01.27.10

IRC: #boycottnovell @ FreeNode: January 27th, 2010

Posted in IRC Logs at 7:11 pm by Dr. Roy Schestowitz

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Microsoft to Spy on Indians, Bank Accounts, Health Records (and Conduct Profiling of Customers)

Posted in Asia, Bill Gates, GNU/Linux, Google, Microsoft, Search, Windows at 2:08 pm by Dr. Roy Schestowitz

“Privacy protects us from abuses by those in power, even if we’re doing nothing wrong at the time of surveillance.”

–Bruce Schneier

Summary: Microsoft is gaining access to systems it must not be allowed into due to misuse of power and a criminal background

Microsoft loves to accuse Google of privacy issues and other perceived issues (Bill Gates is apparently doing a special media tour about it) while praying that people will not realise that Microsoft is far, far worse. Microsoft even tracks people on their own desktops and it gets worse and worse in every new version of Windows (soon to be in Ubuntu too, unless they walk away from that tactless Yahoo! deal which has new GNU/Linux installations ‘phone home’ to Microsoft). We explained the dangers of this last month.

Last year we shed light on how Microsoft was trying to take control of Indian people through corruptible bodies such as NASSCOM [1, 2, 3, 4]. Will they let a convicted monopolist from abroad manage the population? Well, they just have.

India to roll out Microsoft ID system in August

The Indian government is set to roll out the first phase of its ambitious ID scheme as early as this year, it has emerged. And it will be helped by Microsoft.

The Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) project will see more involvement from private IT giants. Ex-Infosys boss, Nandan Nilekani, is heading this huge project of providing unique identification to more than a billion people. Microsoft Research will take an active part in executing the project.

Ah! Infosys again. Microsoft’s biggest shill in India [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15].

This is a disastrous decision that comes amid other current attempts by Microsoft to derail India’s policy in order to illegalise/marginalise Free software [1, 2, 3]. The many aggressive moves from Microsoft in India (especially recently) indicate that India has a bright future, but Microsoft is trying to control this future and thus make it grimmer. Microsoft is just trying to possess the nation’s ICT for lock-in — not technical merit — that secures some future revenue. Red Hat should vigourously protest against this decision and explain to the government how lock-in works (Red Hat is probably in the best position to do so). It sometimes pays off to dump or to even bribe to acquire lock-in and that might be Microsoft’s strategy here. Microsoft has ‘pulled an EDGI’ several times in India.

Microsoft also wants to control people’s medical profiles, which are very private and sensitive. Microsoft is now creating events that resemble AstroTurf (as opposes to grassroots) to advance this agenda. From a new press release:

Steve Aylward, GM of Microsoft Health and Life Sciences, Announced as ShareFEST Keynote Speaker

ShareFEST announced today that Steve Aylward, general manager, U.S. Health & Life Sciences, Microsoft Corporation will be the keynote speaker at ShareFEST 2010, the conference focused exclusively on the use of Microsoft Office SharePoint Server in the life sciences industry.

Steve Ballmer is already going on a tour to promote this agenda as well. From the news:

Nashville health leaders to meet with Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer this week

[...]

Ballmer’s trip — part of a multi-city tour — comes as Microsoft tries to focus more on crafting tech solutions for specific industries such as health care, financial services and retail, said Katherine R. Egbert, a Jefferies & Co. stock analyst in San Francisco.

Yes, it says “financial services and retail”. The investment vehicle called “Gates Foundation” is also investing in massive chains of retailers (JJB is just one example). It’s all about profit and control.

“More control means more leverage.”The British health services at the NHS are already a victim of Microsoft [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6], but patient data from the NHS is not stored on Microsoft’s own servers. Microsoft would love to change that. More control means more leverage.

We previously wrote about bankers and Microsoft’s relationship with them (examples from recent months can be found in [1, 2, 3, 4]). We also wrote about Microsoft and Citigroup, later to mention them again in a separate context. Microsoft is still collaborating with big banks (including those responsible for robbing the US and global economy) and a new bundle is coming from Citigroup and Microsoft. But what’s more curious is this new dangerous step where Microsoft is trying to store records of people’s bank accounts too (and having access to people’s bank details). It’s getting together with its competition.

Sometime-rivals Intuit and Microsoft are now partners in an effort to encourage software developers to use technology from the two companies to create Web-based applications for small businesses that run QuickBooks.

