We [Microsoft] may change or discontinue certain apps or content offered in the Windows Store at any time, for any reason. … we may refund to you the amount you paid for the license… If the Windows Store, an app, or any content is changed or discontinued, your data could be deleted or you may not be able to retrieve data you have stored. We have no obligation to return data to you.
This is the logical conclusion of Microsoft’s attempts to control “open” software on Cheap Off the Shelf Technology and users. From the beginning, when Gates rode IBM’s coattails into market dominance, Microsoft abused their position to sabotage competitors like OS/2, DRDOS and Word Perfect. All along, the monopoly bully portrayed itself as a champion of free enterprise. If OEMs accept Microsoft’s outrageous restricted boot scheme and anti-trust regulators don’t intervene, the only way to get software on x86 and ARM will be through Microsoft’s App store. All other software and OS will be locked out at Microsoft’s discretion. People who want their software freedom will be forced onto more expensive PowerPC and under performing MIPS hardware. Microsoft knows that the control they have over hardware translates directly into money they can charge people.
Prior successes of this model have all been tied to other monopolies and success is not assured because people hate being bullied and extorted. Tivo and iPod depended on big publisher monopolies on movies and music. iPhone and other non free phones have all depended on telco spectrum monopolies. Microsoft and Apple have both previously taken advantage of media format monopolies. Apple’s iPad depends heavily on software and design patents but is swiftly being overrun. Previous Microsoft tablet and PDA efforts have all went the way of Zune. Xbox sponged off the once mighty world of PC gaming and mostly killed it. For these few successes there have been many failures. At this point, with most business software firmly XP focused, it is not clear what Microsoft has to offer developer and vendors to go along. Users have nothing to gain and should demand software freedom. If everyone ignores the new hardware, vendors will be forced to offer things people want.
M$ can raise its prices for years to come to keep the money rolling in from the suckers but they cannot lock in more users it seems. Consider this. In October, Wikimedia records 91% of visits were “non-mobile”, mostly that other OS. 9% were “mobile”, mostly not that other OS. In October a year ago, the numbers were 95.2% and 4.8%. M$ is losing 5% share per annum on the move to mobile alone. In 2010, M$ had 84.29% share but now have 78.38% share, down about 6% per annum.
Asked early in 2011 what consumers thought of that other OS on a tablet, 45% were interested. Now, the number is 25%. At that rate of decline, interest will be ~10% by the time M$ moves its bowels to deliver “8″.
Remember when ASUS shook the world with the announcement of GNU/Linux on a netbook? Well, that will look like a teardrop compared to the flood of innovation 2012 will bring. Expect Android/Linux and GNU/Linux on ARM to intrude into the desktop/notebook space previously dominated by Wintel
Many big Wall Street firms have settled fraud cases brought by the government with a promise to never violate the same law. But an analysis of Securities and Exchange Commission documents by The New York Times found that since 1996, there have been at least 51 repeat violations by those firms.
As with the manufactured debt ceiling crisis in the United States, the E.C.B. is withholding relief in order to extort austerity measures from member governments—and the threat seems to be working.
Claims everyone knew what was going on but no one else can count. The only mystery, supposedly, was who was getting the money but it’s now revealed that the money went to McDonalds. Gee, thanks.
We are economists who oppose ideological cleansing in the economics profession. Equally we oppose political cleansing in the vital debate over the cause and consequences of our current economic crisis.
We support the efforts of the Occupy Wall Street movement across the country and across the globe to liberate the economy from the short-term greed of the rich and powerful one percent.
We oppose cynical and perverse attempts to misuse our police officers and public servants to expel advocates of the public good from our public spaces.
We extend our support to the vision of building an economy that works for the people, for the planet, and the future, and we declare our solidarity with the Occupiers who are exercising our democratic right to demand economic and social justice.
Special undercover investigation: Executives from Bell Pottinger reveal ‘dark arts’ they use to burnish reputations of countries accused of human rights violations [and] to bury bad coverage and influence public opinion.
