Summary: Linux gets injected into it some code that potentially ties software to hardware (in the lock-in sense)

Based on antitrust exhibits, Intel’s relationship with Microsoft is complex, but Intel generally uses Windows to keep the Wintel cash cow going. Earlier this year I spoke to Intel employees who run the UEFI Forum (a forum decorated by some more members who help distract from the real dominating force) and I tried to be polite and constructive, advising the head of this forum to withdraw ‘secure’ boot. I didn’t bring up the fact that his employer, Intel, is a criminal company whose former staff plays a big role in parasites like Intellectual Ventures. I just pointed out that my brother in law works for Intel and that perhaps Intel can be changed for the better. But that was too optimistic. The utter mess which is UEFI ‘secure’ boot (harming hardware, not just computing freedom) goes forth and despite the fact that it is bricking devices with Windows on them (apparently things are getting even worse [1]), Linux developers let that nonsense enter the kernel, specifically for ARM [2], where so-called ‘secure’ boot cannot even be disabled.

“This is like another Tivoization taking place and Linux Torvalds, who spoke out against UEFI ‘secure’ boot, will probably just find some excuses for letting it be.”This is probably happening because Intel funds the Linux Foundation. UEFI Forum is Intel is Linux Foundation (in part). That’s how the influence of money works. This is like another Tivoization taking place and Linux Torvalds, who spoke out against UEFI ‘secure’ boot, will probably just find some excuses for letting it be. The situation is similar when it comes to the W3C (Linux Foundation equivalent), where corporate members (like Intel/UEFI Forum) push DRM into the Web while the founder, Tim Berners-Lee, just lets it be, essentially forcing everyone to just swallow the poison, even good forces like Eich/Mozilla [3].

The head of the UEFI Forum mocked or at least dismissed DRM as just for “business models”, but his employer promotes DRM. UEFI ‘secure’ boot — like DRM — is just about business models, so who is he kidding? Likewise, Berners-Lee has many reasons to dislike DRM given his historical background (he created the Web to share his work), yet he keeps defending DRM right now [1, 2, 3]. Are these people thinking for themselves or are they all just blindly/reluctantly following orders of those who pay their salaries? Rather than protect copyright monopolies in their respective areas (which is why the monopolies try to use DRM on the Web) or protect the monopoly of software crooks (who use bribe and sabotage to hold back GNU/Linux) perhaps those influential people should make a brave stand and rise up against corporate takeover, spilling some beans or using public humiliation to drive away the lobbyists. █

Related/contextual items from the news:

1. Updates knocking on the door!

   And then, there’s the celebrated Microsoft update to convert your Windows 8 RT computer into a Windows 8.1 RT… brick! It went so bad that Microsoft had to prevent people from installing it.

   I don’t know if they fixed it but, according to this post, the update to Win 8.1 now seems to convert your computer into a cat (because it does not play nicely with mice).

2. Linux 3.13 To Support EFI On ARM

   While EFI was originally developed by Intel and largely targeting x86 platforms, the EFI 2.3 specification does exist for Itanium and ARM architectures too and early this year the UEFI Forum had shown a proof-of-concept UEFI boot environment for ARMv8. With the EFI pull for the Linux 3.13 merge window, the Linux EFI support extends to ARM.

3. Brendan Eich, Mozilla’s CTO, on EME and DRM

   If I didn’t before, after talking to Eich I had a strong sense that Mozilla is constrained by conflicting desires – to do the right thing, for example, while retaining enough browser share that it remains able to do the right thing. As you might expect, there are no easy solutions. Fortunately, things seemed more hopeful regarding another topic we discussed: I’ll be exploring that in my next column.

Summary: Short synopsis of a long discussion with the UEFI Forum regarding ‘secure’ boot

We don’t always speak to figures of authority in pursuit of reform, but when we do, it is rather productive (pardon the meme). OIN is a good example of this. Last year, UEFI criticism began as a ‘feature’ of UEFI, namely ‘secure’ boot, was put to use by Microsoft, which basically misused it for anticompetitive reasons, making it hard to boot GNU/Linux.

“Security was not the main outcome of UEFI ‘secure’ boot being put in place.”The UEFI Forum got in touch with yours truly, setting up an interview for exchange of thoughts and ideas. It was productive because a consensus we reached was that ‘secure’ or Restricted Boot in UEFI has no purpose (or little purpose) other than to serve or facilitate business models of corporations, at the expense of customers. It is akin to DRM and TiVoization and it is hard to defend the inclusion of this antifeature, for reasons we covered here before . It was a one-hour conversation mostly with the president of the UEFI Forum, who is a technical and humble man. I politely made suggestions for UEFI, focusing on freedom aspects, and there was no lack of subjects to discuss (including patents). After an hour had lapsed we decided to call it a day (it was Friday night and I was already late to meet some friends at a local pub), but the mutual sentiment can be described as amicable. I accepted the invitation hoping it would lead to progress, not friction. The phone conference focused on questions pertaining to UEFI, with clear focus on the negative aspects, i.e. areas of improvement. In it were UEFI spokespersons Mark Doran, UEFI President, and Michael Krau, UEFI Forum’s Industry Communications Working Group (ICWG) Chair. A lady called Christine was there also, but she did not participate in the technical discussion; she had helped set it all up.

To summarise some of the key points, it was agreed that ‘secure’ boot only gives UEFI Forum a lot of negative publicity. Other issued were raised, but none else got the same amount of coverage, I had not prepared notes, mostly because the goal was to focus on freedom and not to deviate from that. UEFI Forum’s President was understanding. He said I was asking the right questions and did acknowledge that some of my concerns were legitimate (the conversation was recorded with consent from them, but it is not for publication).

Security was not the main outcome of UEFI ‘secure’ boot being put in place. They agreed to some degree. That’s why it was productive as a lengthy debate.

Towards the end, emanating from the conversation were the following tips and links, prepared and sent by Christine, who had also been on the conference call. She wrote:

> Thank you for taking the time to speak with us to address your questions
> regarding the UEFI Forum. If you have any additional questions or need
> information, please don’t hesitate to reach out to me.
>
>
>
> For your reference, I’m including a link to an abstract of the
> presentation
> http://www.linuxtag.org/2013/de/program/freitag-24-mai-2013.html?eventid=6
> referenced today by Mark Doran, President of the UEFI Forum, and
> delivered by Matthew Garrett at the Linux Tag conference in Berlin. The
> title of Garrett’s presentation is “Making UEFI Secure Boot Work for Linux.”
>
>
>
> During the call, Mark also suggested that you might want to view the
> repository of information pertaining to UEFI at Tianocore.org
> http://sourceforge.net/apps/mediawiki/tianocore/index.php?title=Welcome,
> a community site surrounding the open source components of Intel’s
> implementation of UEFI.
>
>
>
> And following are links to the three Intel YouTube videos Mark
> referenced about UEFI Secure Boot configuration:
>
> · Part 1 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eAnlhkbMang – Enabling
> & Disabling UEFI Secure Boot. Instructions for setting up a system with
> UEFI Secure Boot to dual-boot between Microsoft* Windows* 8 & Ubuntu*
> 12.10.
>
> · Part 2 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dwlbf1VRJ60 -UEFI
> dual-boot setup with Microsoft* Windows* 8. Instructions for setting up
> a system with UEFI Secure Boot to dual-boot between Microsoft Windows 8
> & Ubuntu 12.10.
>
> · Part 3 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eAnlhkbMang – UEFI
> dual-boot setup with Linux* (Ubuntu* 12.10). Instructions for setting up
> a system with UEFI Secure Boot to dual-boot between Microsoft* Windows*
> 8 & Ubuntu* 12.10.
>
>
>
> Again, thank you for your time, and please let me know if I can provide
> you with additional information.

To go along with ‘secure’ boot is to help endorse what sure has become a threat to booting freedom, not just to choice. The conference did not alter my mind in any way on this topic. The key point, as was made abundantly clear to them, is that ‘secure’ boot does a major disservice to UEFI by giving it bad reputation — an inevitability when a convicted monopolist like Microsoft perturbs UEFI for non-technical reasons. █

Summary: Arguments against the GPLv3 turn out to have come from companies which all along were nothing but trouble

T

HE third version of the GPL is largely accepted, widely adopted, and those who are affected by it are mostly out of business, e.g. Novell. Novell and SUSE opposed the GPLv3. “Linus is changing distros,” told us iophk, quoting Linus Torvalds as saying:” I gave OpenSUSE a try, because it worked so well at install-time on the Macbook Air, but I have to say, I’ve had enough. There is no way in hell I can honestly suggest that to anybody else any more.”

“That’s good news,” says iophk. But another company which the GPLv3 affects is TiVo, which not only pioneered the malpractice now known as “TiVoization” but also became a patent aggressor with growing appetite (it wants of billions of dollars from software patents). TiVo is a very bad company, no matter if it leverages Linux. See our TiVo wiki page for details. Might all Americans with cable television be forced to pay “TiVo tax” for some software patents?

The GPLv3 sought to address two problems which TiVo makes real. The obvious one is “TiVoization”; The other one is software patents. Sadly, a Microsoft marketing executive created a company which routinely bashes the GPL. It is called Black Duck and days ago we found yet more statistics that contradict its dubious, proprietary output (saturated with Microsoft input after a Microsoft deal). We put that in our daily links.

