Bonum Certa Men Certa

Reader's Article: Novell, Mono and RAND

Post contributed by Slated

As some people here probably already know, I am no fan of Mono - not for technical reasons (mostly [3]), but simply for political ones. Specifically, I'm talking about so-called Software Patents, and even more importantly, precisely who owns those patents. In this case, that would be Microsoft, a convicted monopolist with a viciously anti-FOSS agenda, that employs business methods remarkably similar to that of the Mafia.



IMO the mere fact that .NET/Mono is Microsoft technology should be enough to dissuade any Free Software advocate from going anywhere near it [1], but there is a large contingent of Mono "fans" out there, lead by people like Jeff Waugh and Miguel de Icaza, who (either through ignorance; naivety; apathy or even malice) don't seem to give a damn about whether or not Mono (or even OOXML) endangers the future of Free Software.

Trying to convince people, and especially distro maintainers, that they should stay away from Mono, is therefore extraordinarily difficult, and usually goes something like this:

[P]oint | [C]ounterpoint

P: Don't use Mono C: Why? P: Because it is patented C: So is a lot of other software P: Yes, but this is patented by Microsoft C: So? P: Microsoft is a convicted monopolist C: You're just biased against Microsoft P: I believe I am justified given Microsoft's history C: What history? P: See [1] C: What has that got to do with Mono? P: Microsoft has a history of abusing their "IP" as a weapon to destroy others, and maintain a monopoly C: But how do you know that Microsoft will try to do that to FOSS? P: Because they have already made patent allegations against FOSS; have repeatedly expressed their contempt and hatred for FOSS; have established a protection racket for commercial Linux vendors; have admitted that Linux (they mean FOSS) is their number one competitor; and have a sociopathic tendency to violently attack anyone (read: competitor) who threatens Microsoft's monopoly, using the most unethical and underhand methods they think they can get away with

[At this point, some heavyweight like Waugh enters the debate]

C: Rubbish. Mono only implements the ECMA parts of the .NET framework, which are covered by a RAND covenant to not sue, so you're whining for no good reason P: I don't trust RANDs, especially those underwritten by Microsoft C: Why? P: Because, define "reasonable" ... and then prove that Microsoft will never revoke their promises. In fact, prove that Microsoft has good intentions in this, or any other endeavour

[This is usually the end of the discussion, although sometimes it goes off on one of the following tangents]

[Either]

C: My country doesn't enforce software patents anyway, so I don't care P: Maybe some day it will (see [2]). What then?

[Or]

“How many of those patent holders would risk losing 30 Billion USD just to strike a blow against FOSS (see Microsoft's recent failed Yahoo takeover bid)? How many of those patent holders are convicted monopolists?”C: Probably every piece of software ever written violates some patent or another. If FOSS developers were to abandon packages based on possible patents, then there wouldn't be any Free Software at all P: How many of those patent holders have the immoral and aggressive tendencies that Microsoft has? How many of those patent holders would risk losing 30 Billion USD just to strike a blow against FOSS (see Microsoft's recent failed Yahoo takeover bid)? How many of those patent holders are convicted monopolists? How many of those patent holders have made actual infringement claims against Free Software? How many of those patent holders have described Linux as a "cancer"? How many of those patent holders have created a Linux protection racket that attempts to stifle Free Software and line Microsoft's pockets in the process? How many of those patent holders use bribery and corruption as a matter of standard procedure [1]? How many of those patent holders regularly and predictably stab their own customers and partners in the back whenever any given venture results in anything less than market domination (e.g. "PlaysForSure" and others)?

[And here the debate always ends, but without any resolution]

Occasionally I might get a parting "you're just being paranoid", from those too blind/naive/brainwashed to understand the truth.

Well I don't know if it'll help, but I recently discovered an article that (I believe) exposes RAND for the sham that it really is (quoted in full):

So much quarreling about open standards. Jason Matusow advocates for a document format with RAND licensing conditions for the patents. What does he mean when he talks about RAND? RAND stands for "reasonable and non-discriminatory". But Jason Matusow's company Microsoft lacks honesty when it talks about "reasonable and non-discriminatory" conditions.

