Documentation Compliance Means MS Can Resume Collecting Protocol Royalties 139
angry tapir writes "Microsoft may begin collecting royalties again for licensing some protocols because clear technical documentation is now available, according to the US Department of Justice. The change comes after the DOJ issued its latest joint status report regarding its 2002 antitrust settlement with Microsoft. The settlement required Microsoft to make available technical documentation that would allow other vendors to make products that are interoperable with Windows."
Outrageous (Score:5, Insightful)
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Damn your pizza analogies, I'm hungry now...
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It could be worse. If you've had a few drinks and he used a car analogy, you could be off driving right now...
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First, protocols are like food recipes.
Which can be copyrighted and regarded as a trade secret. Or do you think that KFC should have to post their recipe online for all to see?
Perhaps you should try a car analogy instead? ;)
Re:Outrageous (Score:5, Informative)
You can't copyright recipes, and anything can be regarded as a trade secret.
Re:Outrageous (Score:5, Funny)
Yes, I should have left it at trade secret. My stupid. I shall now commence pounding my head against the table to atone for my error.
I also think that we just got trolled, based on the handle of the first poster.....
Re:Outrageous (Score:5, Funny)
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Bah. Just wait until GoatseAnalogyGuy hears about this! ^^
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Yes, in some cases you can [copyright.gov]. I simple list of ingredients cannot, but then I don't think a protocol would be considered just a list of ingredients.
Re:Outrageous (Score:4, Informative)
A protocol is simply a statement of facts.
Facts are not copyrightable.
Sweat of the brow does not determine if something is deserving of copyright either. It must have _some_ creativity. Indeed, this is why software for years was not deserving of copyright, because it was considered a "list of instructions for a machine" instead of creative. This changed in the early 80's I believe (correct me if it was earlier).
A recipe is not copyrightable. It is a list of facts to reach a goal. The artwork, layout, etc, however, is. Thus cookbooks are copyrighted.
Software is unique in that it's now protected by both copyright, as if it's art, _and_ patent, as if it's a machine. Why one needs both is baffling to me.
--
BMO
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I've had more than 60K recipes online for over a decade and nobody ever bothered me about it. Sadly, I can't provide a link as the site's down now two weeks while we shift hosting providers. It's a hobby and it's free so I'm not apologetic about that. I'm a fairly busy guy and I'm not going to let that get in the way of my slashdotting. We get about 250k hits a month, down from a peak of over a million.
You can't put out your protocol under anything less than an "all implementations are free" license and
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You can't put out your protocol under anything less than an "all implementations are free" license and then pretend you're supporting interopability.
Of course you can. It's called "reasonable and non-discriminating", and it's when you license your protocol to anyone who asks, for the same price regardless of who asks, and that price is reasonable. See MPEG4 etc.
It can be argued whether this is open, but interoperable - sure.
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RAND is a cover for non-open. It used to work before the lawyers got ahold of it. Let me school you:
There is one and only one measure of openness now: You can implement it without a license, or you can't. That's it. You want to be interoperable, or you want to control who can interact with your interface. The control is the limiting factor and it's the difference between useful and not.
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If you write your recipe as some creative prose, then sure, you can copyright that, the same as any creative prose.
But when I come along and see your prose and say "man that's pointless, here's a mere list of ingredients and some straight forward instructions" there's nothing you can do about it. Copyright doesn't prevent me from making a recipe of your prose, and copyright does not protect recipes.
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That of course brings up another question. Should anything be legally treated as a trade secret. Does not the end user, the potential victim of malfeasance have a right to make knowledgeable choices. Should not every citizens be entitled to the truth of what they are purchasing, is the government betraying it's own citizens when it allows companies to with hold information from the public that would likely alter their choice to select a product.
The reality is, in the 21st century there is no longer any r
You can, kinda, from copyright.gov (Score:2)
http://www.copyright.gov/fls/fl122.html [copyright.gov]
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http://www.copyright.gov/fls/fl122.html [copyright.gov]
Given the above, can someone please explain to me why Computer Software is copyrightable?