In other news, trolls suffer a loss against Nintendo in the US:

Today sees Nintendo of America prevailing in a patent infringement lawsuit. At the center of the case was the Wii remote, Wii Balance Board, and Wii Fit software. Impulse technology claimed that these three devices or software infringed upon their patent (U.S. Patent No 5,524,637) which was issued in 1996.

Note that this is an American lawsuit. Nintendo is not an American company, but this is where the patent system breeds trolls. We need the GPLv3 to prevent this, but first the licence must become widespread. It’s clear why Microsoft spreads a lot of FUD about it, usually through proxies. █

Summary: Despite elimination of file system patents, the road remains long in the struggle for software freedom

THE FFII’S mailing lists started debating the news about Microsoft’s FAT patents. “You know the malaria thing,” said their president, quoting Richard Stallman as saying that “fighting patents one by one will never eliminate the danger of software patents, any more than swatting mosquitos will eliminate malaria.”

One subscriber asked: “It is the same patent that was recognized by German Court?”

“Yes,” replied another person, “it is 352 patent.”

We wrote about the ruling in Germany before.

Shane McGlaun notes that:

I’m betting this is really good news for smartphone makers. Open-source poster boy Linus Torvalds stepped up and helped stop a Microsoft patent from being used to choke licensing fees out of other companies. The patent Microsoft owns is being used to force Google Android and Linux handset users to pay licensing fees.

This is indeed, based on what the OIN's CEO told me, what Microsoft often uses to tax Linux and Android. Torvalds’ fight against the FAT patent (he thinks the patent fight is a sign of Microsoft's business dying) is definitely big news and one that other pro-Linux sites are addressing:

There is a Microsoft patent #352 which deals with “storing filenames with lots of characters in old filesystems such as the Windows FAT (File Allocation Table) filesystem that are designed to use very short filenames. Mobile phone makers use this type of technology so that their devices interoperate with other operating systems, including Windows,” reports Wired. You can read more about the patent here.

This whole development helps show that Torvalds takes a stand against patents, even though he tolerates and even “likes’ Tivoization. We ought to remember that TiVo is bad not just for this practice but also for patent aggression. As one Microsoft booster puts it:

TiVo today accused Motorola and Time Warner Cable, a Motorola Customer, of violating patents covering the company’s digital video recorder technology.

Let’s hope that Torvalds will decide to do about Tivoization what he already does about software patents. Both are detrimental to users of software, which is just about everyone in the twenty-first century. █

Two friends have a good chat about free software at OSCON.

The CarrierIQ issue, even if it is part of an organized campaign to smear and ruin Android [2], is showing people the dangers of using non free software. Even one piece of non free software can betray users, so mostly free, “pragmatic” systems can be just as bad as regular non free systems. The free software community should capitalize on this awareness to change people’s attitudes towards their devices so that they will reject non free software in the future. Software freedom must be complete for users to have real conrtol and privacy.

Richard Stallman wrote an extensive review of Android back in September. It lists all of the parts of available phones that can be used maliciously against users, which surprisingly include the radio control firmware. The conclusion was unequivocal, “Android is a major step towards an ethical, user-controlled, free-software portable phone, but there is a long way to go. … While any computing system might have bugs, these devices might be bugs.”

When the CarrierIQ scandal broke, Mr. Stallman was not surprised. His comment was,

The root cause of this problem is that the users don’t control the software on these phones. So if they didn’t put in this surveillance package [Carrier IQ], they would put in some other. The users’ only protection against malicious features (surveillance, intentional restrictions, and back doors) is to insist on free software.

Anyone in the Open Source community who’s surprised should think hard about what the Free Software Society has been telling them. About four years ago at a “Web 2.0″ meeting, Eben Moglen urged the Tim O’Reilly and the Open Source community to quit, “wasting time promoting commercial products.” O’Reilly was sad that Moglen did not want to talk about protecting people’s data on other people’s computers in “the cloud,” but CarrierIQ makes it plain that those rights and protections are meaningless if the user is stripped of privacy by malware in their pocket. It might have been useful ten years ago to hide scary talk about freedom from big companies like IBM. It worked, thanks, but talk about “best tool for the job” and “pragmatic” mixes of free and non free software should now be considered counter productive and the results dangerous.

There are community alternatives to carrier issued Android. Stallman mentions Replicant, a 100% free software replacement for Android. There is also a less careful distribution called CyanogenMod that is focused on performance and includes non free software from Google and perhaps device drivers. Jeff Hoogland, the founder of Bodhi GNU/Linux, is working on Debian for cell phones and we can be sure many others are as well. In the mean time, if you must have a smart phone, it might as well be Android because there is no chance a phone from Apple or Microsoft will be liberated, but don’t expect it to be a Freedom Box the community really wants [2 and don’t trust it until it’s really free.

Sadly, US law is mostly a hindrance. Senator Al Franklin had some very pointed questions about possible violations of law for the company and a lawsuit has been launched against the guilty parties – Apple, HTC, Samsung, Motorola, AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile and Carrier IQ. That’s good but it will be difficult to prove what actually happened, and the free software community can do better. Like Vista and Windows 7, CarrierIQ establishes encrypted communications to hide the data transmitted. It would be better to have free software on your cell phone, so the FSF has petitioned the Librarian of Congress for a DMCA Exemption Without that, it may be against US law for people to replace the software on their phones or even to delete CarrierIQ malware.

The lack of freedom in cell phones is not a natural state but is unlikely to end without changes and enforcement of US law. Android has emerged as the top cell phone OS because it is free software and creates a productive commons for the odd hundred companies that must cooperate to make a cell phoneThe obnoxious US patent system has allowed Microsoft and Apple to practice judicial extortion that should have been blocked by US anti-trust and racketeering laws[1, 2,3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10]. Spectrum licensing itself is a technically obsolete and harmful practice but the FCC could demand adherence to technical standards, demand the publication of technical standards required to operate phones, and forbid practices such as phone locking as the price carriers pay for spectrum as it transitions to open spectrum.

We are in this hole because a long running propaganda campaign by non free software owners has played down ethical issues while convincing people that they are helpless. Billions of dollars in propaganda spending still drown out the basic truth of the situation and non free software use remains prevalent even among people who have every reason to fear spying by the rich and powerful. CarrierIQ gives us a good chance to fix that.

Summary: The largest Free/libre software advocacy group issues a formal statement and call for action against Microsoft’s TiVoization push

ON SEVERAL occasions before we mentioned the situation with regards to UEFI for Vista 8 [1, 2, 3] and we are gratified to see the FSF getting involved because it has a lot of influence, so it can make things happen. From its formal statement:

Microsoft has announced that if computer makers wish to distribute machines with the Windows 8 compatibility logo, they will have to implement a measure called “Secure Boot.” Secure Boot is designed to protect against malware by preventing computers from loading unauthorized binary programs when booting. In practice, this means that computers implementing it won’t boot unauthorized operating systems — including initially authorized systems that have been modified without being re-approved.

Please go ahead and sign the statement.

This just helps show that the FSF was right all along about TiVoization. It had insight and foresight. Speaking of the FSF, its founder Richard Stallman has just told me that “My feelings regarding Jobs are about his work, not about him personally. What I said about Jobs was about his work.” This is worth clarifying for all those who took his words out of context (and we chose not to feed these by doing an article about it). █

Summary: The lesser-realised problem with machines that are made to include TiVoization for Microsoft compliance; more “security” FUD from Microsoft

IT has been a while since we last wrote about the UEFI scandal [1, 2]. Nothing has actually been resolved, despite the comforting sense that the authorities have been informed and Microsoft issued a statement (which was no reassurance).

Several years ago we wrote some articles about the impact of Windows Vista on the environment, but it wasn’t until someone from Asia pointed this out that we realised TiVoization seriously impedes reuse:

Consumers Don’t Own Computers “Designed for Windows 8″, and They Go to Landfills Earlier (Side Effects of “Trusted Computing”)

Microsoft Windows 8 alpha is released and downloadable. But no, I am not recommending it. Nor am I denouncing it in favor of GNU/Linux (well, not in this article anyway). What you should be aware of and concerned about as a consumer is those machines labeled as “Designed for Windows 8″. Much more so if you care about the environmental and humanitarian problems caused by e-wastes, for these machines will end up much faster as e-wastes than the ordinary machines manufactured now.

Machines labeled as “Designed for Windows 8″ have to support UEFI. UEFI is said to have many nice features, which I am not knowledgeable about and will not discuss. But I can assure you that one of those features is a downright hoax, scam, and lie. The “secure boot” feature in UEFI is claimed to make your computer more secure by disallowing intrusions from untrusted sources. This and certain other features in UEFI are important elements of Trusted Computing, a mechanism advocated by Microsoft and other big IT companies. The claim is that booting a computer from an untrusted source (such as a tux usb key which has applications in tourism, education, environment preservation, LOHAS, and ethics) is a security threat and should be avoided.

There is just one tiny problem: it’s not you, the consumer, who gets to decide who is to trust. The propaganda claims that the consumers are too dumb (well, ok, actually phrased in a much more polite way) to make their own decisions about whom to trust. (“Microsoft or Chao-Kuei?”) Software booting from an untrusted source may contain rootkit, for example, which would gain absolute control of your computer. The real, unsaid intention, however, is to prevent consumers from using alternative players and readers on alternative operating systems to circumvent the human-right infringing and infamous Digital Rights Management. If the big IT companies let you decide whom to trust, then they cannot trust you as a DRM-abiding consumer. With the secure booting mechanism in UEFI, the IT companies finally can trust that you will not be able to ask your computer to do what is best in your interest, for example exercising your fair use right and other rights requested in the digital consumer bill of right.