They claim to be able to manipulate Google results and Wikipedia, manipulate weak minded politicians, create doubt with unimportant details, to run fake blogs and all that other Arron Barr trash. Because they also claim to be true belivers in their clients, they are themselves the most manipulated party.
The first is that Bookshare, an online library for people who can’t read standard print books … Bookshare is legal in the US, but that doesn’t stop authors, agents or publishers who don’t know much about people with disabilities or copyright law sending cease and desist letters. … Benetech develops free software to help human rights activists around the world safely record stories of human rights abuse. … when asked if we know whether or not there are “pirated” copyrighted materials, we can’t say. … [under SOPA] If any single publisher or author of any one of the more than 130,000 accessible books in our library gets antsy, they can send a notice to VISA and MasterCard and say, stop money from going to Benetech and Bookshare.
This article uses the propaganda term “piracy” for sharing. The point of SOPA is to give publishers the power to shut down whoever they want and that is unacceptable.
A few days after the verdict was announced The Pirate Bay registered depiraatbaai.be, a new domain not covered by the court order. Today, just a few weeks later, this domain is already the 124th most-visited in Belgium, on its way to enter the top 100.
[a bill] permitting ISPs to funnel private communications and related information back to the government without adequate privacy protections and controls. The bill does not specify which agencies ISPs could disclose customer data to, but the structure and incentives in the bill raise a very real possibility that the National Security Agency or the DOD’s Cybercommand would be the primary recipient.
“Cybersecurity” is impossible as long as people run Windows, but government wants weak security for spying on citizens.
She claims that her age was requested as part of the routine sign-up sequence along with credit card, address, and other related data, and that it was not made clear that IMDb claimed the right to then use this information in their public database. When she asked them to remove this data from public view, IMDb reportedly declined. … Amazon seems to be largely “blowing off” concerns about their behavior in this matter, and worse, is attempting to preemptively shift blame to the plaintiff.
If the Coalition’s plan is implemented, it would mean that national healthcare patients would be required to proactively take themselves off the list, to prevent their personal medical data being shared with researchers. … Apparently, outsourcing medical research is the way forward for the NHS, but to do that, data needs to be shared.
The passage of the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) through the Senate last Thursday saw the culmination of a ten-year crusade by Senator Lindsay Graham (R-SC) to make the law of war apply on US soil. … In summary, once the NDAA becomes law a US citizen on US soil can lawfully be killed by the US military if the military believes that citizen to be a terrorist affiliated with Al Qaeda or its allies.
As Senator Lindsay Graham recently remarked as an explanation for his support of legislation allowing for the indefinite detention of Americans, “Is the homeland the battlefield? You better believe it is the battlefield.” … If signed into law by President Obama, this bill will not only ensure that we remain in a perpetual state of war — with this being a war against the American people — but it will also institute de facto martial law in the United States.
The Senate clearly wished for the military’s “law and order” powers to extend beyond the territory of military bases on the theory that there may be “terrorsymps” (short for “terrorist sympathizers”) lurking everywhere. … By noting that little-known fact [about Awlaki], am I showing “support” for “al-Qaeda, the Taliban or associated forces”? Will the U.S. military be obliged to target me, too?
Tuesday’s “Occupy Our Homes” action in at least 20 cities makes it clear that they are standing up to banks to reverse foreclosures. … We’re here because [there are] a lot of empty buildings owned by Wall Street banks and we’re going to liberate them
The idea of bringing in a unitary EU patent system has been rolling around Brussels so long most people have assumed it will never happen. But there is a clear push on at the moment to realise these plans once and for all. … taking place largely in secret: this is a hugely important area, with implications for all businesses, and yet we are not permitted to see how the final negotiations are being conducted.
