘OS’ — always has been — but in my opinion, extending or modifying the Linux kernel to Microsoft’s whims is too big a concession.”
- Feature set of Linux 3.9 has been established
  
  Experimental RAID 5 and 6 support in the still experimental Btrfs will be one of the major new features of Linux 3.9, expected to arrive in late April. This has become apparent because Linus Torvalds has now issued the first release candidate of Linux 3.9 which, as usual, closes the Linux development cycle’s “merge window”, the phase during which the developers integrate the majority of changes for the next version. This time, the merge window, which started with the release of Linux 3.8, only lasted thirteen instead of the usual fourteen days.
Applications
- Crashplan, the Only Reason I Install Java
  
  For years, I’ve been singing the praises of BackupPC, and for servers, I still think it’s the best thing going. The problem with BackupPC, however, is in order for it to work reliably, your workstations need to be on all the time. This is especially difficult with laptops.
- Instructionals/Technical
  - Coreutils Status Reports: numfmt – A number reformatting utility
  - Free Guide To LibreOffice 4.0
  - PulseAudio: An Achilles Heel that needs repair
  - How to Install Anything in Ubuntu
  - [HOW TO] Install Oxygen Transparent In KDE 4.10
  - Installing Nginx With PHP5 (And PHP-FPM) And MySQL Support On Scientific Linux 6.3
  - A very tiny GIS
    
    quickplot is a fast, interactive 2-D plotter. All it needs to do its job is a text file with x and y points in a list. If those points are longitude and latitude in decimal degrees, quickplot works like a simple GIS program, with some surprising capabilities.
    
    This article explains how I set up quickplot to do species mapping for Australia. For most of my mapping work I use qgis and Google Maps/Earth, but quickplot is handy for quickly making simple maps and zooming in on details. With an executable size of only 453 kb, quickplot is the tiniest and fastest GIS I know.
- Games
  - Latest Steam numbers show Linux, Mac gamers almost equal
  - Steam Hardware Survey Reveals 2.02% Users Are From Linux
    
    Seems like Linux is finally catching up with Mac OS users, at least as a gaming platform. Valve software has released some stats of hardware survey which shows Linux users have become almost double while compared to January. This considerable increase is obviously because of Steam being pushed to Ubuntu Software Center, thus making it available to more number of users.
  - Linux close to overtaking Mac on Steam
    
    Valve’s survey shows Linux already accounts for two per cent of users
    
    Valve’s latest Steam survey shows Linux is already close to overtaking Mac in terms of user base.
    
    Steam for Linux recently left beta testing, and is now available for download through the Ubuntu store.
  - Steam: Linux user percentage close to Mac, Ubuntu 12.10 most popular
    
    2% doesn’t sound like much perhaps, but it’s worth noting that Mac users represent just over 3% of total users, despite having been supported for much longer. Trends show Mac operating systems are losing popularity while Linux is on the rise, too.
  - 0 A.D. Music Shows There’s More to Open Source Than Code
    
    The open source ecosystem is mostly about code. After all, sharing code is at the core of the open source ethos. But for many Free Software projects, there’s more at stake than code itself, as the development team behind the open source game 0 A.D. made clear recently when it highlighted the contributions of musical composer Omri Lahav–whose work is an important reminder that software success, in many cases, is about more than ones and zeroes.
  - Linux users on Steam close the gap on Mac
    
    Just weeks after a native Linux client launched for Valve’s popular Steam digital distribution service, Linux users already make up more than two percent of all Steam users.
    
    Steam for Linux launched last month with more than 100 games readily available for Linux OS users, including a multitude of Valve games like Half-Life, Counter-Strike Source and Team Fortress 2.
  - Whispering Willows: A Horror-Puzzle Adventure Game
  - Voluntary Steam survey finds Linux usage increased during the client’s first official month
Desktop Environments/WMs
- Linus Torvalds switches back to Gnome 3.x desktop
  
  Linus Torvalds, creator of the Linux kernel, has switched by the Gnome 3, saying the desktop’s shortcomings can be fixed via the use of extensions.
- xmonad – The Speed Demon
  
  I’ve been noticing my work machine getting slower, and slower, and slower over the past few months, and over the weekend it finally gave up the ghost and died. For the past five years I’ve been using the most current version of OS X on an old MacBook Pro, but the Mac had a hardware problem. When I dropped by desktop support with the dead Mac, they offered me an equally old Mac, or a new PC. I chose the PC. I’ve returned to Ubuntu for the first time since 2008, and I’ve gone the minimalist route with xmonad, the tiling window manager. I’ve got one thing to say about the new setup, this thing is fast.
- Transocean Turns on BP With Scorching Oil-Spill Document
  
  BP prolonged the Gulf of Mexico oil spill by two months by concealing the rate of oil flowing from the broken Macondo well, Transocean claims in a document filed in the damages trial.
- K Desktop Environment/KDE SC/Qt
  - 5 Useful Plasmoids for KDE
    
    In the past, we’ve written about several cool KDE apps. I’m now going to show you some desktop applets – called plasmoids – that have caught my attention. They are all included in KDE 4.9. KDE and productivity junkies, read on!
  - Plasma Workspaces SDK, Plasmate 1.0 Released
  - Plasmate 1.0
    
    Plasmate follows the UNIX philosophy of “do one thing, and do it well”. As such, it is not a general purpose IDE but rather a tool specifically tailored to creating Plasma Workspace add-ons using non-compiled languages such as QML and Javascript. It guides each step in the process, simplifying and speeding up project creation, development, adding new assets, testing and publishing. The goal of Plasmate is to enable creating something new in seconds and publishing it immediately.
  - Plasmate 1.0: A Plasma Workspaces SDK
  - KDE Ships March Updates to Plasma Workspaces, Applications and Platform
    
    KDE has released updates for its Workspaces, Applications and Development Platform. They are the first in a series of monthly stabilization updates to the 4.10 series. 4.10.1 updates bring many bugfixes and translation updates on top of the 4.10 release and are recommended for everyone running the initial 4.10 release. As this release only contains bugfixes and translation updates, it will be safe and pleasant for everyone.
- GNOME Desktop/GTK
  - Gnome 3.8 Beta PPA Available For Ubuntu Raring
    
    While it’s already known that Raring Ringtail, the next major release of Ubuntu will mostly have Gnome 3.6, users can now install Gnome 3.8 Beta in this currently development version of Ubuntu and try out the new features. All you need to do is add a personal package archive and update the packages using apt.
  - A Few Updates Of Gnome 3.8
    