This abusive behaviour from Microsoft (and Apple) should not be tolerated silently because it is yet another example of using “security” to pass new and self-serving rules that harm everyone’s freedom. In a similar vein, Microsoft is smearing the free Web browsers/competition, very much as usual (although the competition does not quite do that itself). This latest attack too uses “security” and to quote The Register:

Microsoft has unveiled a website aimed at raising awareness of browser security by comparing the ability of Internet Explorer, Mozilla Firefox, and Google Chrome to withstand attacks from malware, phishing, and other types of threats.

Your Browser Matters gives the latest versions of Firefox and Chrome a paltry 2 and 2.5 points respectively out of a possible score of 4. Visit the site using the IE 9, however, and the browser gets a perfect score. IE 7 gets only 1 point, and IE 6 receives no points at all. The site refused to rate Apple’s Safari browser in tests run by The Register.

We recently saw how Microsoft's friend used "security" to derail Free/open source adoption in Bristol. █

Summary: News about CPTN, the Open Invention Network (OIN), and Microsoft patent cases

WAY back in the days, Novell took great pride in its OIN membership, reassuring us all that many of its patents were wonderfully innovative and benevolent because of the OIN. Novell actually used this propaganda for marketing of Novell’s products, even proprietary ones. It was the “goodwill” PR. Now that Novell is eager to give those patents to Microsoft, what is a person supposed to call Novell? There are many words that fit here and our readers and intelligent enough to fill the gap.

The latest CPTN development is now described by IDG, which correctly states that this is “Microsoft’s Purchase”, not the shell it’s hiding behind (like OuterCurve [1, 2] and others) for regulatory reasons and PR purposes. Novell should be shamed and boycotted for what it is doing here. Even when it’s sold to AttachMSFT, its products ought to be avoided. There is no point in asking Novell to withdraw the CPTN agreement because a withdrawal is not going to happen. Novell is now run by a bunch of Microsoft vassals, to whom monetary gifts from Microsoft — Trojan horses included — are a matter of priority.

“Novell should be shamed and boycotted for what it is doing here.”So anyway, what will it be for OIN if CPTN (Microsoft proxy) gets some of the patents once owned by the OIN? We covered this some months ago when companies reacted by joining the OIN before the closure of Novell’s deal. Ever since then OIN grew 28 percent (in the first quarter alone!) and CIS — with roots in OSDL because of Stuart Cohen — will speak about that very soon. Facebook, a patent aggressor with Microsoft ownership (a partial stake), has also just joined the OIN this month and that says a lot. It was already mentioned in that previous post about Facebook joining. Since Microsoft Florian and other Linux haters from Microsoft circles spread so much FUD about the OIN, we can tell for sure that the OIN is doing something positive. So thanks, Florian, for validating what we already knew. Reading Florian is like reading manipulative strategies from within Microosft, the bias, defamation, FUD, and lies included. He is currently pushing for Microsoft to get Novell’s (and probably Nokia’s) patents, by proxy. As for the Nokia situation which he gloats over (premature sealing of the Microsoft deal [1, 2] with Elop), this should definitely get reported to the anti-cartel authorities in Germany, just like CPTN. Microsoft’s Elop, representing Nokia, signed the deal with his former employer very quickly, before an investigation for this cartel-like tactic or entryism could be announced. Even seniors at Nokia too called it a "take over" as opposed to a deal. This is an example of corruption, a white-collar offence that nobody seems to be investigating even though a lot of people complain. This is why Microsoft is generally distrusted or even loathed throughout the industry.

Some ‘Linux companies’ are notorious for a dubious patent strategy and no company is more notorious for it than TiVo, which turned into an aggressor and a loser in its fight for relevance. Here is the latest from the TiVo-EchoStar court case [1, 2]

A federal appeals court upheld a ruling that EchoStar infringed TiVo patents for digital recording technology, raising hopes the long legal battle could end with a TiVo victory.

TiVo shares shot up after the ruling, trading more than 30 percent higher in the early afternoon.

This is nothing to be celebrated. And one need not pardon TiVo for Tivoization, either.

Microsoft is also in court because of patent violations. It is the important case of i4i. Microsoft is in fact at the Supreme Court because it knowingly infringed patents and also engaged in trial misconduct, quite characteristically. Here is some of the latest coverage from IDG, in addition to SJVN’s take [1, 2]. There is another news article today about patent troll Ric Richardson, who used that joke of a ‘company’ called Uniloc (see [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12]) to get a lot of money for code he did not write at all. Watch him help this propaganda piece titled “Innovation festival”:

Inventor Ric Richardson made a name (and a whole lot of money) for himself when his company Uniloc successfully sued Microsoft for a breach of their anti-piracy software patent.

Innovation in software happens at the keyboard, not a “festival” or even a patent lawyer’s office. Now, if only these patent trolls could lead Microsoft to finally flip-flopping on the software patents stance. It would be good to have more such trolls suing Microsoft. 50 is not enough. █

Summary: TiVo’s shift to a strategy of patent litigation is not paying off, patent trolling becomes common, Microsoft rides the wave

TiVo is known for pioneering the practice of “Tivoization”, which prevents running code on particular machines if that code is modified. Tivoization was one of the reasons for making the third version of the GPL. TiVo is a notable user of Linux, but just using the code does not make TiVo a friendly company. In fact, as we have shown many time before (e.g. [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]), TiVo is a patent aggressor.

According to this summary from TechDirt, TiVo’s strategy as a patent aggressor is not working out.

TiVo has been spending a lot of effort suing others for patent infringement, but apparently not very much on actually improving their own services and giving customers a reason to buy them over the competition. So while it may be winning some of its patent lawsuits, it hasn’t helped much for the business, which is rapidly bleeding customers and losing marketshare.

Incidentally, TechDirt has also just written about law practices that turn to patent trolling.

From an economic standpoint, this activity is a pure dead weight loss on economic activity. There is nothing good that comes from it. You basically have companies that have ignored a patent they got for whatever reason, suddenly rediscovering it and using it to go after totally unrelated companies who actually innovated and brought products to market (almost always with no knowledge whatsoever of the questionable patent in the first place). And suddenly the actual innovators have to pay up to a company that did absolutely nothing with the invention.

This is in complete contradiction to the goals of the patent office. And watch what Microsoft is doing right now, looking for a patent on Fog Computing.

Microsoft has filed a patent to lock-down a method for moving data between different “clouds.”

As we showed last week, “Microsoft seems to be patenting stuff like crazy.” █

‘“Other than Bill Gates, I don’t know of any high tech CEO that sits down to review the company’s IP portfolio” —Marshall Phelps

Summary: A lot of patent news from the past few days

QUITE A LOT has happened since the last Patents Roundup and plenty of news relates to Microsoft as a threat to Free software.

An article from Law.com has rejuvenated [1, 2] interest in the real purpose of the world's largest patent troll, headed by Microsoft’s former chief, Nahtan Myhrvold. Mike Masnick calls this troll, Intellectual Ventures (IV), a “pyramid scheme”. He explains why:

Intellectual Ventures, of course, is the Nathan Myhrvold company that has been building up a huge portfolio of patents with which to get big tech companies to pay many millions of dollars to not get sued — and, according to many, to get a cut of future deals as well, making the whole thing sound suspiciously like a pyramid scheme.

[...]

But, a year ago, we noted that the company appeared to be getting antsy. While it was bringing in some hefty fees from a small group of companies who bought into the equity pyramid (which neatly lets the world outside be confused over what’s “investment” and what’s “revenue”), there was concern that investors were getting impatient. Pouring billions of dollars into a company that isn’t doing much can make some investors a little anxious. And while we still don’t know of any direct lawsuits, Zusha Elinson has noticed that Intellectual Ventures’ former patents are starting to show up in court, often involving some of the most well known names normally associated with “patent trolling.”

One reader of ours calls it “Mafia blues”, explaining that Intellectual Ventures “Make[s] the dirt job by others.” It’s an arsenal for hire. They use attack dogs to do their dirty deeds and friends/investors are ‘protected’ from this. Who are those friends/investors? Good question. Facebook seems like one that's a recent addition.

Bill Gates himself is an investor in Intellectual Ventures (private investment), which got Intellectual Ventures about $5 billion to get the ball rolling, i.e. harvesting patents. Microsoft itself turns out to be an investor and so is Apple (which occasionally uses patents against Linux contenders), according to this bit of information found in the corner of the article mentioned some days ago.

Both Apple and Microsoft have been reported to be IV investors.

It is interesting to find Apple investing in such “pyramid schemes” of patents. When it comes to patents, Apple and Microsoft enjoy a special peace (if not affinity). They cross-license. And as we pointed out some days ago, Google contributes its own share of problems, but at least it is a member of the OIN.

Another part of this problem is IBM, whose policy on software patents is unfriendly to Free software not because it’s suing but because it allows others to do so, to an extent. An IBM person currently runs the USPTO, so this is important. IBM’s view of the patent system impacts the policy on technology patents.There are finally some Slashdot comments about it (this has made the front page) and also an updated summary.