Summary: Nokia will not produce anything of mass appeal, but it will, however, emit patents for Microsoft to attack Linux/Android with
OUR new page about MOSAID will help us keep track of the troll Microsoft plans to use, probably against Android.
Microsoft has taken what it wanted from Nokia and it will leave the corpse to dry up and die like like Yahoo! Even longtime Microsoft boosters do not believe that Nokia can save Microsoft or vice versa.
There are early signs of trouble with Nokia‘s initial round of Windows-based smart phones.
The Espoo, Finland-based mobile phone company has bet its future on a decision to shift its high-end hardware to Microsoft Windows Phone software and away from its proprietary Symbian OS. The company recently started selling the first fruits of its arrangement with Microsoft, the Lumia 800.
Bernstein Research analyst Pierre Ferragu pointed out a research note Friday that checks on Google Trends finds that the buzz level for the Lumia 800 is about on a part with the Nokia N8, the company’s top-of-the-line but poor selling smartphone a year ago. He thinks this one could be a dud, too.
Nokia was about to deliver a great GNU/Linux-based platform before a mole entered the company. The rest is history and we covered it extensively. Now we need to keep a close eye on MOSAID. Regulators should too. █
Summary: Bill Gates’ crimes come back to haunt him, but he refuses to admit what things he previously wrote can show rather clearly — that he decided to break the competitors’ products rather than compete
I have decided that we should not publish these extensions. We should wait until we have a way to do a high level of integration that will be harder for the likes of Notes, Wordperfect to achieve, and which will give Office a real advantage. [...] Having the Office team really think through the information intensive scenarios, and be a demanding client of systems is absolutely critical to our future success. We can’t compete with Lotus and Wordperfect/Novell without this.
We had a reporter there at the Novell v. Microsoft antitrust trial on Friday, and I gather it was quite a day. As you probably saw from the Salt Lake Tribune article we put in News Picks yesterday, the judge, U.S. District Judge J. Frederick Motz, had set aside five hours Friday to consider a Microsoft motion on whether to stop the trial now, on the alleged ground that Novell had failed to present a case. That kind of motion is typical after the plaintiff finishes presenting its case in most civil trials. What was different was that the judge took it seriously enough to even listen to extended oral argument. He does seem to have a Microsoft tilt, frankly.
By the way, Bill Gates is expected to testify on Monday. The trial is scheduled to continue on Monday, but the judge took the arguments on the Microsoft motion under advisement, and he could still rule to stop the trial if he wants to. And from all I’ve seen, he wants to. But if that happens, it won’t be before Gates testifies. It seems Novell found a crucial bit of evidence that the judge was not expecting.
The media reports that Bill Gates’ testimony was that they decided to make the API change because of worry about breakage, but Novell responds to that and the other excuses amply.
Novell even points out that the judge is bound by the appeals court. They did rule that this case had to go to the jury, after all. It’s the law of the case. Novell seems to be setting things up so the record is complete and clear for an appeal, should one prove necessary.
The Microsoft boosters cannot quite spin Gates out of this one. Yes, Microsoft needed to shoot Novell’s horse, as Pamela Jones once put it. Techrights‘ Ryan quotes an article as saying: “He [Gates] testified later that Microsoft had to dump a technical feature that would have supported WordPerfect because he feared it would crash the operating system.”
Based on the exhibits we have, this is nonsense. The statement from this article is a lie. To quote other bits:
Microsoft’s Windows 95 rollout presented the most challenges in the company’s history, leading to several last-minute changes to technical features that would no longer support a rival software maker’s word processor, Bill Gates testified Monday in a $1 billion antitrust lawsuit filed by the creator of WordPerfect.
As Homer put it in USENET, “Microsoft’s Godfather [is] back in court”
Quoting his message through The Register: “Gates: Novell are sore losers, Word trounced WordPerfect Microsoft supremo testifies at antitrust hearing
“Gates told a court in Salt Lake City, Utah, on Monday that his Redmond minions “worked super-hard” on Word. He added: “It was a ground-breaking piece of work, and it was very well received when we got it done.””
