James E LaBarre: I smell bribery

I smell either gross incompetence, or BRIBES paid to SDCA members. Once again, the customer gets s c r e w e d.

Also:

“Microsoft is a great partner.”

They’ll find out just how “great” MS is as a partner, a year or so down the line.

And also:

“As an open source company, we feel excited to sign an intellectual property agreement with Microsoft. They are a great partner, and I am confident that our agreements, and this collaboration, will ensure a bright future for file system interoperability and data portability that benefits device manufacturers and consumers alike,” says Mikko Valimaki, Tuxera CEO.

That is it? No explanation as to what the details of the agreement are? And this is in spite of all the horrible context surrounding similar agreements? This is ridiculous.

Then:

wow…..they really offered alot of info as to the licensing details.. under what terms can they distribute what they create.. ?

GreyGeek: A History of Microsoft partnerships

Microsoft has even used the partnership scheme to battle Linux on its own turf with the “deal” it made with Novell in November of 2006. It has made partnership deals (always veiled with NDA’s) with several less popular commercial distros since then, which hasn’t helped the distros popularity or income, but does give Microsoft courtroom ammo for claiming that several Linux businesses “admit” to using MS IP in Linux. That’s probably what the NDAs conceal.

I wonder if there will be a free Linux left in a few years.

A different question to ask is, will there be Windows left in a few years? Microsoft’s profit has fallen by a third for two consecutive quarters. That’s why it it so busy attacking GNU/Linux, without success.

Whoever the muscle are in Microsoft, encouraging people to pay the protection, they must be very good at their job. I wonder if there will be a free Linux left in a few years.