In its Amicus Brief to the US Supreme Court on the Bilski case, IBM is arguing that “patent protection has promoted the free sharing of source code [...] which has fueled the explosive growth of open source software development.”

[...]

Read also page 42 of the IBM letter:

In addition, disclosure of software inventions promotes collaboration among software developers (such as open source development)

Insane.

IBM tends to be seen as an eternal friend of Free software because of its pledges and sincere contributions, but by choosing to continue to accumulate software patents, IBM opens the door for others like Microsoft to pose a real threat. Another company which tends to be associated with Linux is TiVo , but as we regularly show, TiVo is a patent aggressor as well. Watch how one company is forced to pay TiVo $200 million just for patents.

Dish Network and its sister company EchoStar must cough up an extra $200 million to TiVo for continuing to offer DVR functionality in their set-top boxes after being slapped with a court injunction.

A few days ago we also saw the BBC spreading patent propaganda where criminalisation of patent infringement gets justified as a severe action. In relation to that article (one among two) from the BBC, Pamela Jones from Groklaw writes: “Hmm. Let’s see. Could we put Steve Ballmer in jail, then, for the i4i patent? Wait. Uh oh. Look at the picture of Mr. Baylis. I think he might be combing his hair in violation of patent No. 4,022,227, Method of Concealing Partial Baldness. Officers, put Mr. Baylis in the clink while we sort this out, will you? And since the CATO Institute recently announced that most companies infringe patents, I believe we could shut down the entire world economy in no time flat by following Mr. Baylis’ suggestion.”

Glyn Moody had this to say:

Which is the old confusion between theft and infringement. Indeed, it’s probably impossible to nick a patent, since it’s a government-granted monopoly, and they’re pretty hard to steal.

And it’s foolish on a practical level: imagine the current insanity of patent law cases turned into even higher-stake criminal cases, and the burden they would imposed on an already stretched legal system.

So, Trevor, do stick to inventing clever things, and leave stupid intellectual monopolies alone.

Regarding Microsoft's call for harmonisation of patent systems across the world, Moody wrote:

Riiight: “bold” as in “infect the rest of the world with the insanity that is the US patent system” bold, I imagine – not forgetting software as “patentable subject matter” while we’re at it.

Danke, aber nein, danke, Horacio.

Pamela Jones wrote this: “Microsoft suggests an international patent system. That way, it can kill off its competition, most particularly FOSS, everywhere at once. If you are reckless, you’ll go along with them.”

Peter Glaskowsky at CNET calls it a “premature patent proposal,” further arguing:

I really have no problem with harmonization if it is properly done, but I think it would be tremendously difficult to achieve good results. The reality of patent protection is radically different from that of copyrights because patents are allowed based on the merits of the application; someone has to make a judgment call.

In other news that we mentioned before (regarding the i4i case [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11]), here are some articles about the latest development:

• Microsoft on Word sales ban delayed
• The i4i v. Microsoft Order Staying the Injunction
• Microsoft granted stay of Word injunction
• Court Grants Microsoft Stay In Word Injunction
• U.S. appeals court stays Microsoft Word injunction
• The Morning’s News: Word Up! Microsoft Wins a Stay, More

Here is a very interesting insight about this case.

As reported by the Wall Street Journal, i4i’s chairman, Loudon Owen called Microsoft’s brief an “extraordinary document” that “captures the hostile attitude of Microsoft toward inventors who dare to enforce patents against them.” But with friends like Dell and Hewlett-Packard each filing amicus curiae briefs in support of Microsoft’s motion to stay the injunction, i4i is looking to have to fight more software and computer giants than just Microsoft. The AmeriKat predicts that with the addition of Dell and Hewlett-Packard’s briefs and in applying the third and fourth factors in the test for an injunction as set out in eBay Inc v MercExchange she would be surprised if the Court of Appeals does not lift or in someway amend the injunction given the far-reaching effect on third parties like Dell and HP.

Isn’t it enlightening that Microsoft and its allies pretend that the sky will be falling if Word gets banned? As PC World rightly points out, many alternatives to Word exist and they are a lot cheaper (or free).

First, there are plenty of alternative word processors out there, most of which read Word files perfectly well. Sure, there might be a few formatting glitches, but that’s to be expected during any file conversion. Microsoft Office users, particularly those who rely heavily on the well-honed integration between Excel, Word, Outlook, and PowerPoint, would experience the most problems. But, again, the ban would affect new sales of Word, not existing copies. So users would have time to develop workarounds.

Plus, there’d be one big silver lining to a Microsoft Word ban: A true universal document format could take hold, one that replaces today’s defacto standard — Microsoft’s doc/docx — that’s tied too closely to the whims of one software vendor.

Word ban? Sure, why not?

GCN has a similar new article, but the list of proposed alternatives is very limited and disputable.

In other interesting news, Microsoft has quietly settled yet another patent lawsuit where the scale of damages claimed was hundreds of millions of dollars. Only one publication (that we could find) actually covered it, twice even:

i. Microsoft settles Tucson firm’s patent lawsuit on imaging technology

Microsoft Corp., the world’s biggest software maker, settled a patent-infringement lawsuit filed by Tucson-based Research Corporation Technologies Inc. that sought hundreds of millions of dollars over a process to improve images on computer screens.

ii. Microsoft settles with local company

Microsoft Corp. reached a settlement with a Tucson firm that accused the software giant of infringing on patented digital-imaging technology, heading off a jury trial.

Check out this rant about the USPTO. It comes from a reputable source.

The U.S. patent office gets nearly 500,000 applications every year. Figuring out who owns what, typically in court, has morphed into a business worth $10-billion (U.S.) a year in the United States, where the global patent war is mainly being waged.

The ITC is revisiting bans in an important case where patent laws are seemingly being violated. So, there is at least a new sign that recognition of the problem remains poor and another embargo may be on its way.

The U.S. International Trade Commission has voted to investigate technology-related patent complaints brought by two companies, with the vendors asking the agency to ban the import of a wide range of products using flash memory.

In one case, Samsung Electronics of South Korea filed a complaint, and in the second, Samsung is among the targets in the investigation. The two cases involve different types of flash memory.

A Samsung representative didn’t immediately return a phone call seeking comment on the two cases.

If this is what “innovation” is all about, then perhaps we need less of it. █

Summary: Sunny day here today, so here are just some patent ‘quickies’

TiVo is a patent nuisance to everyone. Despite using Linux, it is a patent aggressor [1, 2, 3], just like Akamai. And just because it uses Linux (and applies TiVoization to it) does not magically make it a nice company. TiVo carries on with its journey of aggravation:

TiVo said Wednesday that it is suing AT&T and Verizon over three DVR patents. The complaints seek damages and a permanent injunction.

Simply put, TiVo is pursuing the same legal playbook it followed against Dish/EchoStar. The patents in question include 6,233,389, 7,529,465 and 7,493,015.

Nintendo has just spared a lot of money to save itself from the likes of TiVo.

Nintendo Co., the maker of the top- selling Wii video-game console, settled a U.S. trade fight that could have resulted in a U.S. import ban of the popular gaming systems.

Nintendo and Hillcrest Laboratories Inc. filed a notice with the U.S. International Trade Commission on Aug. 21 that they reached a settlement of patent-infringement claims before the agency. Financial details were blacked out in the copy of the agreement made available to the public.

The patent system may often be characterised as a system of honour and mutual respect, but what we find here is a system of embargoes and strangulation. There is also such a thing as a “nasty patent” and Microsoft shows exactly what that can be:

Microsoft is seeking to patent a method for using a popular human-verification technology on the Web to deliver advertising to a captive audience.

We wrote about it two days ago, just as we mentioned HP and Dell helping Microsoft against patents. Here is another article about it.

Then there is Tuxera [1, 2], which The Register is falsely describing as a “Linux vendor”. Why are they showing off selling out anyway? Is Microsoft paying them?

To finish off on a brighter side, here is an entertaining new video.

[Via]

We wrote about this patent application right here. Someone has also just sent us what he calls “EPO propaganda”, saying that it is “a picture taken of an EPO job advertisement..” [click to enlarge] █

Summary: KDE’s lesson in maintaining Freedom and defending data accessibility at the same time

YESTERDAY WE WROTE about Linux pondering DRM, having already let in TPM or something that's akin to Tivoization. Some of us at Boycott Novell hold the belief that this is counter-productive for users who perceive GNU/Linux as a free (libre) operating system that respects its users by putting rights and trust in the hands of these users.

Aaron Seigo from the KDE project has just dispatched this encouraging post which revealed how they handled the growing plague of document DRM. From the opening paragraphs:

Jonathan Corbet wrote a piece on LWN about Okular and it’s implementation of user permission restrictions in PDFs (sometimes errantly refered to as “DRM”). This is actually something it has done since it was KPDF back in KDE 3. Obviously, permissions in PDFs are a generally misguided attempt at protecting the agenda of a publisher in a demonstrably ineffective way that comes at a cost to things like the concepts of fair use.

So what’s up with Okular having support for permissions? It’s quite simple: not only is permissions in the PDF spec, but there are organizations in the world who, for contractual or legal reasons, require permissions in PDFs be respected.

Do we simply not serve those users needs? Do we “know better” for the user who says “I want to accept the terms of the publisher of this document”? Of course not; that’s rather user unfriendly in itself.

So the strategy adopted was quite simple: make it an option that the user may choose to abide by the permissions flags in a PDF or not.