    Gnome 3.8 is currently in active development phase and a few features planned earlier are being implemented. One of the Gnome developers, Debarshi Ray has posted some screenshots of awesome work he has done with Gnome lately. Like you can now add IMAP/SMTP accounts directly to Gnome Online Accounts via its single sign-on dialog, and integrate all email clients to use them. Best still, Evolution has already been integrated and you will no longer need to separately add accounts in Evolution to receive your mail.
  - Recent GNOME 3.7 sightings
    
    With GNOME 3.7.90, we’ve entered the feature freeze and focus on polish and on whittling down the blocker list (don’t expect all of these to be fixed, the list currently still contains a mixture of actual blockers and nice-to-have things).
Distributions
- First look at Rebellin Linux 1.00 “Adrenaline”
- ROSA Desktop Fresh 2012: Very efficient & elegant stock Gnome 3 distro
  
  I have been following ROSA Linux since 2012. Now that possibly not everything going right for Mandriva Linux, the emergence of ROSA has assumed paramount significance. ROSA has not only enhanced the Mandriva based, but also created its own very distinct theme, especially for KDE. Even I am an ardent admirer of the unique design that ROSA brings on the table. Every ROSA release so far has been very refined and amazingly attractive.
- New Releases
  - Neptune 3 RC
    
    We are proud to announce our release candidate of Neptune 3 “Brotkasten” our first 64bit version of Neptune. This release candidate comes with several bugfixes and changes aswell as the new KDE SC 4.10.
  - Springdale 6.4
  - Clonezilla 2.1.1-2
  - A fresh litter of Puppy Linux releases: Wary, Racy and Quirky
    
    Wary and Racy 5.5, as well as Quirky 5.4.91, can be downloaded from the ibiblio servers. Explanations of the different members of the Puppy Linux family are available from Kauler’s web site.
- PCLinuxOS/Mageia/Mandrake/Mandriva Family
  - Mandriva ‘Back in the Game’ With Enterprise Software
    
    Though Mandriva has been a popular Linux desktop distribution for many years, the company early last year found itself in a tough spot financially. Since then, Mandriva has undergone some major changes, adopting a new enterprise focus and creating an independent nonprofit foundation to carry on the Mandriva open source community work. The company also recently joined The Linux Foundation, a sign that Mandriva is “back in the game,” says CEO Jean-Manuel Croset. Here, he discusses how the company turned around, its new enterprise server and cloud products and its relationship to the new OpenMandriva foundation.
- Gentoo Family
  - Sabayon Linux 11 review
    
    Sabayon Linux 11 is the latest edition of Sabayon, a distribution inspired and based upon Gentoo Linux, a version of Linux that uses source based installation rather than binary packages. Sabayon is intended to have the features of Gentoo with less work, and does include binary package management. This is a review of Sabayon 11, using the MATE desktop. 64 bit edition. As in my previous review of Sabayon 8, I had no trouble creating a bootable USB key with UNetbootin on Windows. I chose MATE not only because it fit within 2 GB, but because I’ve done an Xfce review already.
- Red Hat Family
  - Spin Systems, Inc. Joins Red Hat Partner Program
    
    Spin Systems, a leading provider of enterprise-wide medical, legal and financial solutions to Fortune 500 companies and federal government agencies, announced today that it has joined the Red Hat partner program.
    
    Spin Systems has broad knowledge of technologies based on Red Hat and Red Hat JBoss Middleware solutions and created a solution that collects more than 1.2 billion records per day from medical diagnostic devices, electronic medical records, information kiosks, and other sources. In addition to reducing costs and improving efficiency, the solution is designed to help clients access healthcare records in seconds rather than weeks or months.
  - Dell Inc. : Dell Works With Red Hat, Intel and VMware To Launch Center of Excellence for Hospitals Using Epic EHR Software
  - Dell, Intel, Red Hat, VMware Team on Linux for Health Care
  - Dell, Intel, Red Hat, VMware Team on Linux for Health Care
    
    Dell (NASDAQ: DELL), Intel, (NASDAQ: INTC), Red Hat (NYSE: RHT) and VMware (NYSE: VMW) have teamed up to open a dedicated facility for hospitals to test and deploy new healthcare software running on x86 servers using Red Hat’s Enterprise Linux.
    
    The idea is to show small- to medium-sized hospitals and medical facilities that Epic Systems’ electronic health records (EHR) software running on x86 industry-standard servers with Linux can meet the needs of mission-critical healthcare solutions. Inasmuch as the healthcare industry has long been the poster child for proprietary software and hardware, highlighting the cost savings and interoperability advantages offered by an open source platform also is a key priority of the initiative.
  - Fedora
    - Fedora 18 + Cinnamon – Not bad, more polish needed
    - Fedora Desktops – Quick Look
      
      So in short, while I use Xfce, and will continue doing so, from this short comparison, KDE comes out as the winner.
- Debian Family
  - Debian Project News – March 4th, 2013
  - Debian Developers Prefer Teams and Git
    
    Lucas Nussbaum has been crunching some numbers that lead him to conclude that “Debian is (still) changing.” Over the years a few trends have emerged as Nussbaum demonstrates using snapshot.debian.org and a data mining script.
    
    In a blog post earlier today, Nussbaum posted graphs of some of the trends he’s seeing in Debian package development. His first graph shows that the number of team-maintained packages have seen a dramatic increase the last several years while the number of “not co-maintained” and small independent group maintained packages have remained fairly steady. Nussbaum believes these numbers show the team-maintained model is preferred by today’s developers.
  - Derivatives
    - Canonical/Ubuntu
      - Ubuntu may switch to Android technologies to keep the Linux desktop competitive
        
        With the recent introduction of Ubuntu Touch a very interesting change of strategy is emerging for Canonical.
        
        As Phoronix and others have discovered, Ubuntu Phone and Touch are using SurfaceFlinger as their compositor. SurfaceFlinger uses OpenGL ES to render applications screens/windows in a hardware accelerated way using the OpenGL driver of the GPU directly.
        
        Now, Canonical is promising a completely integrated experience for Ubuntu 14.04 which will run Phone, Touch, TV and Desktop applications in one common GUI environment. How will they be able to fulfill their promise for Linux desktop applications currently running on Xorg?
        