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http://www.copyright.gov/fls/fl122.html [copyright.gov]
Given the above, can someone please explain to me why Computer Software is copyrightable?
It is considered a literary work. Given that nobody actually practices literate programming, I don't think this makes much sense.
A little knowledge can be a dangerous thing (Score:2)
You can't copyright recipes
Mere listings of ingredients as in recipes, formulas, compounds, or prescriptions are not subject to copyright protection. However, when a recipe or formula is accompanied by substantial literary expression in the form of an explanation or directions, or when there is a combination of recipes, as in a cookbook, there may be a basis for copyright protection. Recipes [copyright.gov]
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Actually you can copyright recipes.
They are creative works just like novels and movies.
And most of them btw are longer than the notorious Happy Birthday which somehow seems to enjoy copyright even though it's 4 lines long.
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As for copyright, ye
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About the only thing that you -can't- do with a trade secret is if you know it most agreements forbid you from disclosing it or competing using it.
They only limit you if you signed an agreement, and you're in a country where the authorities give a damn.
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No, but if you reverse-engineer KFC chicken and determine a recipe that makes something that tastes exactly the same, KFC can't stop you from publishing it.
Re:Outrageous (Score:4, Informative)
Just mix these commonly-found spices together! Great when used for skinless chicken fingers too.
2 tablespoons salt
2 cups flour
2 tablespoons pepper
4 tablespoons paprika
1 teaspoon garlic salt
1 tablespoon mustard, ground
1 tablespoon French thyme, ground
1 tablespoon sweet basil
1 teaspoon oregano, ground
1 tablespoon jamaica ginger, ground
http://www.bubhub.com.au/community/forums/showthread.php?t=14201&page=2 [bubhub.com.au]
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What the hell is “garlic salt”? Isn’t that just garlic and salt? But how much of it is garlic then?fresh ingredients, it will taste way better! (Or deep-frozen. But not dried or heated or something. But take more if it’s fresh because of the additional water in it.)
2. If you put the seasoning *below* the skin of the chicken, with a bit of butter, it will become even greater.
3. I prefer real herbes de Provence and a bit or garlic instead. Best taste ever. (If done right.)
How this is o
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Huh, halt the comment just went *poof*. WTH happened there? Here the full comment again:
What the hell is “garlic salt”? Isn’t that just garlic and salt? But how much of it is garlic then? What the hell is “garlic salt”? Isn’t that just garlic and salt? But how much of it is garlic then?
Oh, and by the way:
1. If you use fresh ingredients, it will taste way better! (Or deep-frozen. But not dried or heated or something. But take more if it’s fresh because of the additio
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Actually, rumour has it that in the 80s, KFC switched to using just salt, pepper, MSG and flour. I do think the modern version is less tasty.
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Recipes cannot be copyrighted, although the instructions can be.
You can also patent the machines that put together your item, which would also document exactly how to replicate it.
Basically companies that have a 'secret recipe' are taking a risk-reward gamble.
If you can keep it a secret, you don't have to patent it. Patenting would protect it, but it would "start the clock" so to speak. The patent would eventually expire and the documentation would be there plain as day.
The big companies rely on people thin
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If KFC really ran ads on how to make their secret recipe then they just lost trade secret status through voluntary disclosure.
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They didn't... they only showed them picking up like 3 of them before they said something like "Okay, what's our cost up to now?" I think the ingredients they had picked up so far were pretty generic, flour etc.
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You forgot that KFCs secret recipe is protected in order to keep them competitive against their, uh, competitors. Microsoft forfeited that right when they stopped having competitors, that's why the DoJ got involved in the first place.
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I think the IM clients are a bad example.
The IM clients rely on a central server that costs money.
A company using Microsoft's FAT format for its memory card isn't going to cost Microsoft anything.