We need to be precise about what reasonable and non-discriminatory actually means. A restaurant in apartheid South Africa said it allowed both Boers and English, so was "not discriminatory". It even let some Jews in. However it banned non-whites.

Reasonable and non-discriminatory in patent licensing means "we apply a uniform fee". However with respect to Microsoft's legacy OOXML format, one party controls the standard and the associated patents. All market players need to license except the patent owner. For dominant standards it is a tax on the market. It seems highly unreasonable that such standards should become international standards, mandatory for government users.

You may find it unreasonable for an ubiquitous standard. But there is a more insidious aspect. RAND patent licensing conditions are a tool to ban Free Software, which is entirely incompatible with RAND licensing conditions. Now one side of the debate blames it on the patent licensing conditions, the other side on the software licensing conditions.

"The reason I agree with the statement about patents and Free Software not mixing is that there have been terms written into GPL licenses that explicitly conflict with software patents. Okay, that is the choice of the authors and users of those licenses."

It sounds a bit like: well, you chose to marry an African woman, so we cannot let you into the restaurant. Free choice, right?

Yes, Matusow calls his standards with RAND conditions "open standards" and contradicts the commonly accepted definition of "open standards". We should speak about shared standards. These shared standards appear to discriminate less, but they still discriminate against the only real competitor to Microsoft's hegemony.

It is true that ISO, driven by simple pragmatism, allows shared standards. From the ISO/IEC directives:

"14.1 If, in exceptional situations, technical reasons justify such a step, there is no objection in principle to preparing an International Standard in terms which include the use of items covered by patent rights – defined as patents, utility models and other statutory rights based on inventions, including any published applications for any of the foregoing – even if the terms of the standard are such that there are no alternative means of compliance."

Generally international standards and patents are like water and oil, and RAND conditions are the soap that allow them to mix. But as the move towards Open Standards evolves, shared standards get more and more unacceptable. Shared standards do discriminate and do appear to be unreasonable.

It is time to adapt the legal definition of reasonable and non-discriminatory to common sense.


I would also add that not only are ECMA/.NET patent terms unreasonable (how can it be an Open Standard if you have to pay a fee?), but the non-discriminatory terms have already been broken with Microsoft's exclusive agreement with Novell:

I read the agreement between Xandros and Microsoft, and one of the excluded products was Mono, so Microsoft promises to not sue Xandros over their distribution but excluding Mono and a few other products, i.e. they reserve the right to sue over Mono. I wonder if this is an interesting preview of on what basis they want to fight the free world.

Interestingly, the Novell deal seems to be different, Mono is not excluded from the Novell deal. So Microsoft seems to be promising not to sue Novell over Mono, but keeps the option open for Xandros. Weird but true.


All in all, it is clear that the ECMA/.Net/Mono patent conditions are far from either "reasonable" or "non-discriminatory".

Meanwhile, I stumbled upon some old articles that reminded me of how much de Icaza is in love with the Redmond gangsters, and how dearly he'd love to mutate Gnome into the bastard son of Windows:

Gnome to be based on .NET – de Icaza

Learn to love The Beast By Andrew Orlowski in New York

Published Friday 1st February 2002 17:56 GMT

[Interview] How much do you love Microsoft's .NET? Enough to trust your Gnome applications to its APIs in the future?

That's what Gnome leader Miguel de Icaza, believes should happen. Miguel calls .NET the "natural upgrade" for the Gnome platform, and enthused about the technology in an interview with us at LinuxWorld this week. Basing Gnome on the .NET APIs will cut development time significantly,

He also had praise for the new Microsoft security model, dismissed the notion that Redmond was employing embrace and extend to its web services protocols, and put the message that the community should get over its beef with The Beast.

"I'd like to see Gnome applications written in .NET in version 4.0 - no, version 3.0. But Gnome 4.0 should be based on .NET," he told us. "A lot of people just see .NET as a fantastic upgrade for the development platform from Microsoft.


Read the whole article, it's most revealing.

Miguel loves ActiveX too:

At Microsoft I learned the truth about ActiveX and COM and I got very interested in it inmediately(sic).