        So far, everyone has believed that the Ubuntu desktop is migrating from Xorg to Wayland. This migration has been going so slow that there is actually no visible sign of happening any time soon. It seems that Canonical has slightly changed the “to” part of their migration plans. They are not moving to Wayland, they are moving to SurfaceFlinger.
      - UBUNTU TO USE ITS OWN DISPLAY SERVER CALLED MIR, UNITY TO BE PORTED TO QT/QML
      - Ubuntu Building Own Display Server, Unity To Switch Back to Qt/QML
      - Mixed Reactions On Mir, Upstream Developers Not Happy With It
        
        A few hours after Canonical announced Mir, a new display server that is not derived from X or Wayland, we saw mixed reactions from developers and users. While it seems that some upstream Wayland and X developers are not at all happy with Canonical taking such a decision, some users are excited and expect a faster and snappier desktop out of box, tightly integrated with Unity.
      - Canonical’s Mir Display Server is a clever approach
        
        Unity has been in development for over two years and was based on Nux/Compiz (Unity 3D) and Qt (Unity 2D). It forms the foundation of Canonical’s convergence plan to have one code base and interface on all devices running Ubuntu. This poses several challenges like developing a common display server which is capable of running on all devices without much overhead and an interface to rule them all. This was the sole reason behind the creation of Unity and not choosing other desktop environments such as Gnome Shell etc
      - GK802 Mini PC Ubuntu Release Now Includes Hardware Accelerated Graphics (video)
        
        Owners of the Zealz GK802 Mini PC might be pleased to learn that a new released of Ubuntu has been released for the stick mini PC which allows you to get full use from the mini PC and now even includes hardware accelerated graphics to enjoy.
      - Ubuntu 13.04 beta touts search privacy – before it hooks in eBay, IMDb etc
        
        Linux distro Ubuntu 13.04, which hit its first beta today, is already showing promise: there are small but very useful usability tweaks planned for Ubuntu’s Unity user interface.
      - Ubuntu de-bricked my Android Jelly Bean Touchpad
      - Things to consider before flashing Ubuntu on your Nexus Device
      - Ubuntu-based XPS Sputnik developer ultrabook goes on sale in the UK
      - ServInt Announces Ubuntu Availability
      - Ubuntu should be ready for daily use in a couple of weeks
        
        While the preview version of Ubuntu Touch for developers is a promising look at what the OS has in store it’s far from a fully featured version of the final product. However according to Canonical’s Mark Shuttleworth it shouldn’t be much longer before it’s ready for daily use. According to an interview with ZDnet an everyday driver is going to be ready to download in a couple of weeks.
      - HP launches a cheap Pavilion all-in-one PC running Ubuntu
        
        Last year HP announced its intention to start selling machines shipping with Ubuntu instead of always opting for Windows. That push started in China, but today HP shipped its first new consumer Ubuntu hardware for Europe.
        
        It’s a Pavilion all-in-one carrying the forgettable name of the Pavilion 20-b101ea. It’s also not going to set any performance records as this is a low-end machine aimed at users who want to use the Internet, an office suite, watch HD video, and play a few web games. But what is compelling is the price. In the UK it is being sold for £349 including sales tax. A quick conversion puts the price pre-tax at just US$429.
      - Getting Started With The First Online Ubuntu Developer Summit
      - Canonical reveals plans to launch Mir display server – Update
        
        On the evening before the first online Ubuntu Developer Summit, Canonical has revealed its plans for “Mir”, a next-generation display server which will run as a system-level component to replace the X Window system. Canonical has rejected Wayland, seen by many as the successor to X Windows, because they feel it recreates X semantics in its input event handling and parts of the protocol include privileged shell integration which the Mir specifiers would rather not have. The decisions along this path of development appear to have been taken in the summer of 2012.
      - Ubuntu Touch Will Be Usable In ‘Couple of Weeks’ Says Shuttleworth
      - Dedoimedo Ubuntu smartphone contest!
        
        Normally, I am not a big fan of smartphones. Scratch that, I am very much not a fan of smartphones. However, after I heard and saw Mark Shuttleworth present the upcoming mobile devices that will be running Ubuntu on them, for the first time, I was really intrigued with the technology and its potential use.
        
        Indeed, sometime in Q4 2013 or Q1 2014, I will be buying myself one. In fact, I will be buying two devices, one for myself and one for the lucky winner of the Dedoimedo Ubuntu smartphone contest. Please read to see how you can participate and maybe win yourself a handsome smartphone.
      - Ubuntu Announce Unity Next, Will Be Written in Qt/QML
      - Ubuntu 12.04.2 LTS Review: Now I like Unity!
        
        Ubuntu 12.04 LTS is possibly one of the most landmark long term release for Ubuntu and Canonical for a couple of reasons. Number one, it is the first long term release with Unity desktop. Second, first time the LTS is supported for 5 years. Love it or hate it, Unity has now become synonymous with Ubuntu. And after reviewing a lot of distros with stock Gnome 3 as desktop, I now understand why canonical didn’t pursue Gnome 3. Unity, at least, is intuitive and easier to use even for a Linux novice. If that right side strip irritates you, simply check the auto-hide option. Agree, customisation is sacrificed if you use Unity, but it looks elegant.
      - Google Chrome OS vs. Ubuntu
        
        At the time of this article’s creation, the Samsung Chromebook is the number one top seller on Amazon.com. Chrome OS is attacking other operating systems head on.
        
        In this article, I’ll explore how Chrome OS stacks up against Ubuntu and whether the two operating systems are likely to appeal to the same user base.
      - Ubuntu dumps X window system, creates replacement for PC and mobile
        
        The X window system has served numerous Linux- and Unix-based operating systems well over its nearly three decades of life. But Canonical is ready to move on from X, saying a new display server is necessary to power the Unity user interface in Ubuntu as the OS expands from desktops to tablets and phones.
      - Ubuntu Phone based on CyanogenMod 10.1 … unless it isn’t – new scandal of the week?
        
        Is Ubuntu Phone based on CyanogenMod 10.1? If so, is this a major scandal in the mobile business? According to some, Ubuntu Phone is indeed based on CyanogenMod, while others say that’s not quite so simple.
      - With convergence in mind, Ubuntu Linux scraps Wayland
Devices/Embedded
- Phones
  - The emerging smartphone OS battle: Firefox vs. Tizen vs. Ubuntu
  - Ballnux
    - Samsung posts first teaser video for Galaxy S 4
    - Rumored Specs, Tantalizing Ad Fuel Galaxy S IV Launch Excitement
      
      Samsung may be on the verge of doing something paradoxically Apple-ish: being original. Often accused of copying Cupertino — both in and out of courtrooms — it appears the company may have something completely different to unveil at its Galaxy S IV launch event next week. Not only that, it’s taking a new tack with its prelaunch ad campaign, building suspense instead of taking swipes.
    - Samsung’s New Smartphone Will Track Eyes to Scroll Pages
      
      Samsung’s next big smartphone, to be introduced this month, will have a strong focus on software. A person who has tried the phone, called the Galaxy S IV, described one feature as particularly new and exciting: Eye scrolling.
      
      The phone will track a user’s eyes to determine where to scroll, said a Samsung employee who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the news media. For example, when users read articles and their eyes reach the bottom of the page, the software will automatically scroll down to reveal the next paragraphs of text.
      
