Nosediving after the software chief from Microsoft lets Linux die
Summary: Not so long after Microsoft had called HP a competitive threat (in its SEC filings) for exploring Linux on the desktop, Hurd mysteriously got fired and his purchase of WebOS thrown down the ashtray, sending HP’s stock into a downward spiral
SEVERAL months ago we continued to comment about the departure of Hurd from HP. It happened under mysterious circumstances [1, 2, 3, 4]. A former Microsoft ally took his place after HP’s new software chief had been appointed from Microsoft.
There is something iffy about HP giving up on its Linux-based operating system which Hurd spent billions on. This was not taken too lightly by prominent bloggers, who wrote:
I liked webOS, HP’s Linux-based take on a tablet operating system. I thought it had a shot to be a tablet player. But, then, Leo Apotheker, HP’s new CEO, along with spinning off HP’s PC business, killed webOS. Was it because, as Apotheker said, the tablet effect is real and sales of the TouchPad are not meeting our expectations,” and that the TouchPad was quickly becoming a money pit? No, no it wasn’t.
Yes, webOS and the TouchPad were doing badly on the market. But, so what? A company the size of HP doesn’t get out of the consumer PC market and new tablets and spin around on a dime because it can’t be as “as cool as Apple.” No, it does so because Apotheker and his cronies had planned for months to try to transform HP into their old company, SAP, and go head to head not so much with IBM, but his old sparring partner, Oracle.
In the same year that Microsoft added cut and paste to its mobile feature set, HP added cut and run, announcing last week that it would no longer produce webOS hardware, then dumping its failed HP TouchPad tablet in a $99 fire sale. At the same time, the number-one PC maker signaled its intent to spin off, sell, and otherwise dump its Personal Systems Group—the division that makes all of its computers for business and consumer markets—within 12 to 18 months. Unless a buyer like Samsung is waiting in the wings already, that’s a long time to go without a mobile strategy.
Well, investors agree. They “flee HP” (see the chart):
Hewlett-Packard shares have slumped as investors respond to last week’s announcement of a radical shift in strategy.
From a high of US$32.59 on Thursday, shares fell to US$22.89 on Friday before closing at US$23.60.
Wow. And this made sense why exactly? Microsoft is already trying to sort of bribe WebOS developers away from Linux. The remaining units of TouchPad are getting a new life because the hardware is great and the price is verylow. Both Ubuntu [1, 2, 3, 4, 5] and TouchDroid [1, 2] are being made available for these devices that HP bought just to kill (after Hurd had been fired and Microsoft-friendly people put in charge). Guess who is happy about this whole deal? Microsoft booster Ed Bott is now comparing TouchPad to KIN, which is said to have sold only 503 units. Just before Hurd got canned Microsoft listed HP as a competitive threat on the desktop because HP was exploring GNU/Linux, even its own distributions of it. █
Summary: The mobbyists (mob-like lobbyists) are shedding uncertainty and doubt over Android using new talking points that ought to be ignored
Dana Blankenhorn is once again quoting the mobbyist, Florian Müller, who is looking to exploit lazy journalists who do no double-check the facts or apply critical analysis. Just because someone claims something does not necessarily make it true. “Oracle could not only claim copyright over the mySQL database,” writes Blankenhorn, “but over the interfaces that connect it to other programs, and the names of the routines within the program.”
If Google’s motion for summary judgment were granted, it would blow a pretty big hole in Oracle’s case. If APIs were found to be non-copyrighted, then Oracle could hardly claim Google caused a problem by using the Java APIs.
But Oracle’s response to the August 1 motion is to challenge the entire premise of API copyrights (or lack thereof). In a motion filed over the weekend, Oracle’s motion of opposition argues that APIs do indeed fall under copyright.
If Oracle’s motion is upheld, then this would have enormous consequences for the software industry in the US, which–like other nations–has traditionally held that APIs are not enforceable by copyright.
To examine the impact, here’s the beginner’s guide to APIs. APIs are the aspect of a computer program that enable programmers to “plug in” to that program. They are what enable applications to communicate with each other. Historically, APIs have been regarded as not falling under copyright–the reasoning being that APIs are not creative implementations but rather statements of fact. “To access library A, use this command.”