If a Linux authority ever insists on support for DRM^*, then maybe developers can provide people with a similar option to that which KDE offers. Novell’s Go-OO developers take it a step further.

While on this important subject of Linux and Freedom, what is the consequence this new post from Jim Zemlin?

Canola Project’s GPLv3 Permissions are Worth a Look

[...]

The foundation and its members all believe that licensing choice is ultimately up to the developers and owners of a project. We are concerned, however, with whether the language of popular licenses is legally clear, and also with the fact that having too many licenses and license variations can become confusing.

Regardless of where you come down on the debate as to whether these permissions should be granted, it is clear that this language is effective and that its consistent use will be helpful for those projects and developers that DO wish to provide a similar exception to the GPLv3.

IBM is a little scared of Freedom (and by inference the GPLv3). It refuses to talk about elimination of software patents because it favours them and it is also a (or the) major force in the Linux Foundation and OIN, based on the respective portfolio. Under sufficient pressure from users IBM et al will need to readjust (or face negative impact on PR). █

______
^* Linus Torvalds says he likes Tivoization, but he is glad to see music DRM fading at the same time. Some call it a contradiction.

GPLv3 launch

Summary: TPM in Linux raises important questions about Freedom

A COUPLE of years ago Linus Torvalds wrote “I think Tivoization is *good*,” which led to lengthy discussions.

Yesterday in the IRC channel a fascinating tidbit resurfaced as IBM’s Trusted Computing ambitions for Linux reared their ugly head again. The idea of embedding ‘trusted’ computing in Linux (it is the very opposite of trust) probably involved work from IBM, at least based on some prior reports and the Linux Weather Forecast, which has the following for Linux 2.6.30.

Support for integrity management in the kernel has been merged. This code makes use of the trusted platform module (TPM) built into many systems to ensure that the system’s files (including its executable software) have not been corrupted, maliciously or otherwise.

This can be misused to achieve the very opposite, where “corrupted” means benignly hacked. An older article about this seems innocent enough, but questions may arise, such as: could Linus have known something about TPM when rejecting GPLv3?

“What would this mean to Linux as a Free underlying platform?”“It was one of the main reasons for the rejection in the Linux kernel mailing list,” writes oiaohm. If binaries are changed (or their ‘integrity’ not authenticated), then programs won’t run.

“Problem is, there are devices where TiVo style security is needed,” claims oiaohm, “Like you don’t want people tampering with electronic voting systems.

“As I said, there is good and bad to it. Good for very particular uses. You really do want to be able to inspect the source code of a electronic voting machine to make sure it is not stuffed up. You also don’t want people tampering with it. If you look around, you can find other valid uses of the tech.”

What would this mean to Linux as a Free underlying platform? The GNU/Linux operating system could suffer from this. “Problem is, I would bet almost all the money I have that it will be abused to harm users,” concludes oiaohm. █

Video on Trusted Computing:

Striking balance between mindsets might be a factor on which the success of Free software is hinged. Put simply, a struggle against so-called ‘pragmatism’ may have been one of the greatest barriers to wider adoption of Free software. However, at the same time, such a struggle ensures that Free software never devolves to become excessively assimilated to proprietary software, at which point its fundamental goals are simply not met.

Over the past 25 years, Free software fought its growing pains and became an integral part of the computer industry. Against all odds, Free software, which at a later stage grew alongside the Open Source branch, has reached and touched almost every aspect of our lives, at least as far as computing goes. In the case of Open Source, nowadays it’s common to find that similar concepts get adopted almost everywhere, not just in technology.

“Even Microsoft Windows contained portions of BSD-licensed code.”To give a few examples demonstrating ubiquity, Google is powered by Free software at its deeper levels and Mozilla Firefox, which is said to have reached approximately 123 million desktops and laptops, is by all means Open Source software. The various BSDs gain acceptance also. As Macintosh users are probably aware, their system enjoys a symbiotic relationship with BSD (or Darwin) development. Even Microsoft Windows contained portions of BSD-licensed code.

When it comes to Free software, the outlook seems bright. Market predictions are largely optimistic and sharp growth of Open Source software is foreseen quite uniformly. An overwhelming lump of investments which were seen at the beginning of 2008, along with the one-billion-dollar acquisition of MySQL and another of Trolltech, are definite signs that Free software is no longer just a niche in the industry; it is a major part of it.

Obstacles to Adoption

There are areas where Free software has been more successful than others. In order to understand how adoption can be sped up, one needs to look at known weaknesses and barriers, then address them.

There are two separate sides to consider here; the first is the environment to which Free software needs to adapt and the second is the environment in which Free software is being developed.

In the first case, a reciprocal relationship can be seen. The industry wishes to leverage Free software to its own advantage, whereas Free software relies on an industry which supports, funds, and contributes improvements to the software being deployed. Those two sides are bound to meet half-way and benefit mutually.

“Separate strands — at times even referred to as “movements” — adopted slightly different routes to a digital emancipation.”In the second case, there are frictions to be addressed and reconciliation to be reached. As alluded to at the beginning of this article, there is no single ideology which represents everyone. There are those who prefer to make compromises that can be seen as shortcuts to acceptance, which come at a cost. This is typically accompanied by caution or resistance from one side (developers) and acceptance from another (targeted market).

Separate strands — at times even referred to as “movements” — adopted slightly different routes to a digital emancipation. They strive to accomplish very similar goals, but they use different software licenses. While their philosophy is not inherently the same, it is still almost identical. The development methodologies are largely consistent across the different strands and yet, unnecessary arguments sometimes get in the way. That barrier is akin to a ‘civil war’ and it can quickly becomes a distraction.

In order for Free software to become more dominant, here are just a couple of broad issues that need to be resolved. They correspond to the items above.

External Factors

The problem: In a market where customers are seen as passive, they are often referred to as consumers. Most consumers out there in the market are foreign and oblivious to the ideas which make up Free software. To many people, “Free software” means “cheap software”, which at a mental level translates to “bad quality”. However, “Free software” truly ought to be synonymous with freedom, as in free speech or liberty. This ambiguity in the English language can be misleading and unfortunately enough it has been rather damaging to this software’s reputation.

“Software producers gain greater control over the user’s wallet, too.”In recent years, innocent consumers have grown more familiar with some harms of proprietary software by witnessing unwanted behaviours which can be explained in fairly simple terms. Examples include the inability to access or edit one’s family videos and the loss of access to entire music collections, which need to be repurchased. As the days go by, computers control the user more then the user controls his/her own computer. Software producers gain greater control over the user’s wallet, too. “Why,” you ask? Because they can, particularly as long as customers obey and accept rather than demand change through resistance.

There is clearly a problem of perception here. Users who are ‘external’ to the development world frequently fail to see where they are being led and how they are being controlled. Additionally, despite the fact that software is not tangible, people tend to forget that software is duplicated virtually free of charge and therefore, cost of acquisition says very little about quality. The value of software depends a great deal on the number of people who use it.

Companies that stock and sell Free software are still required to combat public perceptions, which is why the term “Open Source” is used more commonly than “Free software”. What remains unclear, however, is the number of Free software values that are maintained once this transition from Free software to Open Source is made. This can lead to backlash.

There is a always a level of pragmatism which strives to ease migrations between software, including entire operating systems, but the process tends to blur the gap between Free software and proprietary software. Consider the fact that companies which sell GNU/Linux desktops are struggling to please each and every customer and supplier (developer). If the freedom of software and hardware is preserved, this often means that the customer must then cope with a steeper learning curve. There are usually those who would bluntly accuse the company of betraying or exploiting Free software developers if proprietary ‘shims’ are included to remove adoption obstacles such as DVD playback and proprietary codecs.

Lastly, there is the perception that good products are advertised heavily. Wealthier companies, whose business model thrives in high cashflow (higher spendings and higher revenue), are able to raise awareness of their products. The public is drawn in by hype and there is no equally-effective response from the Free software world. Broadly speaking, advertising may be the Achilles Heel of Free software.

Possible solution: Education is probably the key to resolving the issues above. When stressing the value of freedom (and gradual loss thereof) users will be led to exploring more options. Not so many people are aware of real choice.

By raising the importance of user’s control in computing and by understanding that advertising does not necessarily reflect on the quality of advertised products, people can better appreciate Free software alternatives to what they currently use. Manufacturers of software and hardware need to understand this as well in order for them to properly support lesser-known operating systems such as FreeBSD and GNU/Linux.

Pragmatism can sometimes be seen as a case of giving up because there isn’t sufficient understanding out there. Hardware companies, for example, are sometimes unwilling to offer documentation that is needed for improved interaction with Free software. Their attitude is incompatible with Free software ideals simply because they fail to understand the economic benefits of customer-centric computing. Myths and fallacies play a significant role here.

Internal Factors

The great divide between developers and everybody else is so infamous that it created the “nerd” stereotype, but there is another divide which involves just developers. This problem is broad, but let us consider one individual example which is representative of most.

The problem: The creator of Linux, Linus Torvalds, considers himself to be pragmatic. He happily buys Apple hardware on which he immediately installs his own software and he takes pride in focusing on just the technical merits of his work. He rarely gets distracted by some of the more philosophical and seemingly-boring questions that are associated with software. And that’s a good thing, not a problem.