He shows extremely poor taste (in many things).

[1] For anyone still not convinced of Microsoft's ethical depravity, please see the following:

http://www.grokdoc.net/index.php/Dirty_Tricks_history http://www.groklaw.net/staticpages/index.php?page=2005010107100653 http://boycottnovell.com/microsoft-critique-resources/ http://boycottnovell.com/2008/05/25/eu-crackdown-astroturfing/ http://www.vanwensveen.nl/rants/microsoft/IhateMS.html

[2] Proposed US ACTA multi-lateral intellectual property trade agreement

http://antitrust.slated.org/censorship/acta-proposal-2007.pdf [PDF]

And finally:

[3] Why did Microsoft invent .NET (I'm assuming they invented it, rather than their usual MO of simply assimilating it from another source) when there is already Java? To answer this question, you may also like to consider why they "(re)invented" OOXML, Moonlight, XPS and other "fscking kill <vendor>" technologies.

Any supposedly Free Software advocate who can still defend or support Mono at this point, is clearly either irredeemably corrupt or terminally stupid (or possibly both). They are part of the problem, not part of the solution. And yes, the "problem" is Microsoft.

De Icaza, are you listening?

Mono Microsoft brain

Comments

Recent Techrights' Posts

Our Three Lawsuits Against Microsofters Are About to Become a Lot More Relevant to GNU/Linux
The Master will easily understand why Garrett has been attacking me since 2012
Slop Is Not Intelligence and It Does Not Enhance Productivity
Like voice dictation, which cannot tell the difference between "sheet" and "shit"
 