Starting your own disk format is much harder than your own IM client.
Really, I've always thought that its the file formats that are keeping Microsoft in their position.
For instance if you could load windows drivers in Linux, or Mac I think Microsoft would be in serious trouble.
Re:Outrageous (Score:4, Interesting)
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there's no reason you can't charge a license for a protocol,
Bullshit. There are many reasons why charging a license for a protocol is bad. The fact that you are dishonestly pretending there are no reasons is telling.
---
Don't be fooled, slashdot is not immune, like most social networiking sites it is full of lying astroturfers dishonestly pretending to be objective third parties rather than paid company propaganda.
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but seriously, are you suggesting if i come up with a protocol for transfering data between x and y, i shouldn't be able to charge people to use it? i've already pointed out i don't agree with patenting a protocol, so please don't waste time retreating into that.
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telling in what way,
You didn't respond to my main point. Dishonest.
judging by your sig maybe you think i'm paid or something - if you know somewhere i can get paid for pointing out the obvious like i am, sign me up!
Not explicitly stating you are not an astroturfer and trying to distract. Dishonest.
but seriously, are you suggesting if i come up with a protocol for transfering data between x and y, i shouldn't be able to charge people to use it?
Pretending there are no reasons why this is a bad idea. Dis
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For all your pomp about dishonesty, you are doing a pretty good job of poorly reading "there's no reason you can't charge" as if it says "there's no reason you shouldn't charge".
Your attitude is that I shouldn't charge you for my booklet about what my various smoke signals mean, you need to go further than repeating your attitude to establish that I can't charge for it.
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For all your pomp about dishonesty, you are doing a pretty good job of poorly reading "there's no reason you can't charge" as if it says "there's no reason you shouldn't charge".
Thank you, an actual honest response. Yes, a very literal reading would be as you say however given the context he/she was trying to imply a lot more without explicitly saying it (as advertising/marketing lowlifes frequently do, trying to deceive the reader while avoiding a actual, legal commitment) and I called him on it. The fac
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His support of clean room implementations (back here: http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1476008&cid=30411612 [slashdot.org] ) suggests that my reading is the intended reading, not an over-reading.
No, same problem. In that post he's also trying to imply that because you can [legally] do something then you should do something while pretending there are no reasons at all not to.
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Don't be fooled, slashdot is not immune, like most social networking sites it is full of lying astroturfers dishonestly pretending to be
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Good response AC. Go read Bit's other posts, a few are coherent but most lack arguements and many are full of insults like 'astroturfer.
Oh goody, a troll. Get a life - if this is your idea of entertainment you need one.
---
Don't be fooled, slashdot is not immune, like most social networking sites it is full of lying astroturfers dishonestly pretending to be objective third parties rather than paid company propaganda.
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For those reading: The above rambling post may be an astroturfer trying to rationalize his/her sad existence. Probably he's posting anonymously because he/she prefers not to say "I'm not an astroturfer" under their username. While quoting me it doesn't actually address any of the points I've made (e.g. "no reason" in the original post when he knows full well there are many reasons) while also trying to baffle the reader with BS.
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Don't be fooled, slashdot is not immune, like most social networking sites i
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Protocol licensing really isn't all that bad unless you try to be sneaky about it, i.e., with a submarine patent.
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No problem here but a monopoly should not be allowed to bundle products either.
Re:Outrageous (Score:4, Insightful)
You might be able to patent a *particular* implementation of the protocol, but if you think you can patent a 'protocol', you don't understand what a protocol is.
Its like patenting a language. Can you imagine someone patenting English, or French, and then in order to speak it, you'd have to pay a license fee? I'm not talking about books on learning the language, or video courses, or whatever, I'm talking about the language itself.
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Or it is kinda like this article [theonion.com] from 1998. Sometimes life imitates art.
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The license agreement says you are only allowed to use their BBQ sauce on Microsoft approved pizzas. And before you know, these pizzas will be degraded.