Torvalds distanced himself somewhat from the Free Software Foundation when he made the decision to stick with an older software license of theirs, the GNU GPLv2 (General Public License version 2). The main factor that led Torvalds to this decision is a set of clauses which forbid Tivoization. The term Tivoization is used to refer to a GPLv2 workaround which permits manufacturers to forbid modification joined by execution of a program. Some view this as controversial, but some do not. While Tivoization is legally permitted based on the GPLv2, this does not sit right with the spirit of the GNU project as a whole. The GPLv3 (version 3) was introduced to close the Tivoization loophole.

“It is hard to tell whether a solution is near, but it seems to be approached.”Torvalds has openly said that he likes Tivoization. He insists that Linux does not require some of changes introduced in GPLv3. This led to mild hostilities and disagreements. By no means was this a case of infighting, but tensions rose and a little fracture appeared.

Possible solution: While the problem at hand is truly a matter of opinions, divergence in terms of ideologies can be endemic in the sense that it can lead to forks. It is hard to tell whether a solution is near, but it seems to be approached. A year ago Sun Microsystems said that it would license OpenSolaris under the CDDL and the GPLv3 (dual). Past correspondence in the Linux mailing lists seems to suggest that Linux may have no choice but to swallow the GPLv3 along with terms that are perceived as undesirable by Torvalds. Alan Cox, unlike Linus Torvalds, has shown little or no opposition to this and he is very influential.

Summary

The greatest enemy to the success of Free software is Free software itself, as well as public perception. Some mild disagreements regarding the definition and values of Free software can lead to fragmentation, but there are usually some resolutions within sight.

What remains to be achieved is a grand goal related to education. Some computer professionals still fear what is yet to be understood a little better. Getting the word out there is probably the best route to removing that last major obstacle. █

Originally published in Datamation in 2008

The Supreme Court is refusing to disturb a $74 million judgment against Dish Network Corp. for violating a patent held by TiVo Inc. involving digital video recorders.

[...]

TiVo sued in 2004, alleging that EchoStar, a satellite broadcaster, infringed on TiVo’s patented technology that allows viewers to record one program while watching another. EchoStar Communications changed its name to Dish in late 2007.

Equally notorious for software patents is Amazon ('one-click shopping', anyone?), which has patented another very trivial ‘invention’.

Amazon patents ‘customer review incentives’

The self-described patent reform advocates at Amazon.com don’t seem to have broken their habit of putting legal hooks on just about anything they dream up.

Last Tuesday, Amazon was awarded a patent for “creating an incentive to author useful item reviews.”

Over at IAM, it is being claimed that a back door to software patents in Europe is likely at a standstill.

The vice-president of the European Commission, Gunter Verheugen, claims that he remains hopeful that a way forward can be found in negotiations over the creation of a one-stop Community patent covering the entire European Union. In an interview published at the end of last week, Verheugen – who is so committed to patents he fell asleep during a press conference on the subject in May – saluted the efforts of the Portuguese and Slovenian presidencies in getting talks moving. However, he did not mention France, the current holder of the presidency, despite the interviewer’s claim that the Community patent was a priority for the French.

Where is the “innovation” that they speak of? All we have here is a lawsuit, a laughable patents, and political games. It’s a total waste of time. █

“I think that “innovation” is a four-letter word in the industry. It should never be used in polite company. It’s become a PR thing to sell new versions with.”

“It was Edison who said “1% inspiration, 99% perspiration”. That may have been true a hundred years ago. These days it’s “0.01% inspiration, 99.99% perspiration”, and the inspiration is the easy part. As a project manager, I have never had trouble finding people with crazy ideas. I have trouble finding people who can execute. IOW, “innovation” is way oversold. And it sure as hell shouldn’t be applied to products like MS Word or Open office.”

–Linus Torvald

    From: Geico Caveman
    Newsgroups: alt.os.linux.suse,comp.os.linux.advocacy,comp.os.linux.misc
    Subject: Novell / OpenSuSE admit they paid protection money
    Date: Tue, 28 Nov 2006 15:21:22 -0500

http://www.linux.com/article.pl?sid=06/11/27/2113210

“Q: Novell claims to have not acknowledged any patent infringements by
Linux. But Novell is now paying a tax to Microsoft on the Linux
distributions it ships. What, exactly, is Novell paying for?

Nat Friedman: We’re paying for the promise that Microsoft made to our
customers not to sue them.

Q: Not to sue them for *what*? For problems you don’t acknowledge exist?

Nat Friedman: We put together an agreement with Microsoft to make Linux and
Windows work better together. Now, as everyone knows, Microsoft has spent
the last 10 years saying negative things about Linux, including implying
that there are IP issues in Linux. It didn’t make sense for us to do a
partnersihp with Microsoft on interoperability issues and still have this
patent cloud hanging around for our customers, so Microsoft asked us to put
together a patent agreement as well. And so we promise Microsoft’s
customers that we won’t sue them and they promise the same thing to our
customers. They pay us for our promise and we pay them for their promise.
It doesn’t matter if the allegations from MSFT are true or not. People can
sue each other anyway, and a patent lawsuit is very expensive to defend
against. ”

So, essentially what they are saying is :

“”We do not acknowledge any M$ patent violations in stuff we distribute, but
we will pay M$ a lot of money so that they do not sue us for things we are
not guilty of. We want a partnership with them at all costs even if we have
to pay that illegitimate protection money.””

Apparently, its not costly for Novell to fight SCO when it has no case, but
it is costly to fight Microsoft when they have none either. Pretty clear
who badly wanted this deal – it was Novell (agrees with Microsoft
statements that they were approached). As for Microsoft, it was just
Christmas that came early.

This deal is just like a gift that keeps on giving for Microsoft and makes
less and less sense for open source users as revelations keep coming. At
best, it is an industrial shakedown that Novell capitulated to. At worst,
Novell decided to become Microsoft’s underling (the most polite word I
could think of in this context) just for a partnership that lasts 5 years.

Ever since, Novell has committed to a lot more partnerships and collaborations with Microsoft. According to what Novell’s CEO said last month, “we originally agreed to co-operate on three distinct projects and now we’re working on nine projects and there’s a good list of 19 other projects that we plan to co-operate on.”

It sure sounds like the difference between Novell and Microsoft will be blurring further, does it not? Matt Asay returns to his concerns about Novell when he posts a strong statement: “A sign that Microsoft is becoming the world’s biggest law firm.”

There was some distressing news buried in Sean Michael Kerner’s look into Novell’s and Microsoft’s virtualization partnership. The news, however, had nothing to do with virtualization, and everything to do with Microsoft job titles.

[...]

When you have someone whose job it is to come up with “intellectual property and licensing products,” you’ve lost your way. Most software companies focus on selling (gasp!) software. Not, apparently, Microsoft.

Ken Hess is again raising those personal speculations about a Microsoft-Novell merger.

I foresee VMWorld bringing some significant surprises to light this year. Whether it’s a Microsoft-Novell merger, a Sun-Microsoft partnership, or simply that the whole world goes virtual Desktop mad; there will be an abundance of high fiving, glass clicking, and from me — some “I told you so’s.”

What will it eventually be? Those who dare to predict that allies will roost under the same roof are being labeled “conspiracy nuts”. Novell is very cheap to acquire and its worth keeps sliding. █

Is LiMo the OIN of Mobile Linux?

This interesting new article from The Register is little cynical (that’s just the publication’s style). It seems to suggest that LiMo members may benefit from somewhat of a patent pool, a patent shield, some would say an “umbrella”. There is also some legitimate criticism:

For all its talk of openness, just a quarter of the code in the LiMo Foundation’s mobile platform is open source, making it a minefield to navigate in terms of protected patents – 300,000 patents to be precise.

“300,000 patents,” eh? Can people finally understand why OpenMoko feels cornered? Such an industrial environment fosters no development whatsoever, unless you have already established yourself as a giant, a monopoly. And then there’s the patent-trolling…

Is Microsoft Breaking the Indian Law?

This week’s main story probably comes from India. Previously we looked at how software patents can harm Free software. Microsoft understands this and it’s prepared to exploit. Watch this update from India and read this comment:

Infosys was there and pushing for software patents. They are totally against the open source and free software.

Symantec was there and also pushed for software patents.

Microsoft was there.

The Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) was also pushing for software patents.

The situation in India was last alluded to here. It could be getting worse as the county gets looted by Microsoft and its ecosystem.

Software patents are not legal in India, but Microsoft may be ‘leading the way’ by breaking law there, just as it does in South Africa. Professor Derek Keats has already accused Microsoft of breaking the law in hope of setting precedence .

Here is what came up thorough a pointer from a reader:

[ILUG-BOM] Software Patents in India

and while we were asleep three patents have been granted to Microsoft
by the indian patent office.

Just reading the initial brief tells me it this a journalled fs
coupled with some seek n sort.
http://210.210.88.164/patentgrantedSearch

This one looks like DRM but could be SSH
http://210.210.88.164/patentgrantedSearch/displayApplication

And this one hashes of loaded modules in mem to check that there is no
trojan module. DRM? AV?
http://210.210.88.164/patentgrantedSearch/displayApplicatio

Here is another news article about software patents and India. [via Digital Majority]

According to Richard Stallman, the co-developer of the GNU-Linux operating system and proponent of Free Software says, “Software patents are patents which cover software ideas, ideas which you would use in developing software. [...]”

[...]

Indian Position

With respect to computer software, in Patents (Amendment) Act, 2002, the scope of non-patentable subject matter in the Act was amended to include the following: “a mathematical method or a business method or a computer programme per se or algorithms”.