Right. So why give the FUD any credibility at all?
For those who are looking for news which has not been distorted by Microsoft’s cartel and its lobbyists, go to Groklaw which currently tells us of “Potentially Important Victories for Google” in this case. From the latest post of Professor Webbink:
In a flurry of filing activity in the Oracle v. Google case this past week, a couple of rulings by the court stand out. First, Google has won the right 325 [PDF] to file a motion for summary judgment on the Oracle affirmative defense of “assignor estoppel.” Second, Google has won the right 328 [PDF] to file a motion for summary judgment on the issue of infringement outside the U.S. under 35 U.S.C. § 271(f). This last one is really important for reasons we will explain.
Most of the rest of the filing and entry activity (there were 40 separate filings or entries from Tuesday through Friday) related to the on-going discovery disputes, including the dispute over the Lindholm emails. In regard to the Lindholm emails, in the latest round Google argues that the declaration filed by Fred Norton in support of Oracle’s position was improper because it was not limited to factual information, as directed by the court, but included legal arguments. Oracle says that is not true. So much of this argument has now digressed into “he said; she said”. We are inclined to wait for the court to rule before spending more time analyzing this particular dispute.
The situation for Android is not as grim as Microsoft and its minions wish manufacturers to believe. It’s just a reality distortion field. Android keeps expanding despite the FUD. █
Summary: Microsoft PR, along with Microsoft proponents masquerading as journalists, promote Microsoft’s latest manoeuvre whose purpose to extract money out of GNU/Linux in China
YESTERDAY we wrote about Novell's role in the Hyper-V infestation, which Novell was paid hundreds of millions to help advance. A lot of people may no longer remember how it came about, but we sure documented this over the years.
In its embrace-and-extend-like fashion, Microsoft currently uses what the now-defunct Novell helped create as a departure gift for Microsoft. Novell used to work hard for GNU/Linux tax (through SUSE) in China. But Microsoft has just announced in a press release that it will “help sell Hyper-V infused Linux distro in China,” says a Linux site. This was mostly covered by Microsoft boosters like Scott Fulton, IDG, and Mary Jo Foley who called it “legal covenant agreement” (as in patents too?). “Microsoft has signed a “legal covenant agreement” with Linux operating system provider China Standard Software Co. Ltd. (CS2C),” writes the Microsoft booster and other Microsoft proponents (e.g. Gates-funded Seattle Times which boosts Microsoft all the time) did the same thing to make it seem like Microsoft is a friend of GNU/Linux when it fact it’s working to tax GNU/Linux, thanks to the seminal work from Novell. █
Summary: After over 2 weeks since the last show (due to work commitments) we are back to catching up with news
TODAY we release last night’s show, which was the first one for which we roughly outlined subjects we would cover. Sadly, as we neglected to test the audio prior to recording, there is a massive problem with volume differences and a leveller could not compensate for it adequately. Update: detailed show notes are out.
We first discuss HP’s departure from PCs and also WebOS, which can live on elsewhere. The Motorola/Google deal is then dealt with, followed by the song “The One” by PJ Morton. We then start a discussion about the United States Court of Appeals opening the door to invalidating more software patents. We also talk about software patents in the EU and in general, then play “Can’t Stop” by Ozomatli. The Samsung/Apple situation in Europe is then talked about, including fake/’Photoshopped’ images from Apple (Apple’s fake evidence and reversal of a ban). GIMP 2.7.3 with Photoshop-like GUI option is then talked about, shortly before we go into plug-ins, programming (e.g. Java and Python), and a lot about social networks. “Thursday” by Orchid and Hound closes the show.
Users of that other OS are getting 1935 as an error message and it means that other OS broke itself again and must be re-installed.
The Microsoft addict installed Office 2010 and this cost him endless hours over two or three weeks of chasing a .NET mess through forums, knowledge bases, Microsoft support and other waste.
The footage happened to contain proof that a Chinese military university is using hacking software it has developed along with compromised U.S. IP addresses to target dissident groups. … The compromised IP being used is 138.26.72.17, which belongs to the University of Alabama in Birmingham.