The Free Software Foundation (FSF) Has a New Slogan for Its 40th Anniversary
The freedoms are what's most important
Microsoft is Trying to "Pull a Nokia" on GNU/Linux as Desktop/Laptop Platform
We all remember that rather well, don't we?
LLM Slopfarms gbhackers.com, "Cyber Press" and CyberSecurityNews Are Drowning Google News (and Shame on Google for Feeding and Facilitating Them)
All are run by the same people
Links 23/07/2025: Droplets GUI Patent Monopoly Challenge, Nokia Leverages Illegal Patent Court Against Rivals
Links for the day
Gemini Links 23/07/2025: Community in Geminispace and Challenges With Old Computers
Links for the day
Links 23/07/2025: Slop Patents Tackled, Slop Copyright Misuses Tackled by Politicians
Links for the day
Links 23/07/2025: Retreating From Transparency on Jeffrey Epstein, We No Longer Have Press Freedom
Links for the day
Gemini Links 23/07/2025: Piano and Food
Links for the day
New and Old
On Ageism in Tech
EPO Crimes Are Spreading to the British Court System
Society is now paying the price for failing to tackle crimes at the EPO
It's Time to Dump SharePoint and Here's What to Use Instead
Nextcloud, ownCloud, Bookstack, MediaWiki, and MediaGoblin
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Tuesday, July 22, 2025
IRC logs for Tuesday, July 22, 2025
Brett Wilson LLP Has Gone Silent
Sometimes silence says more than nothing at all
Slopwatch: LinuxSecurity, Planet Ubuntu, and LinuxTechLab
some slopfarms show no remorse and they don't value their reputation at all
Links 23/07/2025: Book Bans, Storms, and Kangaroo Court for Patents Commits More Unlawful Acts of Overreach
Links for the day
Gemini Links 22/07/2025: Thinkpad and Pinephone
Links for the day
Links 22/07/2025: "Blog Restart" and Microsoft Clobbered by “ToolShell"
Links for the day
Global Warming and Global GAFAM Energy-Wasting
Burn more money (borrowed, loans), then hope the waste will somehow translate into profit?
No Compliance With the European Patent Convention (EPC) at the European Patent Office (EPO)
It's about preventing competition against this autocracy
Blue-Collar Trolls vs White-Collar Trolls
Examples of white-collar trolls
Apple Vision Pro Failed So Badly That Its Sales Are About 2,000 Times Smaller Than iPhone Sales
What's left for Apple to offer other than hype?
To Millions of People "Year of the Linux Desktop" Was Some Time in the 1990s (Bootable GNU/Linux as a Complete Operating System is Over 33 in Age)
In some sense, "year of the Linux desktop" was 33 years ago
Make No Assumptions (or Demands) About the Screen Resolution Used by Other People
There are usability aspects, aside from accessibility aspects
Why Wayland (and XWayland) Won't Solve the Key Problem It Proclaims to be Tackling (the Same Is True for Rust)
The problem isn't Wayland per se but the false promises and efforts to force everybody to move to it whilst insulting or demonising everyone who won't play along
They Don't Tell Us that 'Digitalisation' (Now Sold as "Hey Hi") Just Means Customers Become Unpaid Staff and Are Made Accountable
People are being conditioned to associate technology with something undesirable, at times even unbearable
Diplomatic Immunity Should Not Exist for Anybody
The EPO in its current form gradually 'normalises' the end of European democracy
Brett Wilson LLP Stopped Sending Me Papers When I Showed It had Sent Me Over 5 Kilograms of Legal Papers
A week ago we lodged our third lawsuit
Microsoft Mass Layoffs and Shutdowns Became the New Normal at Microsoft
Microsoft mass layoffs became a topic of everyday media coverage since May
Amazon Web Services (AWS) Has Layoffs and Microsoft Gaming/Entertainment Division Has an Uncertain Future
it's good to see all those horrible things crashing and burning
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Monday, July 21, 2025
IRC logs for Monday, July 21, 2025
FSF "Raised Almost $139,000 During This Summer Campaign"
"Thank you for making a stand against dystopia!"
Gemini Links 22/07/2025: VPS Exploited and Fear of View
Links for the day
LLM Bots vs Techrights
Slows things down a bit
New Publication Sheds Lights on Abuse of Workers at the European Patent Office (EPO)
Put in simple terms, they're killing the Office, harming remaining staff, try to hire rubber-stampers
Links 21/07/2025: Hardware, Health, and Imperialism
Links for the day
Gemini Links 21/07/2025: "When Buying Isn't Owning" and "CMS Special Edition"
Links for the day
Links 21/07/2025: Indie Web and Toxic Politics
Links for the day
[Meme] Microsoft Lawyers Throwing Stones in Glass Houses
threatened me with bankruptcy
Google "AI Overview" is Not AI and Not Overview
do not be misled; what Google does isn't smart, it's just ripping off the sites it already crawled for as long as 27 years
Making the Case to Dump Microsoft and GAFAM for National and Digital Sovereignty
"Sovereignty is difficult"
The Tactics of the Opposition (Microsoft Lunduke): Associate With K00ks, Throw in Vaccines to Muddy the Water
Who stands to gain from this?
Europe's Second-Largest Institution (EPO) and Largest Patent Monopoly Office Needs More Transparency, Not Less Transparency
In the EPO, what good are elections when one candidate literally bribes all the voters?
How Not to Report News About Microsoft
This pattern of misreporting is so widespread that it's hard to believe it's not intentional
Computer Science is Under Attack, They Want Everyone to be a Consumer
If people can no longer acquire Computer Science education and real Computer Science experience, they will not know how to control their own digital destiny or emancipate the very same universities that now control the syllabus and instead of teaching Computer Science encourage the outsourcing of systems
The Best Tools Are the Simplest Tools
There's a hidden message here about the merits of sticking with X
Ofcom Online Safety Group Speaks of Protecting Women Online, Will Brett Wilson LLP Ever Listen?
They've essentially became like the Taliban's "burka police"
Social Control Media Relies on Advertisers, So It'll Always Be Hostile Towards Free Software
Sales, sales, sales
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Sunday, July 20, 2025
IRC logs for Sunday, July 20, 2025
Fragmentation of Data
Life is too short to "hoard" data
In Defence of "Spinning Rust"
Just because something is "old" (or older) doesn't mean it ought to become extinct
Using Free Software to Prepare Legal Documents
LibreOffice is openly complaining about OOXML as an obstacle
Tech and Technology Are Not the Same Anymore
"Are you into tech, Sir?"
Our Articles About SLAPPs Receive Recognition and Interest
This week we shall continue writing about the 3 lawsuits we filed