I'd say any pizza with BBQ sauce on it is already pretty much degraded!
I'd go for baconnaise instead!
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protocols (Score:3, Insightful)
Since when protocols are something you can license? They're pretty much available for everyone, technical details available or not. Protocols really shouldn't be limited by licenses.
However on another case, Blizzard has [slashdot.org] been fighting such too [slashdot.org] against cheaters on their games.
But really, what law do you violate if you're using a "licensed" protocol? I haven't heard of such cases before.
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The DMCA only prohibits reverse engineering to circumvent "copy protection" mechanisms. It would be circular reasoning to assert that the copyrighted material being protected is the protocol itself.
Re:protocols (Score:4, Informative)
Not only that, the DMCA explicitly allows reverse engineering of software in order to allow for interoperability with other applications:
see paragraph (f) here:
http://static.chillingeffects.org/1201.shtml [chillingeffects.org]
Microsoft has no ground to stand on from the copyright angle, so it's attempting to imlpement the same limitations from a software patent angle. Which currently has no value in most of the civilized world.
Re:protocols (Score:4, Insightful)
Protocols are not code. Protocols are methods of interaction between pieces of code, even if the code is methods of interaction embedded in hardware. That these methods could possibly be considered as something that should be protected by some sort of intellectual property agreement is a testament to how far we've fallen from the root assumption of Unix: that all things should be able to connect to all other things whenever physically possible.
This is the mindset that brought us DRM, all of Sony's stupid proprietary media formats, and an iPhone that won't tether.
I'm sick of it. I have enough stuff that doesn't connect to my other stuff. I'm not buying any more stuff that doesn't connect to the stuff that I already have. I'm not using any systems that require proprietary licensing to connect the stuff I have to the new stuff I buy. I'm done with all that stupidness.
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Re:protocols (Score:5, Insightful)
In fact I can't think of any protocol that was kept secret because it performed better at the time. Maybe some old networking protocol or something. I can think of a ton of protocols that were kept secret purposely to prevent interoperability. Here's a few:
SMB/CIFS
CDMA diagnostic port protocol
Blizzard online game protocols
IPodITunes protocol
Skype
AIM protocol
MSN chat protocol
Yahoo chat protocol
There are others. Fortunately reverse engineering a product for the purpose of interoperability is allowed under the DMCA. That is one of the bright spots of that legislation.
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Blizzard online game protocols ...
Fortunately reverse engineering a product for the purpose of interoperability is allowed under the DMCA.
That's assuming, of course, that you can convince a judge that your purpose was interoperability. Last I heard, it was still illegal to make a client interoperate with Blizzard's servers [massively.com], and illegal to make a server interoperate with Blizzard's clients [eff.org].
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Lrn2read, plz. A poster up the chain already posted the relevant article and subsection specifically stating that reverse-engineering is allowed as long as it isn't used to circumvent copy protection mechanisms.
Examples:
Reverse-engineering Windows Genuine Advantage: Illegal period.
Reverse-engineering the protocol your cell phone uses to transfer data from your computer to the phone and vice-versa: Not illegal, caveat being if it is protected by DRM mechanisms. Encryption doesn't count as DRM (Yet. We'll see
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Except in the case of DRM, anything done for interoperability must first circumvent copy protection because the copy protection is an integral part of being interoperable.
Even better for the companies is that you HAVE to implement the DRM. Failure to do so is a violation of the patent license you need to even use the format period.
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The prior poster is correct. If you actually read the text of the DMCA, it provides a specific exemption for interoperability efforts. That's what was such a crock in the DeCSS cases. DVD Jon was specifically writing a Linux DVD player, which should have been clearly allowed by the letter and spirit of the statute. The judge made a catastrophically bad ruling.
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Just in time, too! (Score:5, Insightful)
And it only took them ten years. [wikipedia.org]
Funny how the government doesn't even give you ten days past the due date of a parking violation though, isn't it?
