DOJ To Oversee Windows 7 Development

MrKaos writes "Windows 7 is already being reviewed by U.S. government technical appointees. Under the terms of Microsoft's November 2001 Justice Department settlement, and final court judgment issued about a year later, a government-sanctioned 'Technical Committee' has been formed to oversee Windows development. The TC is responsible for ensuring that Microsoft complies with the terms of the final judgment, investigating complaints about Microsoft abuses and regularly reporting on the company's compliance."

Yup.

[Kingrames (858416)]

This.

Will signify the year of the Linux Desktop.

If there was anything that could make windows worse, this administration will find it.

Re:Yup.

[hkgroove (791170)]

Is it just the conspiracy theorist in me that finds this scary as to what could be added into Windows 7? Super-secret backroom deals that the DoD / DoJ can covertly spy on the unwitting populace?

Re:Yup.

[badboy_tw2002 (524611)]

How do you know that hasn't been in every version since they included a built in network stack? (Big Hint: You don't!)

Re:

[Tubal-Cain (1289912)]

Because ISPs don't have your encryption keys.

Re:Yup.

[barzok (26681)]

Is there anyplace in the US that is served by both Comcast & TW?

I can see leaving Comcast or TW for Verizon or (insert DSL provider here), but Comcast to TW implies that there's local competition for your cable dollars, and I don't think that happens today.

Homeland Computer Security

[Roger W Moore (538166)]

I can just see it now for all us non-US users...
"Please look at the webcam, place your finger on the scanner and make sure your computer has a network connection."
or worse:
I'm sorry but your username has been placed on the 'no-compute' list. Please try again after the current US administration has expired.

I can just imagine...

[Perseid (660451)]

the staredown between the DOJ geeks and the MS geeks as they both fight for superiority. Think there'll be fistfights in the breakroom?

"Power to the people!" Smack.

"This one's for Billy!" Punch.

Fistfights? Nope.

[Nick Driver (238034)]

the staredown between the DOJ geeks and the MS geeks as they both fight for superiority. Think there'll be fistfights in the breakroom?

Nope, because the DOJ geeks will have badges, guns, pepper spray and tasers.

Re:Fistfights? Nope.

[MBGMorden (803437)]

Nope, because the DOJ geeks will have badges, guns, pepper spray and tasers.

But the MS guys will be packing office chairs . . .

Looking forward to this

[edwebdev (1304531)]

I have been waiting for a built-in Windows National Threat Advisory widget for so long.

Re:Looking forward to this

[gEvil (beta) (945888)]

I have been waiting for a built-in Windows National Threat Advisory widget for so long.

Ooooh! And they can have it automatically change the desktop background color or something, too!

Re:Looking forward to this

[mhall119 (1035984)]

You want a widget that never changes color from orangish-yellow?

Heh

[Oxy the moron (770724)]

At first I read that summary:

"...responsible for ensuring that Microsoft compiles with the terms of the final judgment...

Pity... I thought "final judgment" would be an altogether fitting and proper name for any compiler that could successfully compile a Windows OS.

Eh.

[Mongoose Disciple (722373)]

As judgements go, this seems toothless or perhaps worse . . . unless you consider the specter of this years ago to have caused Microsoft to make some different decisions.

According to TFA, the DoJ is mainly concerned with:

- Compatability/bundling in four areas, three of which, such as bundling an instant messenger, Microsoft has given up on since '01. Web browser is the area on that list still in play.

- Making sure that bugs in previous versions of Windows don't recur. Congratulations, your tax dollars are providing extra Windows QA.

Win 7 is officially vaporware

[Thelasko (1196535)]

With this much oversight, any development will slow to a crawl. If anything gets released at all, it will be a rehash of products they already make.

Insert Windows Vista joke here.

too far

[youngdev (1238812)]

does this not bother anyone else? Why is our government so powerful that it can involve itself in development of a commercial product by a private company? Do we not realize that by endorsing this, we are inviting government to get involved in more an more areas of out lives. Why not regulating what types of products you can build as a developer? This is insane. I cannot believe that my fellow slashdotters think this is ok. Government has gone too far.

Not nearly far enough

[mollog (841386)]

Perhaps you tuned in late. Or, perhaps you just were not paying attention. Maybe you shouldn't be commenting about things that you have no clue about.

Microsoft came to dominance by sabotaging the API so that its competitors did not have a good API to use, and its internal divisions for Excel and Word had a secret API that worked well. This is monopolistic behavior.

Part of the judgement agreed to by Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly is that Microsoft will open its API to all.

Re:Not nearly far enough

[jeiler (1106393)]

Maybe you shouldn't be commenting about things that you have no clue about.