Homer’s response is that “they worked “super-hard” … by poaching Charles Simonyi and Richard Brodie from Xerox, to “rewrite” Xerox Bravo, the first GUI word processor, then rebranded it as Microsoft’s “innovation”.
“Then they worked “super-hard” to break cross-platform software, by releasing deliberately broken APIs, whilst using undocumented APIs for their own software, just like they did with Novell, Netscape, Real Networks and anyone else who dared to support anything but just Windows.
“Both the DOJ and the EU Commission have already exposed Microsoft’s criminal business methods in great detail, producing a swath of court evidence, most of which originates from within Microsoft, so why does this even need to go to trial again? It should be an open and shut case.
Attorneys for Novell are expected to cross-examine Microsoft chairman Bill Gates Monday in a federal courthouse in Utah, where jurors are hearing Novell’s claim that the software giant used anticompetitive means to quash Word competitor WordPerfect and Excel rival Quattro Pro.
U.S. district court judge J. Frederick Motz, who is presiding over the case in Salt Lake City, may also rule Monday on Microsoft’s request, submitted Friday, to dismiss the case.
Novell sued Microsoft in 2004, claiming the software maker “deliberately targeted and destroyed” its WordPerfect word processor and Quattro spreadsheet franchises because they were compatible with non-Windows operating systems. Novell also charged that Microsoft banished WordPerfect from the Windows 95 rollout in an effort to drive the application into obscurity.
While it is true that this was ages ago, no justice was ever restored and Gates has done some other atrocious things since then. He is a user, a self-glorifying one (reputation laundering). █
Summary: The “Compete” euphemism is back and it is being sneakily used to deprive Google of the right to actually compete
TECHRIGHTS is proud to be the exclusive host of a lot of verified EDGI evidence. Based on court exhibits that we put out there for sites like Slashdot to make widely known, one term Microsoft uses to describe such anti-GNU/Linux initiatives is "Compete". It’s a funny term to be using as it’s a euphemism for anti-competitive tactics, wherein the company with a monopoly essentially bribes companies (or governments) to lure them away from the competition. Based on this new report, Microsoft now uses the same tactics to defend the Office monopoly:
Microsoft is so riled up over Google Apps that it has a team called Google Compete offering major inducements to convince customers to stay with Office, according to defectors and the search company itself.
At this week’s Google Atmosphere conference, several defectors who had adopted Google cloud apps said that they were approached by members of the Google Compete team, who had sought to persuade them to stay with Microsoft. If argument failed to convince them, then the team was willing to offer other inducements.
Google should complain about this because for a Redmond-based company with a monopoly in the office suites market there are special rules that Microsoft clearly does not obey. Under the banner “Compete”, Microsoft is being anti-competitive, derailing all efforts to actually compete. █
Summary: Competition crimes/violations from Apple and Microsoft in particular but also in general, exploiting the broken patent system in the United States
IN MONTHS or years to come we are likely to cover Apple’s and Microsoft’s patent attacks on Linux. It’s really that old guard and a case of last resort in action. Apple and Microsoft have reached the point of actually collaborating (or colluding) in their fight against Linux/Android. They use some bogus patents, embargo based on fake evidence, extortion, and patent trolls.
No fruit, just lawsuits!
Apple fan sites, in their usual way, spin Apple as a “victim” by saying that “Apple [got] Sued by a Third Party using Powerful Patents from Palm & 3Com”. To quote this fan site would be unwise, but it’s just something to be aware of. The reality is, Apple has been threatening several Linux-based platforms over the years, always using patents. It also threatened Palm. So who is Apple to claim to be a victim of Palm patents? How silly do these fan sites have to be? The patents in questions are worse than a joke; they are an insult to the USPTO and a real harm to everyone who buys electronic products. Apple and Microsoft just generally cannot compete fairly, so as Google puts it (paraphrased) “when Microsoft’s products fail, it wields patents”. The same goes for Apple, whose sales are falling behind those of several Android backers, even in isolation.
