Bonum Certa Men Certa

There's No 'Open Source' with Microsoft

Underlying platforms, frameworks, even formats are proprietary and Microsoft patents-encumbered

Saugatuck has just published the results of a study where it analysed the impact of companies (referred to as "vendors") on open source. Among the findings there are hints about why Microsoft wants authority. It's all about controlling and taming projects through .NET, patents, Windows and formats like OOXML, then having a band of free labourers. That's how it views it. This is not open source; it's just Microsoft's vision of it, which is self serving.



Fishing net
Dat net



Useful to Microsoft



Savio is still pushing his 'proprietary open source' agenda (see the banner on the right):

I was a little surprised when I stumbled on this page about "Open Source .Net eXchange." It's a mini-conference in London, UK, for .Net developers who are, or are thinking about, using open source.


He even spoke to Microsoft's anti-GNU/Linux guy and Lora Bentley just follows his blog, so she echoes his message.

I agree with Rodrigues’ conclusion that this event is but one small example of instances in which developers can and do have a foot on each side of the open vs. proprietary fence.


This is about marrying the two, for Microsoft to have parenthood of "open source" -- through formats, APIs and platform.

This is the 'Microsoftication' of "open source", which some certain self-professed Mac fans and self-appointed open source advocates seem to welcome.

What Readers Say



Jose, who once wrote about the dangers of Mono and other Microsoft-inspired/led technologies, is now addressing the parallel issues with formats.

Avoid Microsoft led technologies, since these benefit the MS monopolies, since these do not disclose the many other details that would be needed for interop beyond the core shell spec.

[...]

The biggest problem with OOXML was that it didn't leverage even one teensy bit the existing ISO document format, ODF. It threw a ton of existing investments down the drain.

Amazingly, instead of finishing up SVG, OOXML supporters decide to start implementing from scratch a multi-thousand page format that re-invents the SVG wheel and a whole lot of other wheels. Go figure.


Slated, whose thoughts on SUSE/Novell/Microsoft were published earlier today, later commented on Microsoft's attitude towards its resistors, which it consistently tries to characterise as "Haters" (among other similarly-pointless labels [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6]. He wrote:

"One wonders why exactly they hate Linux and the Free Software community. I mean after all - at least any hatred against Microsoft would be justified by, amongst many other (extremely well documented) things, their sabotage of a charity for nothing more than mindshare.

“[A] Microsoft supporter hating those who dissent against Microsoft, is like a criminal hating the police for catching him.”"But a Microsoft supporter hating those who dissent against Microsoft, is like a criminal hating the police for catching him. It's nothing more than knee-jerk reciprocation and mindless contradiction. Was the DOJ engaged in a "campaign of hate" when they prosecuted Microsoft for violation of section 2 of the Sherman Act? Well obviously they must have been, since they dared to challenge Micfrosoft's "right" to operate like gangsters. Punishing criminals is obviously wrong, so dissenting against the persistently unethical behaviour of those criminals is therefore purely irrational hatred, naturally.

"When such people are reminded of how Microsoft bribed ISO delegates to support OOXML, and bribed Nigerian education officials to wipe Mandriva from children's laptops, and any one of the thousands of other vile things that Microsoft do as their standard business practise, does it even register in their minds, I wonder, or is it filtered out by their rose-tinted spectacles?

"There can be only one of two possible explanations. Either they believe that all of this documented evidence against Microsoft is a lie (presumably including all the evidence provided by the DOJ; the EU commission; Joe Comes; and countless others in court), or they fully accept the truth of this evidence, but just happen to think it's perfectly acceptable behaviour.

"In other words they are either utterly delusional or evil.

"Take your pick."