Windows use in the backwoods of Alabama leads to persecution of dissidents. Shamefully, Windows is not mentioned by Geek.com but we know that’s what powers botnets used in these attacks.
“I don’t think we’ll be fishing in five years,” [Lucky Russell, a commercial fisherman] said. [...] “Everybody is worried,” … “When one of these things comes on deck, it’s sort of horrifying,” Cowan [professor of oceanography at Louisiana State University] said. “I mean, there these large dark lesions and eroded fins and areas on the body where scales have been removed. I’d imagine I’ve seen 30 or 40,000 red snapper in my career, and I’ve never seen anything like this. At all. Ever.”
Fresh oil, only slightly weathered, is washing ashore in areas hit hardest by last year’s massive spill, like Breton Island, Ship Island, the Chandeleurs and northern Barataria Bay. BP has reactivated its Vessels of Opportunity (VoO) program to handle cleanup.
BP denies this in a less credible manner the the photographs and analysis posted at Mr. Smtith’s site show there’s still a problem. Mr. Smith has has updates. All along people worried that leaks through the sea floor would never stop.
During his flyover, Henderson also observed oil leaks from other locations: near the Taylor Energy site that has been leaking since 2004, as well as several leaks that may be connected in and around Breton Sound.
the middle of the list saw explosive growth during the same time. For example, take Coral Island. When Lürssen delivered her to her Saudi owner in 1994, this 238-footer made her debut at No. 14—the longest new launch on The PMY 100 that year. Since then she’s moved down the list every year but two, and this year she’s barely hanging on at No. 92. Next year she’ll surely be gone.
Troll Allen’s Octopus is still listed at 14. When someone tells you, “You get what you pay for,” this is what you are paying for, really.
The article compares the crazy prices currently asked for Pre, $500, which make $75 look like a bargain until you realize that Droids will be that cheap soon enough. We can only conclude that HP was not serious about selling webOS devices in the first place. As they sell out, we know that people wanted them and might have bought them at a more competitive price.
A writer at Forbes is stinking up the magazine with Microsoft propaganda. [intentionally not linked]
The theme seems to be all good things in computerdom came from Microsoft. In one of his latest pieces he compares free software to “barbarians” and predicts chaos and massive declines in software availability as Microsoft declines. He’s obviously never experienced the happy and abundant world of free software or is paid to demonize it.
The article says they will only use them to decide sex and age but there’s nothing to keep them from using Facebook or some other service’s facial recognition software. With cameras at every check out, they could build their own database of faces and sell it. I’ve seen IR diodes used as a counter measure for this, perhaps that will become common.
Awareness of [patent] problems is growing in the mainstream press, but there’s only shallow discussion of solutions. … If you think that patent trolls are the problem, then these might sound worth trying. It’s only when you look at the whole range of problems that it becomes clear that software patents simply shouldn’t exist. Very little focus is given to the other group that uses patents to block software developers: large software companies. They all have big patent portfolios. Competition reduces their profits, so they use their patents to lock other developers out.
A small but crucial detail in the plan is that appeals against the EPO’s decisions would be decided based on the EPO’s own rules. The EPO could thus tie European business and computer users in knots to its heart’s content. … the EPO’s decision about software patents has already been made, and can be seen in action. The EPO has issued tens of thousands of software patents, in contempt for the treaty that established it. … Europe should rewrite the plan to make certain software is safe from patents. If that can’t be done, the next best thing is to reject the plan entirely. Minor simplifications are not worth a disaster
Doctorow’s Law #3: “Information doesn’t want to be free, people do”. Way back at The Hackers Conference in 1984, Stewart Brand once said to Steve Jobs, “information wants to be free.” However, Cory argues that it isn’t the information that needs to be free and pirated, but for people to be “free to own devices that don’t let remote authorities set policy against our will and against our interests, free to use networks that don’t spy on us in case we’re infringing the copyright, and free to communicate in private without having to worry that our personal lives will be made public in the name of protecting copyrights.”