[...]

India for its part seems to have adopted the more conservative approach of the European patenting norms for software. But the Ordinance definitely has its use and relevance in today’s India, particularly for our growing domestic semi- conductor industry. This, along with judicial tempering might definitely ensure a judicious use of patent protection while allowing the industry to grow through innovations and inventions, thereby, mitigating the risks of trivial patents chocking the life out of real innovations and inventions. This is the reason a patent should always be treated as a “double edged sword”, to be wielded with caution and sensitivity.

Now whether, in reality this will be implemented on a rigid basis or will become broad in scope through application (as in the U.S.), and, more importantly, whether the Ordinance would, in fact, result in increased innovation and inventions in the software industry, remains to be seen.

What will it be in India? Please send in some feedback shall you come across information of value.

Rick Frenkel, Trolls Buster

Remember the man who exposed Patent Trolls like Ray Niro [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10]?

Well, well…

Niro’s harassment of an innocent blogger seems to have backfired. He turned the man’s hobby into a full-time job.

Former Patent Troll Tracker blogger Rick Frenkel has left Cisco Systems and moved to Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati, a top Silicon Valley law firm, where he is of counsel. Today is his first day at the firm.

“We were impressed with his breadth and depth of experience,” said Michael Barclay, an IP litigation partner at Wilson Sonsini and a PTT reader, natch. “Rick has developed a lot of knowledge and insights about patent trolls that will be helpful to our clients who have to deal with them.”

This turn of events was also covered in an article from Law.com. Congrats to Rick. Now he can expose and depose the other Niros of the world and even get paid for it.

From patent trolls tracker to patent trolls buster.

The world need more ‘regulators’ like him.

Software Patents from Hell

Ugly, ugly, ugly.

It’s appalling to see just what’s perceived as patentable these days. The company that invented GPL circumvention (video, more about it in [1, 2]) continues to be part of the problem. It adopts intellectual monopolies as a business model. Here is the latest from this case:

Dish plans to sustain legal fight with TiVo

[...]

“You know, I know this case inside and out,” Ergen said in a conference call with analysts Monday. “We have changed that intellectual property in a way we don’t violate (TiVo’s patent) anymore. I’m just stubborn enough to say, ‘Why am I going to pay for something that we don’t violate?’ ”

Watch this one too.

The original complaint alleges defendants Cisco Systems, Juniper Networks and Aruba Networks infringe the ’118 Patent by making, using or selling wireless Internet access systems which utilize captive portal techniques to block or redirect HTTP requests.

Virtually all networking/routing equipment rendered “guilty” in one fell swoop?

Google too has just been sued for one of those infamous advertising patents. Watch the simplicity of the patent and recall how this class of patents put the entire patentability of software in jeopardy, even in the United States.

It still seems rather amusing (if not twisted) that some patent system supporters are trying to convince the world Google would be harmed by an absence of software patents. Instead, it seems increasingly obvious that it would only serve to help Google, who is a regular target of questionable patent infringement lawsuits. Take the latest such case as an example. A company by the name of Web Tracking Solutions, which ironically enough, doesn’t appear to have much of a web presence (if any), has sued Google for patent infringement, claiming that its patent on third-party on-line accounting systems is being violated by Google’s AdSense offering.

Need for Reform

There is is truly a need for change. Academics continue to endorse this message.

Arti K. Rai (Duke University School of Law) has posted Building a Better Patent System: Facially Neutral Standards with Disparate Impact (Houston Law Review, Vol. 45, 2008) on SSRN. Here is the abstract:

Prompted by persistent complaints, particularly from the information and communication technology (ICT) industries, about the dangers allegedly posed by strong patents of poor quality, both the legislative and judicial branches have recently made attempts at patent reform.

Here is another new paper on the subject.

To increase the digital economy in different countries myriad firms engage in costly R & D activities to forth innovative software effort due to the fact that achievement of competitive help. This paper covers eight countries the most developed software industry in the in every respect US and than after Europe, UK, Japan, Australia, South Africa, Malaysia, India, and Israel. These countries are having its own standard to grant software Patents, the laws followed not later than these countries are distinctly outlined one by one.

Trademark (In)Sanity in the USPTO

The problems of the USPTO run deeper than just patents. It’s more industry-oriented than logic-oriented or economy-oriented. It too easily obeys the requirements of individual companies and thus loses sight of its original goals. The Dell “Cloud Computing” debacle, which was mentioned here just very briefly, remains inconclusive — for now.

Dell had received near-final approval for its trademark application of the term “cloud computing,” but the US Patent and Trademark Office canceled its “Notice of Allowance” on Tuesday and changed the status to “returned to examination.”

This means that there are still some Clouds [pun] of uncertainty over the use of the term “cloud computing”. Watch this:

Dell’s filing described the term as “Custom manufacture of computer hardware for use in data centers and mega-scale computing environments for others.” Dell also owns the URL cloudcomputing.com.

We’ve done a quick Whois.Net lookup and here’s what it coughed out:

Registrant:
        Dell Inc.
        Dell Inc.
        One Dell Way MS 8033
         Round Rock TX 78682
        US
        dnsadmin@dell.com +1.5127283500 Fax: +1.5122833369

    Domain Name: cloudcomputing.com

        Registrar Name: Markmonitor.com
        Registrar Whois: whois.markmonitor.com
        Registrar Homepage: http://www.markmonitor.com

    Administrative Contact:
        Dell Domain Administrative Contact
        Dell Inc.
        One Dell Way MS 8033
         Round Rock TX 78682
        US
        dnsadmin@dell.com +1.5127283500 Fax: +1.5122833369
    Technical Contact, Zone Contact:
        Wade Sullivan
        Dell Inc.
        One Dell Way
         Round Rock TX 78682
        US
        dnstech@dell.com +1.5127288565 Fax: +1.5127286024

    Created on..............: 2007-02-28.
    Expires on..............: 2010-02-28.
    Record last updated on..: 2008-02-21.

    Domain servers in listed order:

    ns1.us.dell.com
    ns3.us.dell.com
    ns4.us.dell.com
    ns5.us.dell.com
    ns2.us.dell.com
    

It’s hopefully clear to see that this domain was registered long after the term “cloud computing” had been in common use. Dana Blankenhorn asks: Has Dell lost its mind?

Dell did not succeed in the 1990s as an intellectual property company. It succeeded by delivering precisely what buyers wanted, with bulletproof quality, at the lowest possible price.

In an open source world these are still the keys to success. Not intellectual property. Precision, value, quality.

Dell seems to be following Microsoft’s footsteps. In difficult time, it strives to capitalise on imaginary property. █

A fairly far-fetched hypothesis and a controversial opinion too is that Novell has already been sued by Microsoft over software patents, albeit by proxy [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10]. Be it true or not, we know what we know, but we probably will never know the truth — not for sure anyway. We just gather evidence and let others draw conclusions or at least consider probabilities. At the end of the day, likelihood can become compelling enough a factor to satisfy an observer’s thirst for answers and facilitate further connection of dots. In the Internet everyone works together.

Regardless of Microsoft, folks from Astrum (probably just one of them) have have been openly protesting for a while in the Boycott Novell site, using the comments section where they voice their complaint and share the message. We welcomed this because its showed that Novell was willing to betray its own partners.

A question to be begged for is this: if Novell, just like Microsoft, back-stabs its own close partners, what would ever prevent it from screwing codebase siblings like Ubuntu, Red Hat, Mandriva, Slackware, Debian and [apologies to all those who are left out]? In fact, Novell has already done that. It signed a deal which it knew was exclusionary. It took a direct shot at the likes of Red Hat, whom it was unable to defeat otherwise. It helped Microsoft in the process — and knowingly so! It jeopardised free software.

Mono advocates who read this site like to rave about Mono’s speed, power, etc. (avoiding all the key issues). They also rave about Moonlight, which Dana Blankenhorn recently compared to a pony in a horse race. Will you have a look at the Moonlight reference page at microsoft.com? Groklaw has taken a look and said last night: “You might want to read the Microsoft-Novell patent covenant for Moonlight, for example. Who can be sued? When? Under what circumstances?”

As such, there’s no reason to sympathise for/on Novell’s behalf at the sight of this news:

Novell slapped with suit for new mini-OS

Astrum Inc., a software security company in Carrollton, Texas, has filed suit against Novell Inc. Astrum claims that Novell violated its contract regarding development of the mini-operating system appliance that Novell launched last month. Novell’s JeOS or Just enough Operating System, is a miniature version of the SUSE Linux Enterprise OS, which was created to help independent software vendors develop or deploy new SUSE-based applications easier and faster.

Filed in U.S. District Court in Texas’ Eastern Division, the lawsuit contends that the two companies entered into a mutual nondisclosure agreement on Oct. 25, 2006, to develop the software appliance but Novell violated the agreement by revealing confidential information to partners and customers. Then, after the prototype was successfully tested in November 2007, Novell engaged rPath of Raleigh, N.C., the following April to create the appliances based on SUSE Linux Enterprise.

The suit alleged breach of contract, trade secret misappropriation, common law misappropriation, misappropriation of ideas and promissory “estoppel,” or broken promises.