Ahh, shit (Score:2, Funny)
Decision to force them to document more protocols (Score:4, Interesting)
An interesting side effect of the DOJ's decision to force Microsoft to document more of their protocols was that internal Microsoft employees have found their job easier and the teams more efficient.
I stumbled across this tidbit while research for a final paper about software patent (good/bad/why/alternatives). You can read about it here [ssrn.com].
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Any hope for something similar when it comes to MS Office and Exchange?
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Oh, do you mean these :)
Microsoft Exchange Server 2010 Protocol Documentation [microsoft.com]
Here is the announcement from Feb 2008: Microsoft Makes Strategic Changes in Technology and Business Practices to Expand Interoperability [microsoft.com].
Bing is your friend. [bing.com]
-Foredecker
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Given the article, don't you think your protocols link is a little rich? Especially given the similar exFAT [theregister.co.uk] licensing article from yesterday [slashdot.org] ?
You're open or you're not. There's none of this licensing the protocol nonsense in "interopability".
BTW: I'm not stalking you. It seems we're interested in the same stuff. I haven't hit your blog link yet - I've been busy selling your products and blind links from that thread merit the due caution of access from offsite hosting through a proxy or seven, which t
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No worries :)
What is a 'blind link'?
-Foredecker
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A blind link is a link to a server that's not known good, or a link to an URL shortener like j.mp [slashdot.org]
Microsoft advises against clicking blind links, and that's good guidance. It's talking to a wall since Twitter almost requires those links, and it's the hot tech right now. Of course I have my own URL shortener service so I don't have to use other people's.
I'm not worried about you piercing my anonymous veil, since once you've been online as long as I have, "whois username" will almost always pierce that vei
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Hahahah! The bit about the honeydipper is hilarious! I have a septic system and when it isnt working, Ill pay those guys anything. I unclogged it myself last winter and I dont want to do it again...
Im the same way about my foredecker handle. Its not anonymous in any mayterial way, but there is separation from work. Thats why I use my Wordpress blog now and will only use my msdn blog for pure work stuff.
In any case, Id really enjoy meeting you. Next week is really busy for me, but anytime after the 19th wou
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That would be lovely. Sorry about the ranting. You'll note that at 3am on a Saturday I can sometimes get a little dumb.
I'll get you a direct email some way.
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APK - I ask you, politely, not to nag me about this. While you are free to do so, posting a reply to almost all of my posts is tiresome. I'm asking you again, politely, please stop it.
Its anoyong, and fills my in box with spam. This behavior is casting you you in the role of a spammer in a very real way.
-Foredecker
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Ah! I just figured out how to solve this... I'm setting my Slasdhot preferences to only send me mail for replies that score a 2 or better. So no more APK mail in my inbox, but I'll still get notifications of Symbolsets mail.
Cool! lets see if it works...
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Aw, shucks.
I've figured out why I repost to you so much. I friended you and you friended me, and you're a subscriber which puts all of your posts at +3 and makes your posts full rather than abbreviated according to my preference settings. If you post in a thread that I'm interested in your post is always fully expanded, and I'm always interested in the threads you post in and you always say interesting stuff that I usually disagree with. I was starting to worry.
Now don't feed the troll. Not only can he
Charge them for speaking english (Score:1)
I mean they didn't invent it. Their using of this critical interoperability protocol without payment to the inventors is ludicrous.
just my 2 cents ( paid in full to the anglo-saxons )
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...Actually, they'd make trivial, incompatible changes to the language and call it Microsoft Loglan.
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Really? Cool.. James Cooke's estate, will be collecting some massive royalties from MS for use of text written in Loglan :)
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No, they'd call it L#.
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They'd switch to Loglan [loglan.org].
...Actually, they'd make trivial, incompatible changes to the language and call it Microsoft Loglan.
Meanwhile, FSF would promote Lojban [lojban.org], the free alternative that forked back in 1987. Many flame wars would ensue.