Web-based QuickBooks would means that financial data is stored on the server. Hello, Microsoft? We already know that Microsoft engages in McCarthyism.

The scariest part through is not mere access that Microsoft is gaining to all sorts of personal details; Microsoft and Intel are now joining forces and profiling users. This is a privacy hazard:

Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) and Intel (NASDAQ:INTC) have created technology that will allow signs in stores to detect a customer’s gender and which products a shopper looks at.

It gets worse. They are learning people’s habits and together with ID information, bank accounts, and even health records, what can’t Microsoft do? This abuse of power is done with the company that helped Microsoft fight against OLPC (because it used GNU/Linux and AMD chips). █

“Gates looks at everything as something that should be his. He acts in any way he can to make it his. It can be an idea, market share, or a contract. There is not an ounce of conscientiousness or compassion in him. The notion of fairness means nothing to him. The only thing he understands is leverage.”

–Philippe Kahn, Founder and former CEO of Borland

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Microsoft Hijacks More of Education Sector in Carolina, Michigan, and Georgia

Posted in Free/Libre Software, GNU/Linux, Microsoft, Office Suites, Red Hat, Windows at 11:02 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz

Summary: Carolina, Michigan, and Georgia are the latest victims of a programme that Microsoft euphemistically calls “Elevate America” (this programme only retards education and subjugates the people)

THE PREVIOUS post was a depressing one to write because Microsoft may be poisoning its competitors with former employees, who in turn ensure that more Internet users are getting Microsoft’s ‘search’ results that are programmed to say negative things about Microsoft’s competition, notably GNU/Linux. Is there anything that Microsoft doesn’t poison? The company operates like some kind of a dangerous computing cult and the least we can do in Boycott Novell is raise awareness of the issues.

The Grameen Foundation is one of those former Microsofers-run, Microsoft-serving shells [1, 2] that is disguising itself as “open source” while promoting Microsoft’s agenda. From the news we gather:

Grameen Foundation announced the latest release of MIFOS, an open source software platform for microfinance.

That’s hilarious, especially given that the Grameen Foundation is some kind of an EDGI assistance. It is part of Microsoft's coalition of NGOs, all of which serve the queen.

Then there is the programme which we call “American EDGI” [1, 2]. It is a programme whereby Microsoft is attacking the adoption of Free software in the United States and then uses PR to characterise this attack on competition as “charity” or “donation”. Microsoft claims to “Elevate America”, which is the euphemistic banner it chose for this programme (outside the US it is called “Unlimited Potential”, although the *Spark programmes are increasingly marketed too).

In this post we’ll begin by showing some of the latest “American EDGI”, which can easily be identified by its characterisation with euphemisms.

Here is Nash Community College becoming a participant in indoctrination of the young [1, 2, 3, 4], which will become Microsoft engineers/clientèle in the future. We also wrote about Bill Gates working to control more education systems through lobbying and gentle bribes [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8].

Jan. 9–Nash Community College is participating in Elevate America — North Carolina.

But wait. It’s more than one college. Another new report from Carolina says that more than 40 community colleges are involved in this. They become agents of Microsoft rather than places of education.

More than 40 North Carolina community colleges are distributing thousands of vouchers for free Microsoft certification exams and advanced online courses over the next six weeks, thanks to a nationwide Microsoft initiative called “Elevate America.”

It is all happening near Red Hat's headquarters. Microsoft has no boundaries.

In Michigan too, Microsoft helps indoctrination of the nation:

Microsoft and the state of Michigan are teaming up to give free technology training.

“Training” means “Windows and Office training”. It is shocking that the state of Michigan participates in helping one of the most criminal corporations in the country.

What has Microsoft actually done for Michigan, other than mess up its airport's Web site with Windows viruses (that was 3 months ago)?

The “Elevate America” euphemism comes also to Georgia. Watch the press release that’s chock full of spin and lies.

Microsoft is using the economic meltdown to take advantage of people and the Governor’s Office is participating in it, essentially collaborating with a convicted monopolist that continues to be found guilty.

Microsoft will partner with the Governor’s Office of Workforce Development to distribute at least 25,900 vouchers during the next 90 days. They can be used for courses including basic technology literacy, intermediate and advanced level technology skills training and Microsoft certification exams.

More here and here. Microsoft is making money out of chaos (economic meltdown).

Gov. Sonny Perdue announced a partnership between the state and Microsoft that will provide free technology training for Georgians.