It’s been a while since I got to play with Linux. My Toshiba laptop is Linux-proof for some reason and the Asus EEE 701 4G has been in active duty. Now I have another netbook and it came with Windows 7 which was great. I became dependent on a lot of Windows only programs, the Rockmelt browser for example.
Then after a couple of months Windows 7 took forever to not only boot…
Three weeks from today, the X.Org Developers’ Conference, the annual meet-up of Linux graphics driver developers, will be taking place in Chicago. Here’s the latest developments for this conference.
As most Phoronix readers are already aware, I am the organizer of the XDC2011 conference that is taking place in Chicago on the campus of Illinois Institute of Technology. The X.Org conference is running from the 12th to 14th of September where the future of open-source Linux graphics drivers, the X.Org Server, and possibly Wayland will be discussed.
We are pleased to announce availability of a new development version that brings us closer to GIMP 2.8. This version is packed with important new features and improvements.
A new development version of GIMP has been released; version 2.7.3. GIMP is the GNU Image Manipulation Program. It is a freely distributed piece of software for such tasks as photo retouching, image composition & image authoring.
The big problem with Linux users is their aversion to paying for anything, said tech analyst Rob Enderle — so for Humble Bumble’s developers to get customers to voluntarily pay for Linux games is in itself pretty amazing. … The Linux derivative OS, Android, might well be the platform for change when it comes to Linux gamers parting with their cash.
Chronic logic the developers of Gish and other GNU/Linux games, released the second add-on to their freeware strategy and tactics game Zatikon.
Despite the simple graphics the game is very deep and addictive, you can play the game and if you like it and want more units, you can buy the add-ons which add many new strategies and tactics.
Is Red Hat interested in joining the Big Data trend? One of the biggest trends in computing at enterprises and even small- and medium-sized businesses is Big Data crunching, using tools such as the open source Hadoop. Businesses want to slice and dice their analytics and databases in new ways, surfacing views of everything from customer behavior to support trends in new ways. According to Red Hat CEO Jim Whitehurst, the explosion of data and new ways to sift it is squarely on his radar.
Ximea GmbH announced new “smart cameras” that include AMD G-Series processors and monochrome or color image sensors ranging from WVGA (752 x 480 pixels) to five megapixels. The Currera-G devices include flash storage, microSD slots, VGA and Ethernet ports, and isolated digital I/O, the company says.
Many of you already know I am not only a writer of a technical nature, but a writer of fiction. In fact, the second in my I Zombie trilogy will hit the shelves next month. I have been working hard to produce a catalog of ebooks and paperbacks for the last three years. During that time I have discovered something that seems to be slipping through the cracks of the majority of computer-type pundits — open source is one of the major players in the new world publishing order.
With the growth of social networking, blogging and the Web in general, personal privacy is becoming harder and harder to find.
Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg has argued that privacy is no longer “a social norm.” And former Google CEO Eric Schmidt once famously opined, “If you have something that you don’t want anyone to know, maybe you shouldn’t be doing it in the first place.”
Two leading players have announced the Drupal Open App Standard Initiative in an effort to help create an improved user experience within the Drupal content management system and to help spur the development of the Drupal economy.
Phase2 Technology, based in Alexandria, VA, and SubHub, based in Cardiff, United Kingdom, have been collaborating on the initiative to achieve interoperability for Drupal apps and thus make it possible for any developer to write an app that would then be deployable across multiple app market implementations.
The Free Software Foundation reckons its new version of the General Public Licence removes the problems bedevilling version two, but not everyone is convinced the problem even exists.
The FSF reckons that Linux developers need to move quickly to GPLv3 if they’re to avoid Android (and similar Linux-based platforms) getting tied up in legal battles, despite the fact that many are claiming such battles are no more than figments in the eyes of publicity-hungry bloggers.
At issue is the clause in version two of the GPL which states that anyone breaching the restrictions irrevocably surrenders their rights under the licence. As just about every Android licensee has, at some point, failed to provide source code (or written notice of source code provision), then (the argument goes) they are all in breach of the GPLv2 and thus open to copyright suits from every Linux developer.