      The source would not explain what technology was being used to track eye movements, nor did he say whether the feature would be demonstrated at the Galaxy S IV press conference, which will be held in New York on March 14. The Samsung employee said that over all, the software features of the new phone outweighed the importance of the hardware.
  - Android
    - Acer To Ship 7 Million Android Tablets This Year: Sources
      
      With an aim to meet strong demand for entry-level tablets, Acer is reportedly planning to ship 10 million tablets in 2013, an increase of 400 per cent year on year.
      
      Of the projected shipments for this year, seven million units will use an Android-based platform, while the remaining are going to be based on Windows.
    - Android 4.2.2 AOSP Binaries Launched For Nexus Devices
      
      Google has announced the release of Android 4.2.2 Android Open Source Project (AOSP) binaries. These are intended for use with any Nexus AOSP-enabled device including Nexus 4, Nexus 7, Nexus 10 and the previous generation Galaxy Nexus.
    - Android 4.2 Now Available For ASUS Transformer Pad TF300
      
      ASUS has started rolling out Android 4.2 Jelly Bean to its Asus Transformer Pad TF300 in the US region. The roll-out makes it the first non-Nexus device to receive the update to Google’s latest mobile operating system.
      
      Android 4.2 will be released to Transformer Pad owners via a free over the air update starting today in the United States and will be available in other regions later this month. This makes the Asus Transformer Pad TF300 just the fourth device to receive the update, after the Google Nexus 4, Nexus 7 and Nexus 10 devices.
    - Koush releases open source Superuser app for rooted Android devices
      
      Android developer Koushik Doutta has made a name for himself developing some of the most popular tools used by folks who root their devices and install custom ROMs. His ClockworkMod Recovery and ROM Manager apps are some of the most popular tools for installing custom firmware on an Android device.
    - Google’s Red Guide to the Android App Store
- Sub-notebooks/Tablets
  - First Ubuntu Touch tablet up for pre-order in Australia
    
    Recently Canonical showed off a special Ubuntu build for tablets, and now Australian company Intermatix is offering its customers the chance to pre-order the first tablets running the new OS. Unsurprisingly, two models are being offered: the Intermatix U7 and U10, which sport screens measuring 7 and 10 inches, respectively.
  - World’s first Ubuntu tablet is available for pre-order
    
    Here is great news for our readers and Ubuntu fans. World’s first Ubuntu powered tablet is here and currently available for pre-order. The tablet is priced at AUS $299.00 and a discount of 10% is announced for the first 50 customers.

Free Software/Open Source

Google’s Zopfli Compression Algorithm Is Now Open Source

Google has open sourced its Zopfli data compression algorithm. Zopfli, according to the company, can produce files three to eight percent smaller than zlib and can be used to speed up Web downloads.

Zopfli, based on the Deflate algorithm, has been optimised to produce smaller file sizes at the expense of compression speed. The smaller compressed size would mean better space utilisation, quicker load times, and of course lower Web page load latencies.
‘Blender Master Class’ Gets A+ in 3D Graphics Instruction

The Blender graphics tool can result in some great-looking 3D imagery — once you learn the software so you can unlock all its capabilities. Blender Master Class holds the keys to those features and functions; it’s easy to understand and executed with a useful hands-on style that takes advantage of the author’s considerable experience in creating graphics masterpieces.
Open Source Ceph FS Popular in the Cloud, Big Data
Exclusive: Startup AnsibleWorks pitches open-source IT configuration, deployment tool

A couple of former Red Hat veterans think there’s an easier way to configure, deploy and manage IT across an organization and founded AnsibleWorks to attack that problem.
Cloud Sherpas releases open-source framework for short-cutting Google Apps development
Events
- Big Names, Excellent Content at OS Conference in South Carolina – March 27 & 28
SaaS/Big Data
- IBM Delivers OpenStack-based SmartCloud Orchestrator
- IBM Makes a Big Bet on OpenStack in the Cloud
- Where Linux Led, OpenStack Will Follow
  
  The critical momentum that the industry is seeing today for the open standards cloud movement is reminiscent of Linux and its turning point in the late 1990s, and we’re willing to bet that cloud will have a similar outcome – the triumph of open standards over proprietary approaches to cloud computing.
  
  How do we know? When you look at cloud, the fundamentals are the same.
  
  The strategy articulated around open source in 1998 – preventing vendor lock in, providing market choice, spurring innovation, and enabling modularity of design to drive higher quality software – holds true today for enterprise cloud computing.
- IBM OpenStack: Is This Linux All Over Again? (Not Yet)
Oracle/Java/LibreOffice
- Apache OpenOffice Hits 40 Million Download Milestone
  
  Apache OpenOffice has reached an impressive 40 million downloads since the release of OpenOffice 3.4.0 in May 2012. The Apache Software Foundation (ASF) said that this number counts only raw downloads of full install images from SourceForge, excluding language packs and source tarballs.
Education
- Great to meet my young advisers yesterday!
  
  And the unvarnished truth is what I got. They raised a lot of interesting points. From subjects I’m well familiar with, like the need for a modern, European copyright framework. Plus we had an interesting debate about the need for a more modern, dynamic education system – one that is adapted to digital realities. It’s very challenging providing courses and certification in a fast-moving world where practices can change within months; and sometimes, indeed, the best teacher is experience.
BSD
- GNUstep on FreeBSD
  
  I thought it would be fun to share how well GNUstep runs these days. FreeBSD now is a first-quality platform! Stable and not second to Linux at all. NetBSD is close to it too. I try hard that all application maintained by me are not “Linux centric” as most of today’s desktops are!
FSF/FSFE/GNU/SFLC
- Free Software Supporter Issue 59, February 2013
  
  TABLE OF CONTENTS
  
  * Will you be at LibrePlanet? Register today for March 23-24
  * Mako Hill remembers Aaron Swartz
  * Only Gandalf can protect Europe from the unitary patent
  * Winners announced for free software gaming’s highest honor, the Liberated Pixel Cup
  * Announcing the Empowermentors Collective: a group for women of color and queer people of color
  * GNU Press discounts Bison Manual!
  * FSFE asks you to show your love for free software!
  * Keep the pressure on the White House and US Copyright Office to fix anti-circumvention provisions
  * Announcing status.fsf.org: Our new home for microblogging
  * FSF licensing team: What we did in 2012 and why it matters for 2013
  * Join the FSF and friends in updating the Free Software Directory
  * LibrePlanet featured resource: Coreboot installation party at LibrePlanet 2013
  * GNU Spotlight with Karl Berry: 19 new GNU releases!
  * GNU Toolchain update
  * Other FSF and free software events
  * Thank GNUs!
  * Take action with the FSF
- GNU Spotlight with Karl Berry: 27 new GNU releases!
Public Services/Government
- ‘Like medieval merchants, open source community can create its own laws’
  