The company will work with the Governor’s Office of Workforce Development to distribute at least 25,900 vouchers for various classes and Microsoft Certification exams.

Shame on Sonny Perdue. Why associated oneself with that Redmond bunch?

Here is another new one (“Elevate America”): “Microsoft and state team up on free vouchers for tech training”

The application for the vouchers, part of Microsoft’s Elevate America program, can be obtained online at www.gaworkready.org. The vouchers will be issued on a first-come, first-served basis.

Microsoft has almost captured a dozen US states in this way. Someone needs to step in and stop this, knowing what Microsoft is really scheming here and how it affects competition.

“They’ll get sort of addicted, and then we’ll somehow figure out how to collect sometime in the next decade.”

–Bill Gates

What “skills” is Microsoft giving these people anyway? They are just being trained for use of tools from the very same company that would benefit from it. These are not even specialised skills (similar even to MCSE, which is rapidly declining in value based on surveys). They devalue it by stating with pride that even kids under 10 are turning into MCSEs. From this month’s news:

Meet Marko, the 9-year-old systems engineer

[...]

At age 6, he got his first systems administrator credential from Microsoft and, last month, he became perhaps the youngest Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer.

They use children to repair their broken software and a girl of the same age received the same certification about 2 years ago. This is comical at best. But sadly enough (in an insulting way), they treat adults in the same way and offer them the same type of certifications. █

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Why Ubuntu GNU/Linux Should Not Make Microsoft Even Stronger

Posted in GNU/Linux, Google, Microsoft, Search, Ubuntu at 11:01 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz

Summary: Former Microsoft employee announces that Canonical will send Ubuntu users to Microsoft’s datacentres and herein we explain why it’s a big mistake that will alienate users

MANY readers have heard the news by now. It’s even in the front page of Slashdot. The short story is that Ubuntu will channel users towards Microsoft’s datacentre, via Yahoo! (bar EU approval for the search deal). “15 days of lost time,” calls it a reader of ours citing this comment. “Not that more than a single digit percent will change any default settings,” he adds, but the numbers cited there are US-only search numbers (thus incorrect) and Fedora claims 20 million installations.

My first reaction to this news goes almost a day back when Alan Pope (Popey from Ubuntu) announced the news:

Those of you testing out the development version of Ubuntu Lucid should notice a change in Firefox very soon. The default search provider for new installations of Ubuntu Lucid (10.04) and upgrades will be Yahoo! and not Google. Canonical have struck a revenue sharing deal with Yahoo! which generates income for the company. This revenue should help pay the wages of Ubuntu Developers employed by Canonical, and support the infrastructure required to develop and build the distribution.

It is worth noting that announcing this on behalf of Canonical was Rick Spencer, who came to Canonical from Microsoft. We warned about him before because the suggestion to remove GIMP from Ubuntu (under the excuse that a Mono program would replace it) came from him too. It was a grave mistake [1, 2, 3, 4] — a decision that most Ubuntu users are opposed to, based on a big poll at Ubuntu Forums.

I told Popey: ‘But Yahoo! is going to redirect to the convicted monopoly that called Ubuntu “cancer”‘

Popey then told me: ‘Deep irony if their dollars pay Ubuntu developers.’

“What Ubuntu has done is cut off funding to Mozilla to go into there own pockets, so damaging the upstream.”
      –OiaohmIf Microsoft is funding Ubuntu developers, then they are becoming what Microsoft called “pawns in the battle” (in the battle against Google in this case).

“Yahoo is Bingo in disguise,” said our Hungarian reader MinceR. Our reader Kecskebak (also from Hungary) was more blunt. He wrote: “Well, seeing as Yahoo! has done a deal with Bing it’s Bing by proxy. Shuttlecock – say Bing!”

Mozilla makes money when it is Google in the search bar, so the old way (Firefox defaults) supported both Mozilla and Google, not Ubuntu and Microsoft.

Our reader Oiaohm wrote: “Ubuntu is getting more criminal. What Ubuntu has done is cut off funding to Mozilla to go into there own pockets, so damaging the upstream. Really it shows how much respect Ubuntu has for the open source world. None. Really it would not matter who they changed the search company to. I hope Mozilla hits Ubuntu for trademark infringement. Altering the search provider cutting of money normally pisses Mozilla off.”

Yahoo! search is becoming just a surrogate identity to Microsoft, just like Mono is a surrogate to Microsoft, developed by its ally Novell (same with Moonlight).