Good luck, Astrum. If you need some unflattering information about Novell, please feel free to come by and ask. Novell has already pretty much admitted selfishness and it’s no better than Microsoft when it comes to exploiting partners. Ask Cisco. Revisit the big antitrust case. Grave minds [sic] think alike. █

”Microsoft’s conduct as a corporation and a manufacturer of computing products, is predicated upon an internal policy of deception, which includes deceiving customers, deceiving competitors, deceiving partners, deceiving its own vendors, and at some level, deceiving its own staff.“

–Scott M. Fulton, III

This first item is mind-boggling because right there in the headline is claims that “Microsoft’s Contribution Was TCP/IP.” Huh?

Microsoft pushed its own proprietary LAN Manager and unroutable NBF protocol in the early 90’s. The strategy of the day among network software vendors was that if proprietary protocols could be maintained, then locks on entire corporations’ networks might also be maintained. When that strategy failed for Microsoft, it first reverse engineered Novell’s IPX (because Novell wouldn’t license the technology — it was part of their competitive DR-DOS), in order to allow Microsoft’s operating systems to interoperate with Novell Networks. Realizing that only strengthened Novell’s position, Microsoft ultimately championed the open standard TCP/IP protocol.

Novell’s role in this story aside, there is no mentioning of the BSD code. Credit blindly given to Microsoft? Need we also assume that Microsoft invented the word processor, the spreadsheet and the graphical user interface just because these were made widespread?

“Hey, Steve, just because you broke into Xerox’s store before I did and took the TV doesn’t mean I can’t go in later and steal the stereo.”

–Bill Gates

The following video appeared on YouTube around the time of BrainShare 2008. There is now a version with “Brazilian Portuguese Subtitle.”

We have made an Ogg version of it.

Mentioned last week was the news/announcement from Teradata, which uses SUSE. Here is an actual article about it.

At the cheapest end of the new offering is the Teradata 550 SMP, which is a departmental data warehouse that has been developed to run a single application or support test and development workloads. The platform supports up to six terabytes of storage capacity, and operates on either Novell SUSE Linux or Windows.

The Teradata 2500 sits at the middle of the newly-announced range, and is priced at $134,000 per terabyte. The fully integrated, scalable platform sports dual-core Intel processors, enterprise-class storage, open Novell SUSE Linux 64-bit operating system, and the Teradata 12.0 database and utilities.

Moving on to some less business-oriented stuff, the local press mentioned some other activities at Novell.

TUESDAY

• The Utah Valley Entrepreneurs’ Forum; Omniture; the Open Source Technology Center at Novell; the Provo Business Development Corp.; Utah Science, Technology and Research; and the Utah Fund of Funds will host a free lecture series featuring speaker Josh Coates, who will discuss “Raising Capital: The Simple, Well-Understood Path.” Make sure that the projected numbers for your startup tech venture work on paper before launching that business. Aim for a realistic 60-70 percent gross margin with a $500,000 contingency buffer. And don’t put the task of raising capital before the operations of your business on your list of priorities. Time: 11:30 a.m.- 1:30 p.m. Location: Mountain View room, Novell Cafeteria, 1800 S. Novell Place, Provo. Please purchase your own lunch at the Novell cafeteria prior to these events. Contact Linda at This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it or at (801) 705-9303 to reserve your place.

Mentioned last week was also a video clip that brought responses from Novell executives. There is a followup to this in Computer World.

Of course, “wow” can mean a lot of different things. In this case, it seemed to translate to something like, “It’s funny, but whoa. Where in the world did this come from? And how on earth did you get the CEO of Novell and these other people to play along by asking for advice in these video clips?”

Here is a bit about Novell at an educational event in Utah. Novell was there alongside Microsoft.

It was a big day for many teachers and students; listening to experts from Microsoft, Novell, and Certiport about industry insights.

Watch Novell’s and Microsoft’s relationship in this new press release.

WS-Management Has Been Ratified as a Final Standard Based on Implementation Experience

[...]

“A key piece of the technical collaboration agreement between Microsoft and Novell is to support the DMTF’s WS-Management as a standards-based, interoperable protocol that leverages the web to manage desktops, servers and virtualized environments across distributed infrastructures,” said Eric Anderson, vice president of engineering at Novell. “Novell is committed to bringing open source and open standards together to provide system management interoperability across mixed IT environments, which will ultimately help to reduce the cost and complexity of IT management.”

In a fear-inspiring piece from CIO Magazine you could see Novell mentioned only in a semi-flattering context.

Novell and Sun for example, are working to re-explain and emphasize to the press and customers that they “get” virtualization. When you think virtualization, you probably think one name: VMware. (Did IBM pop into your mind? I didn’t think so.) The bigs other than VMware find themselves having to work hard to win your virtual affection.

And here is the announcement about Novell and Microsoft working together in this area.

Novell to work with Microsoft to build upon technical collaboration agreement and develop advanced management solutions based on open source and industry standards

Some days ago we included the press releases from Xandros and Microsoft.

Jacqueline Emigh, who covers Novell frequently, showed the readers of Beta News how Novell is praising Microsoft.

In another expansion to their 18-month-old interoperability agreement, Microsoft and Novell introduced software tools designed to let systems administrators monitor Linux, Unix, and Windows servers from within Windows.

[...]

“This is a great milestone,” Wagner told BetaNews. “I really applaud Microsoft for joining the open source community.”

Heise Online Weighed in as well.

Of course, Microsoft will not be reinventing IT management by taking these steps. But it will improve its reputation in data centers. It will take Microsoft some time to catch up with CA, HP, Tivoli, and the rest when it comes to heterogeneity.

Network World was more pessimistic.

– Microsoft this week set its sites on becoming a dominant enterprise management vendor, but experts and users say first it will have to define the scope of its goals, improve the platform, and prove it can be the caretaker of non-Windows systems.

The company laid out its plans this week at its annual Microsoft Management Summit (MMS) for a cross-platform enterprise data-center management infrastructure that includes hooks into Linux and Unix systems.

Here are the coverages from Disinformation Week and from CRN.

IBM is still collaborating with Novell, no matter some of the world’s opinion about it..

“Novell is pleased to be part of this alliance with IBM and others to help customers better manage data complexity along with operational, energy and cost efficiencies, which is precisely the value proposition around SUSE Linux Enterprise Server and virtualization in the data center,” said Carlos Montero-Luque, vice president of product management for Open Platform Solutions at Novell. “Novell is committed to green computing, virtualization, security and data center management, all priorities of the new program.”

There is an article about this press release too.

IBM has pulled in technology notables, including Brocade and Citrix, as well as Emulex, Eaton, Juniper Networks, Novell, RedHat, Sun and VMware. Participating vendors will gain increased exposure to potentially new clients, and benefit from joint go-to-market activities and joint-development projects a well as exposure to early interoperability development, according to IBM.

Lastly, here is another interview with Volker Smid of Novell.

We’ve made an Ogg version available.

Next up: OpenSUSE, Xandros and Linspire. █

Here is a story about poor old Linspire, which explains just what happened there with Microsoft several years ago. The antitrust petition says a lot more.

Poor old Microsoft

The firm often likes to cast itself as the victim despite being manifestly ill-suited to the role

It’s a safe bet that if you ask the average PC user to name a well-known computing resource starting with “lin” they’d think of Second Life’s unit of currency, Linden Dollars. And, five years back, the same people would probably have said: “Oh, Lindows!”

That was when Lindows was a brand name that didn’t belong to Microsoft. It does today, but only after a long lawsuit that didn’t in fact go Microsoft’s way: the software giant had to pay what is now Linspire Inc $24m to settle the case and get the rights to the name. And this was a case that Microsoft initiated.

[...]

There is, of course, a marked difference between protecting a brand, and exerting monopoly power. Monopoly power involves telling the small PC builder that they have to pay Microsoft for a Windows licence on every PC they build, whether or not they install Windows on every PC, because those are Microsoft’s terms of business ­ take it or leave it.

Linspire made some noise about Win4Lin with this press release earlier this week.

Linspire, Inc. developer of CNR.com, an easy-to-use, one-click digital software delivery service for desktop Linux software, and Virtual Bridges, Inc. developers of the award-winning Win4Lin Pro virtualization software, today announced the immediate availability of Win4Lin Pro Desktop 4.5 through CNR.com’s one-click Linux software delivery service. Available at a special introductory price of $34.99, Win4Lin Pro Desktop provides consumers, SMBs and enterprise customers an easy-to-use virtualization solution that allows Freespire 2.0, Linspire 6.0, Ubuntu 7.04 & 7.10 desktop Linux users to run Windows on Linux and assists in the complete migration process to desktop Linux.

Here is Linspire’s big problem.

With so many new distributions like PCLinuxOS, Linux Mint, and more established distributions like Ubuntu and Fedora stepping up on polish, and even since the community edition of Linspire is available, Freespire came out a while back, why buy Linspire?

Moving on the Xandros, it has just introduced a tool for Red Hat.

Xandros, the leading provider of intuitive Linux solutions and mixed-environment management tools, and parent of Scalix, Inc., the leading e-mail server and solutions company, today announced the preview of the all new Xandros BridgeWays Management Console for Red Hat servers.

There was also this other announcement, but the press bothered to cover none of the two.

Low-Cost Turnkey Solution for Windows Deployment and Updates to Preview at CeBit in Hanover

There is a new review of Scalix here (now part of Xandros), but it’s interesting that none of the press releases above actually attracted the attention of journalists. Scalix and Novell’s Groupwise are listed in this article about E-mail server suites, but it’s hardly the article’s focus. █