  Communities of developers of free and open source software can create their own governing laws, using more than just their software licences, say two Irish researchers Ian Ó Maolchraoibhe and Maureen O’Sullivan, from the National University of Ireland, in the city of Galway. The two are currently working on an academic paper, a follow up to the presentation they gave at the Fosdem conference in Brussels earlier this month.
- Local authorities network to focus on open standards and interoperability
  
  Open standards and the compatibility of data and IT systems are two of the core themes of a network of municipalities, founded last week Thursday. The new organisation is called Linked Organisation of Local Authority ICT Societies (LOLA). It is the international version of national networks of local administrations in Canada, New Zealand, Sweden, the United Kingdom, the United States, the Netherlands and Belgium.
- Ozone Widget Framework required to be open source under congressional law
Openness/Sharing
- Open Access/Content
  - New leaders in science are those who share
    
    The Obama administration recently responded to a petition asking the government to “require free access over the Internet to scientific journal articles arising from taxpayer-funded research.”
    
    I first heard about the petition on Google+, and am very proud to be signature #52. Back then 25,000 signatures seemed like a tall order for what is a somewhat niche area. In the end, the petition gained over 65,000 signatures and an official response from the White House. The Open Science Federation posted a screen capture of the 25,000th signature landmark on June 3, 2012. John Wilibanks started the petition with signature #1.
- Open Hardware
  - As Willow Garage Shifts Course, a Key Robotics Platform Changes Stewardship
    
    For many years now, some of the more interesting work in the field of robotics has been driven by open source efforts. Open source robotics platforms have flourished, but they’ve also been fragmented, with software and hardware designs produced all around the world that have little to do with each other. That’s why it was so promising when the folks behind Willow Garage–a robotics project that originated at Stanford University–announced the Open Source Robotics Foundation (OSRF).
Programming
- Eclipse Releases Open Source Orion 2.0 web-based IDE
  
  I’ve been following the development of Orion, since the Eclipse Foundation started the effort back in January of 2011. The basic idea behind Orion is to move development online into a web-based development model.
  
  The Orion 1.0 release came out in October of last year, and here we are four months later with an Orion 2.0 release.
Standards/Consortia
- IBM, standards, and the cloud
  
  I just figured out that I’ve been involved with standards for almost one-third of my life, since the mid-1990s. During that time, I’ve been employed by IBM but I’ve also worked collaboratively with other people in the IT industry on standards efforts in groups like the W3C and OASIS. I think that collectively we’ve helped move the industry from “proprietary and locked-in” toward “open and interoperable.” That’s a good thing.
  
  With that prolog, I’m pleased to help announce that, moving forward, IBM will base all its cloud services and software on an open cloud architecture. To kick this off, IBM will deliver a new private cloud offering based on the OpenStack open source software. (More marketing sort of stuff is available in the press release, which I will link to just as soon as I get the URL.)
- Open standards are key for security in the cloud
  
  The current divide between proprietary and open approaches to enterprise cloud computing has implications beyond the obvious. More than just issues of cloud interoperability and data portability, open standards have benefits for user identity, authentication and security intelligence that closed or proprietary clouds threaten to compromise.

Leftovers

Defence/Police/Secrecy/Aggression
- Ten Years Ago, the Truth About Iraqi WMDs Was Published–and Ignored
  
  Ten years ago, a major American magazine published a bombshell report about the non-existence of Iraq’s WMDs. But it was hardly noticed by a corporate press corps too busy hyping the threat from those non-existent weapons.
  
  The story appeared in the March 3, 2003, issue of Newsweek–a short piece with the headline “The Defector’s Secrets.” It almost seemed as if the magazine didn’t know what it had on its hands. Or perhaps it did.
- Eric Holder: Yes, Your Government Can Drone You to Death on U.S. Soil (UPDATED)
  
  Remember how Sen. Rand Paul (R-Kentucky) has been trying to get a straight answer about whether the United States government reserves the legal right to assassinate American citizens on U.S. soil? Well, Attorney General Eric Holder has just answered the question in a letter to Paul, partially reprinted by Mother Jones.
- Singapore asks US to help probe scientist Shane Todd’s ‘suicide’
- VP Biden Beats Drums of War Against Iran at AIPAC Conference
  
  The annual AIPAC (American Israel Public Affairs Committee) conference was the stage for U.S. and Israeli leaders to affirm their message that “all options are on the table” against Iran.
- Attorney General Eric Holder: US Government Has Authority to Target & Kill US Citizens on US Soil
- F.B.I. to Help Investigate American’s Death in Singapore, Reports Say
  
  …pathologist hired by the parents in the United States after their son’s body was flown back said it showed signs of struggle, and ruled the death a homicide.
- FBI, FAA investigating drone spotted over Brooklyn
- Pilot reports mysterious drone that could have caused crash over JFK airport
- Importing the War on Terror: Glenn Greenwald & Activist Trevor Timm on Domestic Drone Surveillance
  
  Guardian columnist Glenn Greenwald and Trevor Timm of the Electronic Frontier Foundation join us to discuss domestic surveillance drones and the secrecy surrounding military drones around the world. “I think the importation of the war on terror and its tactics, generally, to the U.S. is probably the most significant development in the world of civil liberties,” says Greenwald. Timm is also the co-manager of the @Drones Twitter account. As a result of the FAA Modernization and Reform Act of 2012, drone use in the United States is expected to expand rapidly in the next few years, an issue that is being closely watched by the Electronic Frontier Foundation. [includes rush transcript]
- UN demands prosecution of Bush-era CIA crimes
- U.N.’s Drone Inquisitor: CIA Torture Was an ‘International Conspiracy of Crime’
  
  As his inquiry into U.S. drone strikes gets underway, the United Nations special rapporteur for counterterrorism and human rights has stepped up his rhetoric against the agency he’ll inevitably investigate. The CIA’s torture program was at the center of an “international conspiracy of crime,” he told a U.N. panel on Tuesday.
  