It is Ubuntu's crisis of democracy as Novell’s Banshee is still being promoted for Ubuntu by some people, despite the obvious problem with Microsoft's community promise (Banshee uses excluded components [1, 2, 3, 4]).

Another thing that Ubuntu is doing right now (which is quite benign in comparison) is development of Ubuntu One for Windows. That’s fine, it’s a very separate project constructed for other reasons, but a lot of people missed the news.

“Could Ubuntu maybe retract or withdraw this deal?”All the above was discussed in great length in our IRC channel since yesterday (starting here). We are still talking about it today. We think it is not worth making a huge scene out of it because it was discussed in IRC for hours (with Jono Bacon included) and clarified to the extent possible. It was never clearly insinuated that malicious intent led to such a deal, but Ubuntu is supporting Microsoft without saying so. Linspire signed such a search deal with Microsoft as part of the 2007 patent deal, sending their customers to essentially enrich Microsoft and share data with the company that’s almost alone in viciously attacking those very same users (or at least their operating system of choice). Could Ubuntu maybe retract or withdraw this deal? We sure hope so.

What do users think of the possibility that many (if not most) GNU/Linux users are to be redirected for Microsoft to spy on their search habits (and gather statistics/intelligence on the competition), not to mention that it would give them GNU/Linux-hostile search results (Bong [sic] is doctored for built-in bias, including thin and mostly negative results on the subject of GNU/Linux).

Verizon’s recent search deal with Microsoft shows that not giving users what they want simply makes them angry. This would not be smart for Ubuntu to do, either. Many people come to Ubuntu in order to escape Microsoft and even Firefox for Windows uses Google by default. This is a bizarre reversal of role. █

“Gathering intelligence on enemy activities is critical to the success of the Slog.”

–Microsoft, internal document [PDF]

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Chief Microsoft Lobbyist Bill Gates Goes on Anti-Google Tour in the Press

Posted in Bill Gates, FUD, Google, IBM, Microsoft, Search, Ubuntu at 9:56 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz

Bill Gates Deposition Transcript

Summary: The mainstream press/media shows its cowardice by permitting a felon to call is rival all sorts of things

BILL GATES is pretending to have left Microsoft, but he is a super lobbyist [1, 2, 3, 4] with a criminal past and a fake ‘charity’ that he uses to make even more money by harming society with cartels (oil, pharmaceutical, genetics, etc.) while using his wealth to control communication about the subject [1, 2, 3] and indoctrinate the young [1, 2, 3, 4].

As we showed yesterday, Bill Gates had begun some kind of a media blitz starting with the New York Times and the Huffington Post [1, 2, 3]. Bill Gates is attacking Google while pretending to congratulate them. He also uses some shrewd talking points in order to use Google to whitewash his own crimes in all sorts of publications. Here is what he did in Good Morning America: (direct link to the interview)

TAKING A BREAK from global philanthropy, Bill Gates has chipped in his tuppence worth on China’s Internet policy by stating that the Internet needs to thrive as an engine of free speech.

In an interview with ABC’s Good Morning America, Gates said he felt that official Internet censorship policies are very limited. When questioned about Steve Ballmer’s remark on China’s ‘Google problem’, Gates replied without referring to Google.

The same nonsense from Bill Gates has reached Reuters and other Web sites. They just print everything he says as if his wealth indicates that he knows better than anyone else, even in fields like economics. Robber barons are the ones to inquire about rogue economies, not economics.

Regarding the New York Times piece, our reader quotes Gates as follows:

“I wouldn’t call anyone a monopolist,”…

‘He went on to say that historically companies that become “hyper-successful” invite government antitrust scrutiny…’

“If governments don’t care, that’s a bad sign,” Mr. Gates said.

“There are several positive feedback loops in this business, and they are particularly powerful” [regarding Google]

‘Microsoft is investing heavily in search — “the last big investor” other than Google’

[ haaaa ? what the **** is he on about ? Remember Microsoft was in 'search' way before Google, yea ?? ]

“They’ve done nothing and gotten a lot of credit for it,”

“Now, if Google ever chooses to pull out of the United States, then I’d give them credit.”

Pay attention to these talking points which he is repeating in his latest “anti-Google tour”.

Over at Ghabuntu (Ghana Ubuntu), memories of what Bill Gates did to Gary Kildall and his business have just been resurrected.