Congratulations! (Score:5, Funny)
Congratulations, Microsoft, and allow me to offer this toast:
May you attempt to create a revenue stream and inhibit competition, and continue to poison your long-term success by limiting others' ability to create novel goods and services with your platforms.
May your long, slow, demise be as stealthy as a panther in the night, so that you may continue not to understand until it is too late to recover and your war chest is too depleted to purchase any particularly egregious laws during your death spasms.
And finally, may Steve Ballmer always be your public face. He is nearly as amusing as Sarah Palin.
Re:Congratulations! (Score:5, Funny)
And finally, may Steve Ballmer always be your public face. He is nearly as amusing as Sarah Palin.
You software hippies are just afraid of Steve Ballmer because of his good looks, his charm, his masculinity, his Christianity, his ability connect to the common user and his overall wonderfulness!
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Yes, someone who throws chairs about so handily must press a lot of benches.
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You software hippies are just afraid of Steve Ballmer because of his good looks, his charm, his masculinity, his Christianity, his ability connect to the common user and his overall wonderfulness!
Yawn. Wake me when he's the mother of five children.
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And MS is the most developer friendly company in the world, so they have plenty of others creating novel goods and services with their platforms. But nice try, rabble rouser.
I... I don't know what to say.
What did that weekend at the lake mean to you? I shared my darkest secrets with you as we held each other in front of the fire. I bared my soul to you. And now you accuse me of rousing rabble?!? I thought we meant something to each other. You know how I feel about the rousing of rabble, and this is what you
Did Microsoft made yet another mistake? (Score:1, Interesting)
OK. So the government order Microsoft to document the protocols. Microsoft then does what the government asks. Now the government acknowledges that Microsoft has done what was asked.
Somehow, the comments here make it seem like Microsoft made yet another mistake. Wasn't this what they asked Microsoft to do?
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OK. So the government order Microsoft to document the protocols. Microsoft then does what the government asks. Now the government acknowledges that Microsoft has done what was asked.
Somehow, the comments here make it seem like Microsoft made yet another mistake.
This is Slashdot. Hereabouts, the ultimate Microsoft mistake is that it exists in the first place.
Well, some softer guys would settle at MS releasing all its existing code under GPL, and switching to producing a fully libre Linux distro with drivers, blackjack, and hookers.
Microsoft undocumentation :) (Score:2)
No, they were asked to open the specs not, after much delay, publish a mishmash of source code and API calls and then charge other compamies to connect their computers to their-own customers computer
Trade barriers (Score:2)
Nice, another trade barrier. You can't use this protocol unless you pay $x. At least, if you live in the USA. If you live in a country where interoperability is a right, you now have documentation to help you attain it. If you live in a country where the $x barrier to entry doesn't exist or isn't enforced, you can now make your product $x cheaper than your competitors in the USA.
Interoperability: brought to you by the European Union and the People's Republic of China while companies in the USA fought expens
Samba has a license for many of the key patents (Score:5, Informative)
http://samba.org/samba/PFIF/ [samba.org]
Samba and any other free software project (via the PFIF) has a royalty free license to most of the patents that are important for these protocols.
There are some patents that are excluded from this (see appendix 4 of the agreement for a list of the excluded patents), and we do indeed need to avoid infringement of those patents. That has not so far proved to be an insurmountable obstacle, although it is an inconvenience.
Cheers, Tridge
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Speaking of government regulation... I know there are laws against talking on the phone sans hands-free... laws against texting... I wonder if there are any laws against visiting Slashdot.
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I do believe more and more states are outlawing "Distracted Driving," which is a catchall that covers texting, talking without handsfree, receiving oral sex on the freeway, slashdotting, Farking, flogging the dolphin and watching TV or movies on your portable. Kids these days, once they get off our lawn, seem to be offered less fun than we had.
Naturally proper Libertarians are going to have a problem with that. I'm a Libertarian, but not a proper one, so I don't have a problem with these laws as long as