Well, there goes Slashdot's whole purpose for existence.

Microsoft chose regulation.

[argent (18001)]

If Microsoft had been split into separate competing companies back when they lost the original DoJ lawsuit then:

(1) Microsoft would collectively be bigger and more profitable than they are now.
(2) Microsoft would be largely free of this kind of oversight.

Why did they fight so hard to remain a regulated monopoly instead?

Re:too far

[MikeURL (890801)]

I don't know if it qualifies as theory...

In any case, as a convicted monopolist, of course Microsoft is subject to government regulators. Ht only alternative would be to leave MS alone and then only step in when they inevitably violate the terms and 1,000,000 lawsuits are filed.

Before we weep too much over Windows and their government overlords we should mourn all the good startups that were crushed by unfair competition from MS. Of course Netscape comes to mind but it isn't the only one.

Don't hold your breath

[Toe, The (545098)]

Windows 7 is "scheduled" for maybe something like sometime in 2010, but they're not making any promises. And if you look at the slated "features [wikipedia.org]" It also looks like they're not sure what they have going on there. Updated versions of Paint and WordPad? Is that really what they're going for?

Instead of "Windows 7" the real code name is "Maybe we can come up with something you will want to buy, unlike Vista...?" However, unfortunately, they really have no idea how to accomplish that.

Oh, and just to be a snob... by comparison, OS X 10.5 looks like it will be adding real features [appleinsider.com] and actually be released in about one year from now.

(I know, -3 Troll/Flamebait... But it was too fun not to post.)

How about....

[ArIck (203)]

they check for illegal cooperation between a OS powerhouse (Microsoft) and a music/movies powerhouse (RIAA/MPAA)

Government? In MY computer?

[WolverineOfLove (1305907)]

The more I read about government oversight of operating systems, the more FOSS software I install... "America who isn't paranoid must be crazy" -- Robert Anton Wilson

History repeats itself...

[StandardDeviant (122674)]

I remember reading (long enough ago that I don't remember the source or exact words) something by Gates saying that he feared the worst case for Microsoft would be to end up like their partner IBM: big and slow, with lawyers wedged into every orifice impeding every move. Fast forward twenty/thirty years and now they're in pretty much the same situation. I don't envy them.

Re:History repeats itself...

[by Anonymous Coward]

M$ has only themselves to blame for being in the position you posit.

They still aren't in compliance with documentation

[b4dc0d3r (1268512)]

They still aren't in compliance with documentation from the original order. There are lots of functions for example that iexplore/explorer call which are not found in a search of MSDN, and really google fails for a lot of them - except returning one page complaining about the lack of documentation.

The explorer shell could be seen as part of the OS, but a web browser has no business calling undocumented functions. Too bad they tried to bundle the two. And it's also too bad that there is a lot of duplicated code among explorer.exe, browseui.dll, shlwapi.dll, and some others - I can't imagine trying to make a patch for this stuff. Instead of just making a documented API, they copy the code into all sorts of different places. And slightly differently I might add - so patching is not just a copy and paste job - it definitely has to be merged.

Because the DOJ knows that

[by Anonymous Coward]

If you want a back door for spying coded right, code it yourself!

Great

[halcyon1234 (834388)]

So we're going to get some DoJ PHB looking over the coder's shoulders, saying "Hrm, y'know, I really liked that paper clip thing. I turned him into a doggie and kept him jumping around all day long. He ever wrote all my memos for me. I-- I mean the DoJ-- really mandates that he be put back."

Government oversight..

[Cathoderoytube (1088737)]

Yes considering how astute government bureaucracies are I'm sure they'll really make a lot of difference

Government: We're having some issues with this 'notepad' program. You can't include it, it's anti-competitive.
Microsoft: Are you crazy?! Nobody uses that for actual word processing!
Government: That may be so, but including a word program with your operating system is unfair to the people who make MSOffice
Microsoft: Oh.. Okay... Well, what if we struck some sort of deal with the 'MSOffice' people as a gesture of good will? Maybe bundle their software with our OS?
Government: Why that sounds like a wonderful idea. I'm sure the MSOffice people would really appreciate such a brotherly gesture.

Re:I am _so_ calling this one:

[morgan_greywolf (835522)]

Pssst. DoJ had oversight of Vista, too, and it turned out just f...uhhh...oh. Nevermind. Nothing to see here, move along

Re:I am _so_ calling this one:

[thtrgremlin (1158085)]

Are you kidding? They did great! It has really helped spread out the market and expand peoples awareness of the range of OS's out there. OS is really becoming more of that background as cross compatibility really expands. Wasn't that the point? At least in terms of the 2001 judgment?
IMHO, this is how most government intervention works. They are very clever.