Gary Kildall was an computer instructor at the U.S. Naval Postgraduate school in Monterey, California. In 1974 he saw an ad for an Intel processor and called the company to offer his services. He was hired to write programming tools for the new Intel 4004 microprocessor. When Intel introduced the 8008 and 8080 models he wrote a high-level language for them that made the processor infinitely more useful. You could give English-like commands to the chip instead of talking in 0s and 1s.

When Intel developed the world’s first floppy disk system, the company decided not to sell it to the public. Kildall asked if he could sell a version. He invented the first DOS (disk operating system) and called it CP/M or control program for microprocessors. It could keep track of peripherals like a monitor or a disk drive.

His friends said he wrote it by himself, effortlessly, which showed his tremendous aptitude for writing computer code. They also wondered why anybody would possibly want an operating system for a single user. Kildall wasn’t in it for the money, but for the joy of being able to do it.

[...]

He sold his company DRI to Novell for $120 million in 1991. He hosted a television show for PBS about computers and wrote a 250 page tell all book that was never published. He acknowledged that the book would probably be construed as sour grapes. His son is afraid to have the book published to this day for fear of being sued by Bill Gates.

Shortly before midnight July 8, 1994, Kildall walked into a bar wearing his Harley-Davidson vest. The bar was filled with a group of rough looking bikers. No one is sure what happened, but somehow he hit his head on something while falling backwards. Was he in a fight? Drunk? Not even Kildall could remember.

He walked out of the bar on his own. In two separate visits to the hospital that weekend no one found the bloodclot between his skull and brain. Three days later he was dead at age 52.

This version from Ghabuntu says that “Gary Kildall was not happy when he found out about the Microsoft-IBM deal. He considered it theft when he learned how similar MS-DOS was to CP/M. He was too easy going to sue and even if he did, copyright laws would have made it hard for him to win. A copyright only protects you from an outright copy, not an imitation.” Sadly, Ubuntu is now helping Microsoft against Google, but that’s the subject of the next post. █

“He [Bill Gates] is divisive. He is manipulative. He is a user. He has taken much from me and the industry.”

–Gary Kildall

Related posts:

1. With Microsoft Monopoly in Check, Bill Gates Proceeds to Creating More Monopolies
2. Gates-Backed Company Accused of Monopoly Abuse and Investigated
3. How the Gates Foundation Privatises Africa
4. Reader’s Article: The Gates Foundation and Genetically-Modified Foods
5. Monsanto: The Microsoft of Food
6. Seeds of Doubt in Bill Gates Investments
7. Gates Foundation Accused of Faking/Fabricating Data to Advance Political Goals
8. More Dubious Practices from the Gates Foundation
9. Video Transcript of Vandana Shiva on Insane Patents
10. Explanation of What Bill Gates’ Patent Investments Do to Developing World
11. Black Friday Film: What the Bill Gates-Backed Monsanto Does to Animals, Farmers, Food, and Patent Systems
12. Gates Foundation Looking to Destroy Kenya with Intellectual Monopolies
13. Young Napoleon Comes to Africa and Told Off
14. Bill Gates Takes His GMO Patent Investments/Experiments to India
15. Gates/Microsoft Tax Dodge and Agriculture Monopoly Revisited
16. Beyond the ‘Public Relations’
17. UK Intellectual Monopoly Office (UK-IPO) May be Breaking the Law
18. “Boycott Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation in China”

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Microsoft, Intel, and White-collar Crime

Posted in GNU/Linux, Hardware, Microsoft, OLPC, SCO, UNIX at 9:09 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz

Summary: More information about the two abusive monopolies and how GNU/Linux fits their puzzle

GROKLAW has begun publishing more Comes vs Microsoft exhibits, including some that we shared here before (some of these posts of ours made the front page of Slashdot, Digg, and even the mainstream press). This series from Groklaw began some weeks ago and we think it’s wonderful that Groklaw brings the material to a broader audience, using some of the transcripts which we worked on in the past (there is reuse going on). It’s a truly wonderful case of community collaboration for the sake of justice.

Some days ago, Groklaw published its own interpretation of the Intel exhibits, adding to them Groklaw’s expertise on SCO matters:

This exhibit, for example, is from early 2002, and if you recall Darl McBride joined Caldera, now calling itself SCO, in the summer of 2002, and at the end of the year, it was gearing up to attack Linux. That is the context. Microsoft by 2002, after losing to Linux in 1999, was still not able to persuade Intel developers to come back to Windows.