Bruce Perens (co-founder of the Open Source Initiative) has been opining about the difference between open source hardware and open hardware. People have compared the debate to the difference between open source software and free software, and are concerned that it might become as divisive. I’m not so sure. I think they are two different things, and they can co-exist peacefully.
The largest natural earthquake in Colorado in more than a century struck Monday night in the state’s southeast corner, but there had been no reports of damage or injuries.
The quake, with a preliminary magnitude of 5.3 and centered about nine miles from the city of Trinidad, hit at 11:46 p.m. local time. It was felt as far away as Greeley, about 350 miles north, and into Kansas and New Mexico, said Julie Dutton, a geophysicist at the National Earthquake Information Center in Golden, Colo.
The U.S. Geological Survey said the earthquake was 3.7 miles deep. Shaking was felt at the White House and all over the East Coast, as far south as Chapel Hill, N.C. Parts of the Pentagon, White House and Capitol were evacuated. The quake was in Mineral, Va., in Louisa County.
Embattled Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice David Prosser is in the spotlight once again, this time for a conflict-of-interest in a pending case involving Koch-funded Tea Party groups.
Science graduates should scale back their hopes of finding work in the UK and cast their net wider, according to two of the UK’s most influential scientists.
Dame Jocelyn Bell Burnell and Prof Keith Campbell said decreasing levels of funding for British research meant would-be scientists should think globally when hunting for employment.
The pair made their comments on Sunday at an Edinburgh International Book Festival debate on the future of science.
EXPOSED: A picture of the hacking software shown during the Chinese military program. The large writing at the top says “Select Attack Target.” Next, the user choose an IP address to attack from (it belongs to an American university).
IN OCTOBER 2005, three Citigroup analysts released a report describing the pattern of growth in the U.S. economy. To really understand the future of the economy and the stock market, they wrote, you first needed to recognize that there was “no such animal as the U.S. consumer,” and that concepts such as “average” consumer debt and “average” consumer spending were highly misleading.
A couple of years ago, when Sen. Jay Rockefeller of West Virginia asked me to testify about little-known health insurance industry practices at a hearing of his Senate Commerce Committee, I initially was reluctant. I knew that if I was completely honest, my life would change forever.
What he was asking me to do was to disclose practices that have contributed to the growing number of Americans without insurance, the even faster growing number of us who are underinsured, and the phenomenal increase in insurance industry profits over the years, even as the ranks of those without coverage swelled.
Summary: Richard Stallman further validates the FFII’s warning that Europe is besieged by the same forces who sought to legalise software patents in the whole EU just over half a decade ago
Amazon’s so called “One-Click Patent” is one of the most controversially discussed software inventions ever. The term, which nowadays is used as a cipher for a prototypical business method patent, was originally coined for US 5,960,411 titled “method and system for placing a purchase order via a communications network” (filed 12 Sep 2007, granted 28 Sep 1999; pdf), which has been enforced against competitor Barnes & Noble and licensed to Apple.
The respective teaching enables easy Internet shopping in that a customer visits a website, enters address and payment information and is associated with an identifier stored in a “cookie” in his client computer. A server is then able to recognize the client by the cookie and to retrieve purchasing information related to the customer, who thus can buy an item with a “single click”.
Read this patent GRANTED in Europe t.co/aaGAtfa then read this t.co/BxK8stq for more crappy #swpats
Richard Stallman has emerged from his more political commentary and contributed this article which warns about the “unitary patent” — the latest among many euphemisms used to silently push a pro-software patents agenda. To quote Stallman:
Just as the US software industry is experiencing the long-anticipated all-out software patent wars, the European Union has a plan to follow the same course. When the Hargreaves report urged the UK to avoid software patents, the UK government had already approved a plan that is likely to impose them.
Software patents are dangerous to software developers because they impose monopolies on software ideas. It is not feasible or safe to develop non-trivial software if you must thread a maze of patents. (See Patent absurdity, Guardian, 20 June 2005.)
Every program combines many ideas; a large program implements thousands of them. Google recently estimated there might be 250,000 patented ideas in a smartphone. I find that figure plausible, because in 2004 I estimated that the GNU/Linux operating system implemented around 100,000 actually patented ideas. (Linux, the kernel, had been found by Dan Ravicher to contain 283 such ideas, and was estimated to be 25% of the whole system at the time.)