  The CIA’s torture in the last decade is unrelated from its current drone campaign. But Ben Emmerson, the U.N. rapporteur, will still need access to the drones from a CIA he portrayed on Tuesday morning as something similar to a Bond villain. In an interview with Danger Room last month, Emmerson said he was confident the Obama administration would grant him access to one of its most secretive counterterrorism programs.
- $1.5 Trillion for the Drug War? 5 Outrageous Areas of Gov’t Spending That Should be Cut Instead of Social Services
Cablegate
- Bradley Manning Nobel Peace Prize Nomination 2013
  
  Following is the reasoning we sent to the committee explaining why we felt compelled to nominate Private Bradley Manning for this important recognition of an individual effort to have an impact for peace in our world. The lengthy personal statement to the pre-trial hearing February 28th by Bradley Manning in his own words validate that his motives were for the greater good of humankind.
- Manning among record number Nobel Peace Prize nominees
  
  A record number of Nobel Peace Prize nominations were received this year, which saw US soldier and Wikileaks whistleblower Bradley Manning being nominated for a third time.
Finance
- Fascist Switzerland Strikes back
  
  Switzerland will still go to any lengths to protect the ultra-rich dictators and mafia who flock there. Mutabar Tadjibaeva – multiple rape victim, survivor of repeated torture and still dogged human rights activist, is wanted for questioning by Geneva Police for the crime of ringing the bell of Gulnata Karimova’s 25 million dollar house and asking to speak to her.
  
  That is absolutely all she did. I know, as I was there and did it too. We both left our visiting cards, took some photos from the streets so the children of Uzbekistan could see where the profits from their slave labour in the cotton fields went, and then we left on the bus, as we came.
- Selig Cartwright, Goldman Sachs Washroom Attendant, Comforts The Afflicted
  
  A job creator! I’m a job creator, Selig.
- Building WSDEs: Strategies and Alliances
  
  Among those persuaded of the value of Worker Self-Directed Enterprises (WSDEs) and of a transition to an economic system that includes a large and growing number of such enterprises, the question often arises, how do we get there from here? In other words, what sorts of strategies and alliances might allow or facilitate that transition? Here is an initial response to that question.
- New Study by National Employment Law Project Documents ALEC’s Attack on Wages
  
  Since the Center for Media and Democracy’s launch of ALEC Exposed in July 2011, CMD has known that the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) and its corporate funders are accelerating the race to the bottom in wages and working conditions for America’s working families. ALEC has a raft of “model bills” to lower wages and slash benefits for workers, even one to repeal state minimum wage laws.
  
  Now the National Employment Law Project (NELP) has joined in the effort to take a closer look at this ALEC agenda, tallying the bills introduced and pushed in states in the last few years.
  
  In an issue brief called “The Politics of Wage Suppression: Inside ALEC’s Legislative Campaign Against Low-Paid Workers,” NELP has documented that since January 2011, legislators from 31 states have introduced 105 bills aiming to repeal or weaken core wage standards at the state and local level, and 67 of these 105 bills were directly sponsored or co-sponsored by legislators affiliated with ALEC.
- Goldman Sachs Has Already Figured a Way Around Regulation to Some of the Riskiest Investments on Wall Street
- New Report By U.S. PIRG Targets Cash Stashed Overseas
  
  …offshore tax havens would net about $90 billion annually.
- Tragedy or Farce? FBI Claims Sequester Will Harm Their Wall Street Investigations
  
  Following the failure of the U.S. Congress and President Obama to navigate away from an otherwise avoidable sequester, the FBI is up in arms over the subsequent spending cuts they say will hamper, among other things, its ability to pursue financial crimes.
PR/AstroTurf/Lobbying
- Walker Walks Away from “John Doe” Investigation, Pushes Budget Deal Only ALEC Could Love
  
  On March 1, 2013, Milwaukee Country prosecutors shut down the long running “John Doe” probe into corruption in Scott Walker’s office during the time he served as Milwaukee County Executive. Six people were charged and convicted, including three former Walker staff, but no charges were brought against Walker. Milwaukee County District Attorney John Chisholm issued a brief, telling statement: “After a review of the John Doe evidence, I am satisfied that all charges that are supported by proof beyond a reasonable doubt have now been brought and concluded.”
  
  There is no doubt that Walker emerges from the scandal in a stronger position to advance his extreme legislative agenda and his plans for higher office.
  
  Walker’s recently-unveiled budget is covered with American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) fingerprints: his tax plan disproportionately benefits the top one-fifth of earners while putting a whopping $2 in the pockets of the bottom one-fifth; his school voucher program would leave 870,000 public school students with no additional funds; and his food stamp stipulations would force the needy to look for the 212,400 jobs that the governor has promised but failed to create. To top it all off, his ALEC cronies want to cover their tracks with a bill that would put a price on the public records that expose them.
- Keystone’s Endorsement by a TV ‘Leftist’
  
  controversy over the Keystone XL pipeline doesn’t get covered much in corporate television–it takes tens of thousands of activists marching in Washington to get a few words on the nightly newscasts.
  
  But the State Department’s recent draft assessment of the pipeline’s environmental impact got a mention on one show, and it said a lot. Not about the pipeline, really, but about corporate media.
- Why Are Walmart Billionaires Bankrolling Phony School “Reform” In LA?
  
  For years, Los Angeles has been ground zero in an intense debate about how to improve our nation’s education system. What’s less known is who is shaping that debate. Many of the biggest contributors to the so-called “school choice” movement — code words for privatizing our public education system — are billionaires who don’t live in Southern California, but have gained significant influence in local school politics. New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s recent contribution of $1 million to a political action committee created to influence next week’s LAUSD school board elections is only the most recent example of the billionaire blitzkrieg.
Privacy
- Brussels introduces rules to combat illegal logging
  
  European rules to combat the trade of illegal timber have come into force, but NGOs and think tanks doubt the readiness of EU countries to carry out the legislation.
  The new laws, which came into effect on Monday (4 March), require operators importing or producing wood to identify its country of origin and legality.
  
  The regulation also prohibits the sale of illegally harvested timber on the European market to cut profits from the trade worldwide, which analysts link to deforestation and desertification, rising CO2 emissions, corruption, armed conflict and the destruction of vulnerable communities.
  
  The EU law requires member states to lay down “effective, proportionate and dissuasive penalties”. However, despite two years of preparation, EU countries have so far failed to apply the legislation or impose credible penalties and sanctions, said analysis by the WWF.
- Don’t make me ROFL! Teens are losing interest in Facebook
- Someone please explain the term ‘irony’ to the NSA
  
  National Security Agency’s massive new surveillance compound in the Utah desert outside Salt Lake City.
- The NSA doesn’t like having its privacy invaded
  
  A reporter tried to take pictures of a massive new government data center in Utah. Bad idea
- Surprise Visitors Are Unwelcome At The NSA’s Unfinished Utah Spy Center (Especially When They Take Photos)
  
  Most people who visit Salt Lake City in the winter months are excited about taking advantage of the area’s storied slopes. While skiing was on my itinerary last week, I was more excited about an offbeat tourism opportunity in the area: I wanted to check out the construction site for “the country’s biggest spy center.”
- Seattle Police surveillance cameras: No ‘public vetting’ events announced yet; councilmembers consider new oversight rules tomorrow
- Google Breaks Silence On FBI’s National Security Letters That Demand Its Users’ Data
  