As you read the exhibit, then, please imagine you are Microsoft when Darl McBride comes calling with a plan to litigate Linux into the ground, force Linux to remove code SCOfolk thought Linux couldn’t function without in the enterprise, or place a SCO tax on every Linux server, all of which would make it easier for Microsoft to compete against an operating system that was preferred already at Intel. Imagine you are not the type to stay awake nights, worrying about business ethics or fine points like that.

Microsoft asked Intel what it should do. Some suggestions from Intel: improve interoperability between Windows and Linux/UNIX, improve “stability of environment, OS, shell environment, scripts, etc.”, find “a unique value prop that will convince EDA ISVs about the advantage of supporting Windows & .NET.” Intel reportedly offered to help Microsoft with developing that, “since they’re familiar with the terrain.” In short, if Microsoft could improve in interoperability, it would enable Intel to switch from Linux to Windows and .NET.

So all you folks helping Microsoft become more interoperable, are you working with a “new” Microsoft that has now seen the light? Or, are you enabling Microsoft to replace Linux, after you help them write the code and share with them the way to fix their stupid software? What are you thinking? You are doing their coding for them with a goal on their part you won’t enjoy. In short, the conclusion I reach after reading this exhibit is that if Microsoft can’t interoperate well with Linux, it will decline faster.

We have covered this before. See the following:

• Bill Gates: “Where Are We on This Jihad?” (Against Linux at Intel)
• Microsoft on Intel’s Anti-Linux: “Please Keep Confidential. This is a Nightmare”
• Bill Gates on Linux@Intel: “This Huge Driver Group Scares Me.”
• Steve Ballmer: “We cannot let intel do chip design on Linux ever”
• Bill Gates et al Lean on Other Companies to Derail GNU/Linux as “Main Stream Operating System”
• Microsoft: Intel Ain’t Done Until Windows Can Run?
• Bill Gates: “Intel should not just treat us as one of many”

More Intel exhibits are to be covered in the future (we haven’t the time to do that yet). We also have some alarming exhibits that show Microsoft giving hints of the SCO lawsuit (or similar). See for example:

• Jim Allchin (2002): “There’s Going to Be a Patent Lawsuit on Linux” (Analysts Cartel Part V)
• Microsoft Studies How to Use Intellectual Property Against GNU/Linux
• What Was Microsoft’s “Big Bet” Post Novell-SCO (2002)?

Here is a good comment from Groklaw:

These applications touch the heart of corporate innovation – the core designs and concepts that will drive a company forward for a decade or more. They’re more than just marketing numbers and advertising strategies that might affect their bottom line for a few quarters or two years at most. They’re important.
Given that Windows-only users are just the sort who take their work home on their laptops to connect directly to their home Internet connection without so much as a NAT router to protect them – and then click on any old flash game or link they find on Facebook – and then bring the same laptop back to connect to the intranet, is any consideration at all given to security? Do corporations just accept that their most precious intellectual property is flying out the door at an aggregate 1000Gbps? Or do they consider these issues and decide that the value add of Windows environments is worth more than keeping their secrets? If so, how? How do you sit at the table where supposedly savvy and responsible people decide such things and advocate that without being walked directly to the door by security staff?

We hope that more people will help Groklaw assemble what we have from Comes. It’s a fountain of knowledge and a peephole into Microsoft’s corporate crime. In Groklaw’s latest exhibit, Bill Gates is shown referring to his completion as “Jihad”; he has done that more than once (on other occasions), so it’s not just a slip of the tongue.

Earlier this month Microsoft and Intel entered a collaboration around the spying on users and profiling of their habits, having previously attacked OLPC more or less jointly. We will hopefully have time to cover this later today. █

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Patents Roundup: A Week’s Worth, Links and Snippets Only

Posted in IBM, Law, Patents at 8:38 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz

Summary: A quick assemblage of patent news of interest (patents being the #1 barrier to Free software)

• Save the Whales! Abolish Patents! The Case of Green Technology

Abolishing so-called intellectual “property” (IP) won’t solve all social ills — yet perhaps it will save the whales. In a series of posts based on research with my co-author Michele Boldrin, we are tackling one issue at a time. Our first post looked at health care. Here we examine green technology, specifically technologies designed to mitigate global warming.