Re:

[smitty_one_each (243267)]

Yeah, or 4: you be the judge.

Re:I am _so_ calling this one:

[darkmeridian (119044)]

We can hate Microsoft but as a libertarian, I find this development scary. Getting the federal government involved in the design and manufacture of a product is unwarranted and is akin to precrime. The US Government should leave Microsoft's development of Windows 7 alone. If it turns out to have anti-competitive effects, then the government can punish Microsoft for it. Everyone may say that would be too little, too late, but preemptive strikes are un-American. (And besides, we can always break MS up if it keeps pushing out monopolistic products.)

Re:I am _so_ calling this one:

[pmbasehore (1198857)]

We can hate Microsoft but as a libertarian, I find this development scary. Getting the federal government involved in the design and manufacture of a product is unwarranted and is akin to precrime. The US Government should leave Microsoft's development of Windows 7 alone. If it turns out to have anti-competitive effects, then the government can punish Microsoft for it. Everyone may say that would be too little, too late, but preemptive strikes are un-American. (And besides, we can always break MS up if it keeps pushing out monopolistic products.)

As much as I would love to see a version of Windows that actually follows applicable laws before legal action is taken against it, I shudder to think of the precedent that this sets. If the government doesn't like/doesn't get enough kickbacks from a company, then all of a sudden their entire design and manufacturing process is subject to unwarranted government intervention.

As a republican, I find this sort of increased government intervention frightening.

darkmeridian has a great point, too--we can always break Microsoft up if the monopolistic policies do not stop. It would likely even be easier to separate than Ma Bell was in the 80s--Microsoft peripherals, Microsoft software, Microsoft gaming, etc etc.

Just my $0.02.

Re:I am _so_ calling this one:

[by Anonymous Coward]

As a republican, I find this sort of increased government intervention frightening.

Then maybe you should stop calling yourself a republican.

Re:I am _so_ calling this one:

[LWATCDR (28044)]

"We can hate Microsoft but as a libertarian, I find this development scary. "
That is okay I find libertarians scary.

This is part of the punishment that Microsoft received. A pretty ineffective one if you ask me but still one of them.
This isn't a precrime this is probation.

Re:I am _so_ calling this one:

[by Anonymous Coward]

bring us back to the ideals of the founding fathers of the country

Well, if those ideas are still good and pertinent ideas today, then bringing them back may be good. I don't give a hoot who came up with them though. If our founding fathers said that blacks should be slaves I would flatly disagree with them. Just because our founding fathers said something doesn't automatically make it worthy of being brought back.

But what scares me is political extremism. I don't think that *everything* should be privatized, nor do I think that businesses should have no government oversight or intervention (especially in the Day of Monopolies), though I have heard extreme libertarians say this stuff.

Extreme republicans and democrats are just as scary, IMO. Real solutions to real problems will not come from extremism, nor from blind acceptance of overbroad party-line solutions that apply quite well in economic/social/technological landscapes other than the one we have.

Re:I am _so_ calling this one:

[RiotingPacifist (1228016)]

Do you think that US independence was a bad idea too? Honestly?

On behalf of the rest of the world im gunna have to say yes

Re:I am _so_ calling this one:

[bberens (965711)]

Everyone may say that would be too little, too late, but preemptive strikes are un-American.

I disagree on two counts. First, this is not a preemptive strike. This is the punishment for past wrongdoings. I would liken it to being on parole. The 'police' watch over you very carefully for a while to make sure you keep your nose clean. Secondly, it's no longer correct to suggest that preemptive strikes are un-American. That has been our standing military policy since at minimum 5 years, and arguably longer than that. It is in fact, you, who are un-American. (even if I agree with your stance).

Re:I am _so_ calling this one:

[Amiga Trombone (592952)]

I disagree on two counts. First, this is not a preemptive strike. This is the punishment for past wrongdoings. I would liken it to being on parole.

No, it's not like parole, parole has a defined expiration date. What's the expiration date of Microsoft's parole?

Re:I am _so_ calling this one:

[PetiePooo (606423)]

The US Government should leave Microsoft's development of Windows 7 alone. If it turns out to have anti-competitive effects, then the government can punish Microsoft for it.

Once someone has been convicted of murder, they're put in jail until society can be reasonably sure they aren't going to do it again. The convict necessarily loses most or all of his freedoms until he regains society's trust.