Comments

Recent Techrights' Posts

Michael “Monty” Widenius: It Started in 1983 With Richard Stallman (RMS)
The other co-founder of MySQL is a bit notorious for confronting RMS rather viciously
For the Second Time in a Few Weeks Microsoft Lunduke Makes False Accusations Against Senior Red Hat Staff to Incite a Despicable 'Troll Army'
Nothing that Microsoft Lunduke claims of says can be trusted
 
Links 03/10/2025: Lawyers Caught Using LLM Slop Explain Why They Did It, LibreSSL 4.1.1 and 4.0.1 Released
Links for the day
FSF Board Grew 50% Since Last Year, Has New President, Turns 40 in Two Days
It's a good move for the FSF and - by extension - for software freedom
Links 03/10/2025: Conflicts, Death of TypePad, and TikTok/CheeTok Gives a Boost to Far Right Groups in Europe
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Thursday, October 02, 2025
IRC logs for Thursday, October 02, 2025
Slopwatch: Linux Journal, Google News, and LinuxSecurity
They carry on polluting the Web with fake articles
Gemini Links 02/10/2025: Kubernetes With FreeBSD and robots.txt
Links for the day
Links 02/10/2025: 'Open' 'AI' Resorting to Gimmicks and Fake Funding, Europe’s ‘Drone Wall’ Discussed
Links for the day
Links 02/10/2025: Brave Passes 100M Users Milestone, Kodak Selling Its Own Film Again
Links for the day
su lisa && rm -rf /home/ibm/power
Novell was ruined by another person from IBM, Ronald Hovsepian
A Record Demand at Microsoft: Demand to Cancel
What we're witnessing is a very ungraceful destruction of XBox
Microsoft is Losing Europe
Hence all the "support" and "discount" offers that are limited to Europe
The Free Software Foundation Starts Fund-raising for 40th Anniversary
New pop-up 2-3 days ahead of the 40th anniversary event
Systemd Breaks Networking in Debian and Microsoft Staff Rushes to Make Face-Saving Excuses in LWN
Microsoft's bluca is already there in the comments, his Microsoft money pays for LWN to let him leave comments early
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Wednesday, October 01, 2025
IRC logs for Wednesday, October 01, 2025
What the End of XBox Will Look Like: a Fiery Crash
XBox is the next Skype. It won't last much longer. Expect many more layoffs.
Richard Stallman is Going to Finland to Give a Talk Next Thursday
A day later he speaks in Sweden
Gemini Links 02/10/2025: SMTP Pipelining and End of ROOPHLOCH 2025
Links for the day
Slopwatch: Plagiarism, Fake Articles, and FUD About Linux
not a day goes by without Google News feeding FUD from slopfarms
Gemini Links 01/10/2025: Chat Control and End of Life
Links for the day
Links 01/10/2025: Long Covid Risk Reiterated, "Bitcoin Queen" Caught
Links for the day
Links 01/10/2025: EA $55 Billion Deal is Debt and Slop "Raises Vishing Risks"
Links for the day
Bluewashing at Red Hat Means Redundancies
The man who sold Red Hat to IBM meanwhile became a Microsoft Mono booster
After Killing OpenSource.com, IBM ('Red Hat') and OSI Told Us OpenSource.net Would Replace It (But That Didn't Happen)
Now it's time to move on, perhaps tarnishing the "Open Source" label some more (for whatever sponsor wants this)
Linux is Not a Community Project, It's a Wall Street Product
The core goal should be freedom
Bad Actors Abusing the Free Software Community, Vandalising It Using Rogue Politics and Old Tactics
Oil giants have long attempted to do this; now, the digital equivalent of Big Oil does this in technology
Social Control Media Isn't the Future, The Federation or Fediverse Isn't Growing, People's Accounts Vanish for Good
users' accounts will get deleted, not just become inactive
IBM is Failing, This Helps Show Wall Street is Entirely Detached From Actual Commercial Performance
IBM is unable to grow, it's just constantly shrinking
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Tuesday, September 30, 2025
IRC logs for Tuesday, September 30, 2025
Clerical Aspects of Publishing and Development
In Free software, the management aspects are considerably reduced
Slopwatch: Fake Articles and Google News Promoting "Linux" Spam or Bot-Generated Fear, Uncertainty, Doubt (FUD)
These slopfarms help misplace blame
Third Wave of Microsoft Layoffs in September, This Time Many in Liverpool Affected
Be ready for more waves of layoffs ahead of the so-called "results" in late October