There are many solutions to the problem of global warming — ignoring it is popular with the extreme right, and moving back to the stone age is of equal interest to the extreme left. For the rest of us improving technology seems like a good place to start. Even if dumping carbon dioxide in the atmosphere turns out not to lead to global warming, the ill-health effects of pollution aren’t controversial.

Note: old pattern of articles warning against patents that prevent fixing of the environment. We’ll see a lot more of these.

• Update On Bilski

Editor: Clearly this case has drawn significant interest, with nearly 70 amicus briefs having been filed. How big are the stakes here?

Bauer: The stakes are very high. Depending on what the court does, this could be a transforming event. Over the last 30 to 40 years, the patent system has evolved essentially to allow nearly anything to be patented. This case has brought the issue of business method patents into question, specifically a process that could make energy costs more predictable. Based on the justices’ comments during oral arguments, the Supreme Court appears poised to scale back what should be considered patentable – the question is how far they’ll go.

• Groklaw News Picks about Gene Quinn from IP Watchdog:

[PJ: Nice to know this patent attorney doesn't respect even the Supreme Court, and expressed that he and other patent attorneys intend to overrule the Supreme Court's decision if they don't agree with it. And I know Mr. Quinn knows that the objections to software patents are not based on a desire to copy, because he and I have had conversations. I think there is no point in answering him in his comments section, therefore. Once folks start saying things like this, it's probably time to exit the scene, because it's no longer a rational conversation.]

Note: IP Watchdog sometimes seems like IP Watchtroll. Gene Quinn is a troll; “Troll” in the Internet sense anyway, as he’s seemingly provoking for the sake of it, not just for his pocket.

• IBM leads list of US patents granted in 2009

• Obama’s Man at the USPTO Seeks to Rehab the Agency

ID: Interesting. We need to talk about first-to-file. But before we get to that, to what extent is your lengthy tenure at IBM influencing you at the USPTO? Are you running it more like a Fortune 500 company?

David Kappos: That’s another great question and I would answer it with yes and no. Yes in the sense that I am trying to bring business discipline. I have a lot of experience in managing and leading in running businesses and running P and Ls – profits and losses, right – in management processes, in setting cadence, in developing and running a pipeline. These are all disciplines that you learn when you spend your career in the business world.

[...]

I spent a lot of time with Richard. I’m here to make the Richards of the world successful. I’m here to make the pharmaceutical industry successful. I’m here to make specialty chemicals successful. I’m here to make medium-sized businesses in California successful.

• Talking tough on censorship (from the comments)

Actually, if you look at the world of software patents, the entire system is corrupt and a ghastly, horrible mess. There are entire industries of software patent squatters, who never – for a moment – desire to make hardware or software, they just go through the motions filing as many conceivable patents as they can, and when a company goes and makes a product they sue them looking for money. The system was intended so people who performed original and innovative research did not have their plans stolen and reproduced. That desire is not happening.

Patents are not the same as copyright rights, though they are related. Of course, this is not to defend Chinese state hacking or piracy, but don’t cry about the Patent system too much – it is indefensible.

• Libertarian Patent Lawyer Defends Patent Law

I see here a libertarian patent lawyer who is taking it for granted that patents are legitimate property rights–presumably because he believes the law should grant a monopoly license to provide “the exclusivity needed to encourage investment in new technology.” Patents are not legitimate property rights. They are mercantalist, monopolistic abominations. Libertarians, including libertarian patent attorneys, should oppose the patent system.

• Patent Lawyer Mostly Agrees With Me

For years I have been wondering what the EPO, JPO, and KIPO are doing right that the USPTO is not and why can’t the USPTO look and see what the EPO, JPO, and KIPO are doing to figure it out and then adopt it. It reminds me of the time that Bush’s first crony appointment to head the PTO came to our PIPLA meeting and told us “We’ve got the best patent office in the world.” In reality, we wouldn’t even get the bronze metal. Our typical American chauvinism prevents us from looking elsewhere for improvement.

• Motorola seeks ban on US BlackBerries (embargo attempt, mentioned before)

• ArcelorMittal, IPCom, Bimbo: Intellectual Property (Update1)

An affiliate of ArcelorMittal, the world’s largest steelmaker, sued some of its biggest rivals alleging infringement of a U.S. patent for hot- and cold-rolled metal sheeting used for car bodies.