The quality of patent filings has fallen dramatically over the past two decades. The rush to protect even minor improvements in products or services is overburdening patent offices. This slows the time to market for true innovations and reduces the potential for breakthrough inventions, according to a new OECD report.
Reference to the name Upaid instantly reminds one of January 2009, the Satyam shock and class-action suits. The dispute between the two ended up with a tax issue, which was referred to the Authority for Advance Rulings (AAR). Among withholding tax issues, the AAR recently ruled on “hidden royalties”. Upaid was in the business of designing and developing software technology relating to payment-processing platforms and services. It conceived of an intelligent processing platform for which it outsourced the software development to Satyam. After all the agreements were done and dusted, two products — Call Manager and Net Manager — were developed. Patents were approved.
Two employees of Satyam also produced declarations that they had developed the patents which were assigned to Upaid, who turned out to be bad paymasters, forcing Satyam to acquire 22.06 per cent of its equity and offset its receivables. Disputes resulted in the termination of all agreements, with Upaid getting the intellectual-property (IP) rights and Satyam discontinuing software development.
Notice the terrible language in this article, not just “intellectual property” but also “develop patent”. How on Earth does one develop a piece of paper with ink on it? This whole system seem to have become somewhat rotten, especially when nothing physical is produced (e.g. in the software industry), which implies natural abundance.
As I’ve noted many times, one of the biggest threats hanging over open source is patents, because of the way trivial but indispensable software techniques have been patented in some jurisdictions (mostly the US). Things are made worse by the fact that vague threats can be made in this area, for example this famous assertion in 2007:
Microsoft General Counsel Brad Smith and licensing chief Horacio Gutierrez sat down with Fortune recently to map out their strategy for getting FOSS users to pay royalties. Revealing the precise figure for the first time, they state that FOSS infringes on no fewer than 235 Microsoft patents.
It’s striking that Microsoft has never said exactly which patents it thinks free software infringes upon, although not surprising. If it did, it would be possible to see whether there were any likely infringement and, more damagingly for Microsoft, to look for prior art or other grounds for those patents to be revoked. By keeping everything as vague accusations, Microsoft gets the best of both worlds: it is able to imply that free software is in big trouble, but without running the risk of being proved a paper tiger.
That’s what makes Barnes & Noble’s principled stand against Microsoft’s patent bullying so important. As PJ writes on Groklaw:
Barnes & Noble has done the world a tremendous favor, by pulling aside the curtain and revealing Microsoft’s patent campaign tactics against Android in lurid detail.
It reveals the assertion of “trivial” and “invalid” patents against Barnes & Noble and some shocking details about an “oppressive” license agreement that would have controlled hardware and software design features that Microsoft presented, thus limiting to what degree Barnes & Noble could offer upgrades and improved features to its customers if it had signed it, features it says none of Microsoft’s patents cover. Microsoft worked so hard to keep it all secret, and I think you’ll see why. It’s ugly behind that curtain.
[...]
However, the Barnes & Noble filing goes further than simply listing these patents: it also provides detailed information about prior art or other reasons why they are all invalid. But even if they were valid, they are pathetic in the extreme. That Microsoft is using such flimsy weapons against Barnes & Noble exposes how its whole approach is a sham.
It is obviously hoping that the sheer effort and expense of fighting them in a long-drawn out court process will persuade manufacturers simply to roll over and license them as the easier option. And indeed, that has worked with companies like HTC and Samsung signing up, to their eternal shame.