  National security letters are the Fight Club of government data surveillance. Thanks to the gag orders that accompany those FBI requests for users’ private information, the first rule for any company that receives an NSL is that it doesn’t talk about receiving an NSL. Now Google is doing its best to blur–if not quite break–that rule.
- Transparency Report: Shedding more light on National Security Letters
  
  Our users trust Google with a lot of very important data, whether it’s emails, photos, documents, posts or videos. We work exceptionally hard to keep that information safe—hiring some of the best security experts in the world, investing millions of dollars in technology and baking security protections such as 2-step verification into our products.
- AG Holder Asserts Authority to Conduct Drone Strikes on U.S. Citizens
  
  Today, Sen. Rand Paul received two pieces of correspondence regarding the legality and constitutionality of the U.S. government using lethal force, including drone strikes, on Americans and in U.S. territory. Sen. Paul sent three inquires on the matter to President Obama’s nominee to be Director of the Central Intelligence Agency, John Brennan (HERE, HERE and HERE). He finally received responses from both Mr. Brennan and U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder on one item of inquiry.
- Obama Administration Says President Can Use Lethal Force Against Americans on US Soil
  
  Yes, the president does have the authority to use military force against American citizens on US soil—but only in “an extraordinary circumstance,” Attorney General Eric Holder said in a letter to Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) on Tuesday.
- The Google Glass feature no one is talking about
- Google services should not require real names: Vint Cerf
- DNA Collection Questioned as Court Weighs Privacy Rights
Civil Rights
- Four essential safeguards MPs must back
  
  Time is running out to ensure that the British legal system is not fundamentally altered in favour of the State’s desire to keep secret what it chooses. Today several amendments to the Justice and Security Bill are before the House and we urge MPs to back them, if they are unwilling to vote against Part 2 of the Bill.
- “Undignified” practice of child strip searches still taking place
  
  Unbelievably, tens of thousands of children, as young as 12, are still being subjected to the “undignified” practice of strip searches, despite reassurances from the Youth Justice Board.
DRM
- First Cell-phones. PCs Next?
  
  If restricting what consumers can do with the cell-phones, smartphones and tablets that they own is unconscionable, isn’t it time personal computers of all kinds were freed from the unconscionable terms of end-user licence agreements (more likely, decrees by monopolists) which are clear attempts to monopolize hardware and to extend copyright beyond what legislators conceived? This is not a new concept. Richard Stallman was decades ahead of the US government when he called for Free Software to be used everywhere.
Intellectual Monopolies
- Wenohah Hauter, Author of “Foodopoly,” Discusses Why Corporate Control of America’s Food System Affects YOU
  
  Wenonah Hauter, Executive Director of the national advocacy organization Food and Water Watch, will be in Madison, March 18, to read from her acclaimed new book “Foodopoly: The Battle Over the Future of Food and Farming in America.” Publishers Weekly calls it a “tour de force.”
  
  Since 2005, Food and Water Watch has lead the fight against corporate control of the U.S. food system, against the privatization of the U.S. water supply and against water contamination by hydraulic fracturing or fracking.
  
  In her new book “Foodopoly,” Hauter examines farming at the turn of the 20th century until today, and details the consolidation of the food chain from crop seeds to retail stores to argue that the people who grow our food, and consumers, have been cheated and manipulated by agribusiness and the leading food companies. She explores how the evisceration of anti-trust laws has dramatically increased consolidation among food and agricultural firms, which, along with the growth of big box stores and the marketing of junk food, has perverted how food is sold and marketed and what people eat.
- Copyrights
  - Saying “Copy” Was A Screw-Up
    
    Why is a song that I play digitally or a book I read electronically subject to extensive controls that are not considered appropriate to records or books? It’s because they are subject to licenses that can’t be applied by the seller to the physical works. Why can those licences be imposed on digital works? Because the use of digital works is considered subject to copyright, whereas the use of physical works is not. Why is that? Because the act of instantiating the work for use has been described as “copying”, allowing the rules surrounding copyright to be used as a threat to back up arbitrary license terms controlling use.
  - Doubt cast on Pirate Bay’s claim to have set up in North Korea
  - After Being Cut From Norway, The Pirate Bay Returns From North Korea
  - Fake headline of the day: the Pirate Bay “moves” to North Korea
  - REQUIEM FOR A DREAM

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Microsoft Florian Goes Ad Hominem in AstroTurf Against Android, Oracle and Microsoft Help Apple Attack Google

Posted in Apple, GNU/Linux, Google, Microsoft, Oracle, Patents at 1:38 pm by Dr. Roy Schestowitz

Summary: New smears against Android come from an Oracle- and Microsoft-funded lobbyist; Oracle and Microsoft now openly collaborate in the fight against Android while Apple, longtime friend of Oracle and Microsoft, fails to stop Android’s momentum

The antics of Microsoft Florian, better known as Florian Müller or (anti-)FOSS Patents, are well known by now and his history of deception should leave no informed journalist in a position/decision to cite him. But groomed by Microsoft’s PR and the MSBBC he is doing some more of his personal attacks. It’s almost as though the PR agents ‘serve’ him with smears to publish (which according to my communications with him is likely, hence making him a communications proxy). To quote the latest from the BBC:

Sir Robin – who is also a law professor at University College London (UCL) – is now acting as a consultant to a law firm helping Samsung defend itself against a patent infringement complaint filed in the US by network equipment provider Ericsson.

After news of this spread his clerk, John Call, issued a statement.

“Sir Robin had not discussed any role as an expert, or any related matter, with Samsung or any of its representatives either directly or indirectly before 9 January 2013, when he was approached through his clerk by Bristows in the normal way to enquire as to his availability to give an expert opinion,” it said.

“Sir Robin accepted those instructions on 21 January 2013.

“Sir Robin’s role is entirely unrelated to his judgment in the Court of Appeal given on 18 October 2012 in the case of Samsung Electronics (UK) Ltd and Apple Inc. The instruction does not relate to any UK litigation or advice of any kind. Sir Robin is being remunerated for providing his expert opinion at his usual rates.”

As Open Source Consortium (UK) put it the other day:

#swpats and reputations – good article http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-21613152 … note anonymous sniping at Prof Jacob reminiscent of #odf and Peter Quinn

BBC is Android-hostile and has been like this for quite some time. It did not point out Microsoft’s ties to Florian, only Oracle’s. Here is a rebuttal:

FOSS Patents is a blog run by Florian Mueller who gets paid by Microsoft (and Oracle) and writes anti-Android stories in wholesale. He then feeds them to lazy bloggers who prefer copy+paste over doing their own research. He has again weaved an anti-Android story. This time he has questioned the integrity of the UK judge Sir Robin Jacob by writing a blog titled “UK judge who issued extreme ruling for Samsung against Apple hired by… Samsung!”

