For those not paying attention, here's the sequence of events over the
last two weeks:
. eBay makes the unsubstantiated claim that "the vast majority of the
threats [eBay] saw were rootkitted Linux boxes". No evidence has been
offered to support that allegation, which was made publicly at a
Microsoft sponsored security symposium. [1]
. Ballmer claims Red Hat users have "an obligation to compensate [MS]"
"...with respect to [Microsoft's] intellectual property.", although he
has yet to demonstrate precisely what Microsoft-held patents Red Hat,
or any other GNU/Linux vendor, violates. [2] [3]
. A shell company operating as a patent Troll, called IP Innovation LLC,
files a patent lawsuit against Red Hat and Novell, for infringing a
patent issued to Xerox *16 years ago*. This same type of technology is
probably used in every operating system currently available, including
Windows (MSVDM) and the Mac (Spaces). It has yet to be established
whether or not this patent is valid, or even if the X Window System
implementation is indeed in violation of that patent. It is then
discovered that the parent company (Acacia) is manned by ex-Microsoft
personnel, including Brad Brunell, Former Microsoft General Manager of
Intellectual Property Licensing, who only joined Acacia two weeks ago.
[4]
. Today, eBay Australia depicts phishers as GNU/Linux users, thus
promoting the idea that GNU/Linux is illegal and its users are
criminals. [5]
There is no question that this series of events represents an extremely
well planned and coordinated attack against GNU/Linux instigated by
Microsoft. The more Microsoft see that they are losing (the EU
commission and CFI's judgements, the OOXML fiasco, the Vista disaster,
OEMs capitulating to customers' demands for GNU/Linux, the ridiculous
Zune, the massively loss-making and dangerous Xbox, their failed efforts
in search and advertising) the nastier they get, and this last couple of
weeks they have been behaving like cornered rats. They know they can't
win, so they're going to try to inflict as much damage as possible on
their way down.
Microsoft and their henchmen can shut down every commercial GNU/Linux
vendor in the world, but they can never shut down the Free Software that
powers those distributions, and so GNU/Linux will go on, despite
Microsoft's best efforts to "fsking kill" it by "tipping it into a death
spiral". It won't work ... ultimately they're going to lose, it's just a
question of time. The pervasiveness of Free Software is inevitable.
[1] http://news.yahoo.com/s/infoworld/20071004/tc_infoworld/92338
[2]
http://www.theinquirer.net/gb/inquirer/news/2007/10/09/ballmer-threatens-red-hat-users
[3] http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=5B0GTYfPoMo
[4] http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20071011205044141
[5]
http://www.linuxlookup.com/2007/oct/12/ebay_using_tux_as_a_symbol_for_internet_fraud
--
K.
http://slated.org
.----
| "[Microsoft] are willing to lose money for years and years just to
| make sure that you don't make any money, either." - Bob Cringely.
| - http://blog.businessofsoftware.org/2007/07/cringely-the-un.html
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Fedora release 7 (Moonshine) on sky, running kernel 2.6.22.1-41.fc7
18:01:17 up 65 days, 16:56, 2 users, load average: 0.27, 0.22, 0.14
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