While not murder, Microsoft (the corporate entity) has been convicted of anti-competitive behavior. I think it is entirely just for society to monitor them for a while to ensure they don't do it again. Think of it as a convict's probation period. Would a judge let a convicted murderer who feels their last murder was justified go without jail time or probation?

Microsoft's board has not admitted or acknowledged that they've committed anti-competitive acts; I think they still feel they've been unjustly treated by the DoJ. Saying we should just leave them alone and wait until they turn out something else that's anti-competitive is akin to saying we're not going to jail unrepentant murder convicts, not going to monitor them, and if they kill again, then we'll just tell them again that they shouldn't do that. That's not a deterrent!

Not to mention that Microsoft understands that some ethical/law violations make good business sense. They make more money by ignoring a law and paying the fines from the profits they reap than they would make by following the law. When an individual shows no scruples, we put them away. Why should a corporate entity be any different?

Re:I am _so_ calling this one:

[AJWM (19027)]

The only way to get a monopoly is to provide better service than the competition.

Hah! If that were true, there'd be no need for antitrust legislation. However, the issue isn't really how they got the monopoly in the first place (it was pretty much handed to them by IBM). The laws that they broke, and are being supervised to make sure they don't break them again, are laws that are intended to prevent a monopoly from abusing its monopoly status to either maintain or expand into other areas its monopoly without providing better service than the competition. You know, things like product-tying, questionable vendor pre-load contracts, etc.

Re:You're kidding?

[Kamokazi (1080091)]

This reminds me of Katrina...how do you make a huge disaster even worse? Throw some federal bureaucracy into the mix.

Re:You're kidding?

[UnknowingFool (672806)]

This reminds me of Katrina...how do you make a huge disaster even worse? Throw some incompetent federal bureaucracy into the mix.

There fixed that for you. Bureaucracy in itself isn't bad. The problem with FEMA was that it was run by idiots who, over the years, drove away all the competent people. FEMA for the most part did a good job with the 1996 Midwest floods, Nor Cal earthquake, and Sept. 11. By the time of Katrina, who was in charge of FEMA: A lawyer who had no experience in emergency management, no experience running a large organization, and may have exaggerated or falsified his resume. Also the federal government in its wisdom decided to merge the previously small and independent FEMA into the huge conglomerate that is the Department of Homeland Security while reducing its funding.

Re:You're kidding?

[JCSoRocks (1142053)]

I love how much abuse FEMA gets. Everyone always leaves out the awesomely retarded governor of that state. The few things she did do... were interesting [wikipedia.org].

Re:You're kidding?

[UnknowingFool (672806)]

From my standpoint, everyone that was involved with Katrina was over their heads. Why I put more blame on FEMA is that emergency management was the reason it was created and it failed due to the incompetence at top. The governor of a state and the mayor of the city might be idiots but they clearly were not trained for this kind of situation. One of the main reasons/excuses that the federal gave why aid was not sent earlier was that Louisiana and New Orleans had not formally requested it. Basically they didn't fill out the correct paperwork; however, numerous counter examples were given where detailed requests were being passed to FEMA and the federal government but for some reason, it did not act on the requests.

Bureaucracy in itself IS bad!

[mangu (126918)]

The problem with Katrina wasn't Katrina itself, it was the idiots who built levees that allowed a city to exist below the natural water level in a zone where hurricanes happen from time to time.

The problem with MS-Windows is the legislation that allows copyrights for binary executable files. Check the US Constitution: "To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries". Which part of "Writings" they didn't understand? Where is it mentioned the exclusive Right to codes compiled from Writings?

If the US Constitution were fully respected, programmers should have to publish their source code in order to get copyright protection.

Re:Bureaucracy in itself IS bad!

[UnknowingFool (672806)]

The problem with Katrina wasn't Katrina itself, it was the idiots who built levees that allowed a city to exist below the natural water level in a zone where hurricanes happen from time to time.

The levees were built over 40 years ago based on the best known estimates at the time. However, over the last 30 years, the Army Core of Engineers has repeatedly warned that they were not adequate and asked for funding to replace the system. Every year, they were told to fix the levees, but when it came time to fund the upgrade, no money was given to them to actually do it.

No, we're serious.

[mollog (841386)]

Perhaps you haven't been following the Microsoft/DoJ saga. Microsoft has gained its dominance on the desktop by spiking its competitors software via the API. The gummint is just trying to be the police that makes sure that the API is fully open and available to developers just as it would be for Microsoft's internal developers.

Where have you been?

Re:Death Knell

[TheRealMindChild (743925)]

Just wait until the first backdoor-so-that-the-govt-can-fight-terrorism is found... "doom" doesn't even begin to explain fallout.