Barnes & Noble, by contrast, emerges with considerable honour here, since it refused to buckle, and as a result is able to provide us with the first real glimpse into Microsoft’s new strategy as a patent troll following the continuing failure of Windows Mobile in the market. And that is a key factor, as Barnes & Noble points out in its submission to the FTC (also on Groklaw), where it calls for a full anti-trust investigation into Microsoft’s behaviour
The rest is worth reading. We are working on a petition to have Microsoft executives prosecuted for these acts. Rich powerful people never/rarely get prosecuted because of the bias of the system, but at least it makes a loud statement about the lack of justice. This raises awareness. █
Summary: Why the modus operandi of Microsoft (against Linux) is mostly overlooked because of proxies that it uses to distance itself from attacks
BASED on the comments we received yesterday, people misunderstood the basis of our complaint. Microsoft is breaking the law like Capone broke the law. Microsoft uses thugs to go and beat up the competition. If a company does not pay Microsoft “protection money”, then Microsoft will send some trolls. Microsoft’s patent troll Nathan Myhrvold does the same thing and should accordingly come under criminal/federal investigation (as already suggested by some of his victims).
When B&N complained about Microsoft abuses it did not neglect to mention this important point. MOSAID, for example, is one of those thugs [1, 2, 3] that Microsoft along with its mole Stephen Elop are arming. As one article from a Linux site put it, “Barnes and Noble petitions Nokia over Microsoft deal”. To quote:
Barnes & Noble has subpoenaed Nokia in its defense against Microsoft’s Android-related patent infringement claims, following its petition to the U.S. Department of Justice to look into Microsoft’s patent behavior for possible antitrust violations. In other patent-related news, Microsoft and Huawei are negotiating on a patent agreement, say reports.
When we say that Microsoft is breaking the law, it is essential to understand why and perhaps actually read the B&N complaint. One of our US-based members is currently preparing a petition to the White House about this. █
Summary: Negative pricing and retaliatory offerings from a convicted monopolist with antitrust violations — is that the ‘new’ Microsoft?
WHEN Microsoft paid people to use its Google scraper (known as "Bong") journalists called it a "bribe" and it failed anyway (Microsoft loses billions per year online). Microsoft wanted to be able to spy on more Internet users for all sorts of purposes. Now, we also know that Microsoft uses Internet Explorer to spy on users by keeping track of all the pages they visit. But this browser is failing pretty badly, so what does Microsoft do? Bribe ‘em:
Somewhere along the line, Microsoft went from being the 800-pound gorilla in the browser market to begging users to switch back to Internet Explorer. Now, Microsoft is running a “where’s the love?” campaign to offer “free stuff” for users who download IE9. After all these years, hasn’t Microsoft learned yet that it can’t buy love? Is the company capable of competing on features at all?
While IE may hold a lead over Firefox, Chrome and Safari individually, it’s trounced by the trio overall.
There are several articles about it out there. Microsoft gets slammed for trying to merely buy its userbase and thus deprive smaller companies, removing their rivals’ customers to the point where they are in mortal danger. This is monopoly abuse. There is some other interesting news today which very much screams “EDGI”. Assuming this report is accurate, Microsoft is offering ‘free’ stuff to derail its Free/open source competition, which again, is definitely monopoly abuse and ought to be investigated. To quote:
Free Microsoft upgrade when you threaten open source?
Qamar Yunus, assistant director in the Cabinet Office ICT policy team, says that Microsoft provided its software for free when a government department decided to pilot open source LibreOffice as an alternative to upgrading its Microsoft software.
Yunus was making the point that considering open source helps improve competition. He added, though, that open source should be considered properly rather than simply as a negotiating tool, according to Guardian Government Computing.
Yunus was speaking at EHI Live in Birmingham. He said that extensive research has established that neither departments nor system integrators understand open source.
He was also reported as saying that the ‘myth’ that open source was less secure than proprietary had been dispelled, and every government department was now mandated to look at both proprietary and open source software.
Antitrust officials should take action against this. If they disregard monopoly-related rules, then what good is the rule of law anyway? █
Summary: Nokia will not produce anything of mass appeal, but it will, however, emit patents for Microsoft to attack Linux/Android with
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