ArcelorMittal France contends AK Steel Corp. of West Chester, Ohio; Severstal Dearborn Inc. of Dearborn, Michigan; and Wheeling-Nisshin Inc. of Follansbee, West Virginia, should pay damages and stop using the invention for aluminum-coated boron steel products and a thermal treatment process used to strengthen auto parts.

• Is IP another bubble about to burst? A view from another civilization.

As a child growing up in India, one of the first things I learned is a hymn to Saraswati, the Goddess of Knowledge, which says that:

Wonderful is your gift of knowledge
the more we share, the more it grows
the more we hoard it, the more it diminishes

As a grown-up living in a globalized world, I am constantly bombarded by the the term, “intellectual property.” Policy makers keep saying that India should create more IP. Countless seminars extol the virtues of IP even as patents are granted for “Method for swinging on a swing,” “Method for Concealing Partial Baldness.” In the computer industry, patents are routinely granted for things that are obvious and have been known for years. Things have come to such a pass that even an industry veteran like Andy Grove was forced to say that, “The true value of an invention is its usefulness to the public. Patents themselves have become products. They’re instruments of investment traded on a separate market, often by speculators motivated by the highest financial return on their investment….

[...]

When we look back on our times, we may find that the term, “Intellectual Property” has taken its place along side another archaic term, “Horseless Carriage.” Both were attempts to impose metaphors of the past on the future. And the folly of our times is that we treat inexhaustible resources like knowledge as finite resource and treat finite resources like oil and forests as infinite resources. The sooner we turn these attitudes around, the better it will be for the future of mankind.

• Software patents petition pushed

A PETITION opposing software patents has been launched in Europe with the hope of preventing costly legal battles and restrictive policies.

It has long been thought that patenting software was counter-productive to innovation in the industry, and the adoption of software patents in the UK and Europe has long been debated. This latest online petition looks to be gathering broad support in light of some recent disputes.

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Microsoft Signs Deal with Acacia and Builds More Patent Walls Against Linux

Posted in GNU/Linux, Microsoft, Patents at 8:18 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz

Summary: An accumulation of new information about Microsoft’s i4i fallout and use of software patents against its most potent competition, GNU/Linux

LAST night we reminded readers that Apple's patents are a threat to GNU/Linux. Apple is already using them against Linux. We presented coverage from the past week in order to support this contention. Now we come to Microsoft, which is extremely busy on the patent front.

We will start with an issue that was mentioned here before, but this time we use a variety of new references. Software patents are biting Microsoft’s rear side as Microsoft Office gets pulled from some typical distribution points in the market.

“Microsoft falls on its face,” says The Inquirer, whereas Microsoft Nick tries to justify Microsoft’s abhorrent actions [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12], as usual. When something is called “Microsoft blog” it can usually be assumed that it’s strongly pro-Microsoft (and sometimes paid for by Microsoft). More older coverage:

Microsoft today said that retailers can continue to sell unmodified versions of Word 2007, even though a court order that required the company to remove custom XML technology from the software took effect Monday.

Many clients of Microsoft cannot license its software anyway, due to downtime:

Nearly a month after a software upgrade bumped Microsoft partners and customers off the company’s volume licensing site, the main problem has been fixed but some users are still locked out.

This problem was mentioned here before. The i4i fallout mostly means that for the time being it is harder to acquire Office and OOXML gets even more badly fragmented. It’s all due to software patents.

On we move to the news about Acacia settling with Microsoft. Microsoft and Acacia are to enter a licence agreement.

Acacia Research Corporation announced on Friday its Freyburger LLC subsidiary settled litigation and entered a license agreement with Microsoft Corp.

Acacia is the company which was suing GNU/Linux shortly after it had hired Microsoft staff. Another new press release speaks about Microsoft’s licence agreement with Funai. Microsoft Nick received an additional statement from David Kaefer, Microsoft’s general manager of intellectual property licensing who played a role in the extortion of GNU/Linux distributors (we mentioned him in [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10]). Here is what he said about the Novell deal back in 2006.

As we noted before, the Funai deal is about exFAT, which is Microsoft’s way of excluding GNU/Linux from the market.

Microsoft said that the agreement covers consumer audio-video products including LCD TVs. Funai also will gain access to Microsoft’s extended file allocation table (exFAT) patents.

We also wrote about this Funai deal in [1, 2]. Microsoft is already suing Linux and using threats to coerce companies like Funai. Last week Microsoft even sued TiVo — a subject that we covered here. █

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