[...]
The volunteer activists drifted away, thinking the battle won, but the corporate lobbyists for software patents were paid to stay on the job. Now they have contrived another sneaky method: the “unitary patent” system proposed for the EU. Under this system, if the European Patent Office issues a patent, it will automatically be valid in every participating country, which in this case means all of the EU except for Spain and Italy.
European patent lawyers are obviously unhappy about Stallman’s article. As Stallman warns about lobbying those aim is to get software patents approved in Europe, European patent lawyers label his allegation a “conspiracy theory” — a term whose usage we explained before.
This cheapening of Stallman’s views (which reached a lot of people through The Guardian, plus the “Slashdot effect”) actually comes from the group which is typically polite, German patent people like Falk Metzler (here is his latest agenda-pushing) and Axel H. Horns, who gets into an argument (after calling Stallman’s argument “conspiracy theory) with the FFII. He, along with pro-Microsoft lobbyist (Florian Müller), writes pro-software patents rhetoric and adds in relation to the “unitary patent” that:
On July 10, 2010, I had reported on the planned Organisation of work on the patent reform under the Polish Presidency. Now, as we still are within the summer recess period where nothing appears to move forward there might be a little stretch of time to contemplate as to how things might move on during next fall.
There is a recent precedent of successful adoption of enhanced co-operation in the EU: As we can learn from Wikipedia, with the rise in cross border divorce in the EU, common rules were put forward to settle the issue of where trans-national couples can divorce in the EU. However Sweden was blocking the new rules, fearing the loss of its liberal divorce law (divorce law differs strongly, with Nordic liberalism being in contrast to more conservative countries such as Malta which – until recently – did not even allow it). In order to allow those willing states to proceed without Sweden, in July 2008 nine countries put forward a proposal to use enhanced co-operation. At a meeting of the justice ministers on July 25, 2008, the nine states decided to formally seek the measure of enhanced cooperation; eight states formally requested it from the European Commission on 28 July 2008.
This is an interesting analysis (the author is typically informative), but why potray a so-called ‘unity’ patent as a good thing like peace-making? It’s not. All it does is, it increases damages in European industries and raises the frequency/impact of litigation, which helps the likes of the author, not real producers.
To give a very recent example of the toxic effects of US monopolies inside Europe, consider the Apple embargogate [1, 2, 3] , which fortunately turned out to be just an Apple scam that ended badly for Apple. To quote:
Apple faces a turnover of the Samsung injunction and iPad 3 may be delayed with screen supply problems
It was a black Wednesday for Apple. Samsung managed to overturn the European Union ban on sales of its flagship tablet, an action prosecuted by Apple, and the iPad 3 launch was “put back” because of technical problems.
Added to the news that if Google’s bid for Motorola Mobile goes through, Apple will lose some of its patents litigation power because of its reliance on Motorola technologies, it is probably not a good time to be in the Cupertino company’s boardroom.
Summary: More examples of the way Microsoft uses SUSE developers to put its Trojan horses inside the competition so as to grow from the inside
SEVERAL years ago and even last year we showed how Microsoft was using Novell as a back door for entering the HPC market, which is overwhelmingly dominated by GNU/Linux. Now, watch how Microsoft is using Novell’s implant for Microsoft (inside Linux) to create an unnecessary dependency on proprietary software. The whole Hyper-V nonsense that Greg K-H has been helping Microsoft advance is finding its way in a Linux-oriented market, leading to Microsoft partnerships and a drift away from software freedom. Novell has been nothing but trouble and SUSE is likely to be equally troublesome. Putting aside Microsoft’s and Novell’s Windows harmony (new YouTube videos), there is clearly some sort of attempt to embed Microsoft (and Microsoft tax) inside GNU/Linux. The question remains then, why would anybody choose SUSE over another distribution? And why would anyone attend the OpenSUSE events rather than broader scope events such as the recent one in Berlin? SUSE — like Novell — is like Microsoft inside the GNU/Linux world. It’s only serving itself. Boycott Novell and SUSE.
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