I am not saying that he gets paid by Microsoft and Oracle to write anti-Android stories and spread FUD against Android, but looking at the amount of time he spends on long boring posts, I wonder when does he get time to do anything else. Nilay Patel of The Verge once wrote, “Mueller’s enormous volume of output on FOSS Patents fairly raises the question of when he finds the time to do any serious consulting work for Oracle in between his diligently granular tracking of several international patent lawsuits, his frequent media appearances, and his additional work as a paid consultant to Microsoft.”

Another Linux foe actually takes a shot at Apple after promoting SCO for years. Oracle’s case (SCO 2) is back in the court and to quote this one report: “Oracle tries to undo Google’s successful defense of Android by claiming that software code is no different than literary text in matters of copyright.”

Florian has spread a lot of copyright-themed lies about Android, including some for Oracle’s case, which is actually supported by Microsoft. Check out this BSA event. “Of course,” Pamela Jones pointed out, “Microsoft General Counsel and Executive VP Brad Smith will be there, as will Oracle SVP, General Counsel, and Secretary Dorian Daley, and IBM Software Group VP and Assistant General Counsel Neil Abrams.”

The Business Software Alliance (BSA) shows Microsoft and Oracle standing shoulder to shoulder. Microsoft is behind Oracle in it and Jones has the details which are based on the original documents. She says: “That is, of course, exactly what SCO was asking for, before it flamed out and fell into oblivion. SCO used the same law firm as Oracle, Boies Schiller, so perhaps it’s not astounding that they raised that same theory of copyright for SCO, an adventure Microsoft and Sun (now part of Oracle) funded, and here it is again, this time in Microsoft’s mouth. I’d like to correct several misleading elements in this amicus brief. And we now have all the amicus briefs as PDFs.”

Apple and Oracle are closely connected by their leaders as well and Jones has this update on Apple’s foremost case:

I told you that the jury’s damages award in Apple v. Samsung would not stand. And this isn’t even the end, but Judge Lucy Koh has just ruled on both Apple and Samsung’s motions on damages. The jury’s award, she says, was excessive, being based on wrong theories. In some cases, she can’t even figure out what they did, and so she has ordered a new trial on damages for certain products and has reduced the award on those she could figure out herself to $598,908,892:

Apple is truly desperate to stop Samsung:

“To say that the Samsung momentum is an issue for Apple is an understatement,” said Barclays analyst Ben Reitzes.

Apple has got the most to lose here; Oracle and Microsoft mostly clear the path to Apple, perhaps fearing that Free/open source platform will become a de facto standard (Oracle and Microsoft have de facto proprietary monopoly in desktop and databases). This is case of patent stacking and conspiracy to sue.

Samsung stole Apple’s thunder and it shows. All that Apple can do now it take public knowledge that was funded by the public (later purchased by Apple to deprive others from having it) and then use patents around it to hound Android/Samsung. As a pro-Microsoft site, put it:

“Here’s a great example of this R&D ecosystem at work: Apple’s iPad. It’s amazing – a device that perhaps only Apple could have designed. But every distinctive aspect of this device – the multi-touch user interface, the sensors, the processor – has its origins in federally sponsored research,” said Lazowska in his written testimony.

That’s about all we have to say about the war on Android for now. It’s more complicated that an outsider may realise. There is a cartel at work. █

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Microsoft is Moving the Security Goalposts

Posted in Deception, Microsoft, Security at 12:48 pm by Dr. Roy Schestowitz

Armchair reseachers fall right into the trap

Game of chess

Summary: Microsoft’s “patch Tuesday” is being rebranded and studies that are based on it continue to make GNU/Linux look bad

The game of counting vulnerabilities is a dirty game which Microsoft knows how to cheat in.

“Microsoft renames “patch Tuesday”,” said a reader of this site, pointing to this article. “What those updates would contain remained a mystery to the experts,” says the article. Yes, because when you patch proprietary software nobody really knows what is going on.

This comes amid some security PR from Microsoft partners like Trustwave [1, 2] (it got to LWN) and Sourcefire, which seems to think that Linux has existed since 1988 in its so-called analysis which neglects to take account of Microsoft's hidden patches. Be wary and sceptical of so-called ‘security’ reports that compare platforms on particular criteria that they score based on public knowledge alone. Microsoft has already admitted hiding security-related patches.█

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Financial Penalties Won’t Undo the Crimes (Microsoft Antitrust)

Posted in Antitrust, Europe, Microsoft at 12:26 pm by Dr. Roy Schestowitz

UEFI

Summary: Critique of the “too little, too late” action that addresses Microsoft’s abuses against the Web

So Microsoft is engaging in anticompetitive behaviour again. A petition has been set up to protest UEFI restricted boot, but not many people are signing it because of low awareness. Something is clearly not working because Microsoft can do almost anything it wishes without facing consequences, at least not immediately. A better regulatory system is urgently needed; it’s the same in the financial sector.

As part of a story that was mentioned here recently, we wish to mention this summary of 4 sources about Microsoft antitrust:

Unnamed sources are saying that the EU plans to levy fines against Microsoft, perhaps before the end of March. The EU said Microsoft recently failed to comply with a settlement that required it to offer EU consumers a choice of browsers.

Foo Yun Chee with Reuters first broke the story, reporting, “EU competition regulators plan to fine Microsoft Corp before the end of March in a case tied to the U.S. software giant’s antitrust battle in Europe more than a decade ago, three people familiar with the matter said on Thursday…. ‘The Commission is planning to fine Microsoft before the Easter break,’ one of the sources said, adding that it is possible that procedural issues could push back the decision.”

All Things D’s John Paczkowski confirmed the report, writing, “And sources familiar with the matter have confirmed to AllThingsD that this is indeed the case at this time. No word yet on the size of the fine, but given EU Competition Commissioner Joaquin Almunia’s public threats over the misstep, penalties could be severe. Whatever they are, sources say the EC will likely announce them sometime in March.”

Generally speaking, purely financial (and belated) penalty is not the answer; they should send people to prison, prevent anticompetitive action when it happens, make remedy by forcing the firing of particular members of staff, etc. A writer in Forbes said, “Microsoft To Be Fined By The EU Again? And The Problem With Governments Being Able To Fine Companies” (no link on purpose).

He said: “Yes, we do need to have some means of stopping companies breaking the law and money seems the best way to do it.”

A more immediate penalty would have worked better. Many people lost their jobs when Microsoft did its crimes. They’ll never get justice. █

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03.04.13