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[News] Microsoft Abuses and Deception with Novell - Analysis

  • Subject: [News] Microsoft Abuses and Deception with Novell - Analysis
  • From: Roy Schestowitz <newsgroups@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
  • Date: Sat, 19 Sep 2009 00:17:04 +0100
  • Followup-to: comp.os.linux.advocacy
  • Newsgroups: comp.os.linux.advocacy
  • User-agent: KNode/4.3.1
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Microsoft needs a crutch.

,----[ Quote ]
| I remember that a while ago, as I was attending a heated 
| debate on the (in)famous standardization of OOXML. As we 
| were arguing with Microsoft on some specification 
| details, I happened to state all aloud that when it came 
| to this level of security (the topic at hand was 
| security), I had my concerns about the encryption 
| algorithms used by the specification but that in a 
| general sense, security relied much more on the 
| application using the format and the underlying 
| operating systemâs level of security. I went on to say 
| that for the specific portion of the draft we were 
| studying, it was perhaps not necessary to waste time in 
| fruitless discussion topics including the behavior of 
| OOXML documents in a computer undergoing a nuclear 
| attack and being stored on a computer facing a zero-day 
| exploit at the same time.
| 
| The response from one of the Microsoft spokesperson (Iâm 
| coining the term spokesperson, because thatâs what most 
| of them were) was a mix of surprise and sarcasm: 
| âEverything happens, today you agreed with us!â. And 
| indeed, I agreed that we should continue to parse the 
| 6000 pages-long draft. 
| 
| [...]
| 
| First, one has to realize that what happened with Novell 
| was a serious attack against free and open source 
| software, but although it was serious, it never really 
| had any major impact on the community itself. What I 
| mean by this is not that it did not have any real and 
| damageable impact on IT companies or OEMs that ended up 
| signing phony IPR deals with Microsoft. I mean by this 
| that when you step back, you end up realizing that even 
| the divide it caused inside the community is not that 
| big. There is no one âNovell Communityâ and one âFSF 
| Communityâ. That simply never existed except perhaps in 
| the mind of some Mono architects. Even the Ximian bunch 
| is very much on its own; influential because of monthly 
| salaries, and time to devout to their pet projects and 
| an historical ties to Gnome. But aside this, the impact 
| of the Novell agreement with Microsoft did not create 
| the âgrand schismâ many feared or wished at that time. 
| 
| [...]
| 
| That is, I believe, the essence of the Codeplex 
| foundation that is described here. Forget the code for a 
| moment, and you might come to the conclusion that either 
| Microsoft wants to impose its views on patents and 
| copyrights, or it genuinely wants to have a fruitful 
| conversation with the free and open source software 
| community. The former is only surprising as it shows a 
| different approach, but if thatâs what theyâre looking 
| to achieve I am afraid that unless this foundation comes 
| out with the most radically innovative ideas in the 
| field of IPR, it will fail, for the first reason I 
| outlined much above: Nobody will follow them, except 
| people and constituencies who have an economic incentive 
| to do that. What is left, then, if not the latter 
| hypothesis? Interesting times are ahead of us in this 
| case.
`----

http://standardsandfreedom.net/index.php/2009/09/18/microsoft-needs-a-crutch/


Recent:

NOME in .NET? â Not on my desktop!

,----[ Quote ]
| I believe the weapon of Mono is to âget Linux users hookedâ to the .net
| environment, always offering the superior and more mature version on the
| Windows platform.  Just like when you first tried alcohol you would probably
| start off on lighter products until you acquired a taste for it, progressing
| later in life to liking stronger spirits.  With Windows having
| the âdefinitive versionâ and users hooked or caught in the .net, Microsoft
| could effectively remove or hold to ransom the addiction of using .net from
| non-Windows users.  Just an idea, but from a PR standpoint IMO  it would seem
| far more viable than MONO being used to trick people into installing
| Microsoft patent infested code.
`----

http://openbytes.wordpress.com/2009/08/25/gnome-in-net-not-on-my-desktop/
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