Microsoft Attacks Google on Copyright

The Microsoft Corporation has prepared a blistering attack on rival Google, arguing that the Web search leader takes a cavalier approach to copyright protection. The attack, such as it were, came from Microsoft's Associate General Counsel who was giving a speech to the Association of American Publishers...who have a copyright lawsuit against Google for the last sixteen months. So, an audience ready to hear about how Bad Google is.

Oh boy.

[Sneakernets (1026296)]

Let the chairs fly!

Microsoft's half finished sentence.

[pallmall1 (882819)]

From TFA:

Microsoft, he said, asks the copyrights owner for permission first...

They should have added:

...unless it's software.

no doubt; kettle meet pot.

[WindBourne (631190)]

amazing that MS says these things when they are well known in and out of the industry for their large amounts of theft and patent/copyright abuse, let alone their total abuse of their monopoly.

Re:no doubt; kettle meet pot.

[WindBourne (631190)]

1. Apple Quick Time; Lead to a major 150 million settlement.
2. The code and idea for the embedding in MSIE. Still in the settlement as I recall.
3. How about MSIE itself. they cut a deal to pay the mozaic group spin-off a .01 / each one sold and then embedded it (i.e. the company got SQUAT).
4. Or how about the theft of the stacker's work in dos 6.2. IIRC, they had to pay something like 75 million (not chump change back in the 80's).

And that is just off the top of the head.
Man, you MS types have incredibly short memories on MS's actions, let alone how to use google.

More fun from TFA

[Mateo_LeFou (859634)]

"In essence, Google is saying to you and to other copyright owners: 'Trust us -- you're protected. We'll keep the digital copies secure, we'll only show snippets, we won't harm you, we'll promote you,' "

Bad news, Rubin: Google is exactly right to say that. Fair Use Rule #4 evaluates "the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work." And I don't think it's hard to show that prominence on a Google property affects this potential market *extremely positively.

Re:More fun from TFA

[tha_mink (518151)]

Bad news, Rubin: Google is exactly right to say that. Fair Use Rule #4 evaluates "the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work." And I don't think it's hard to show that prominence on a Google property affects this potential market *extremely positively.

I'd love to see how many "copyright holders" would actually make the choice of being delisted from any and all google enterprises rather than expose the copyrighted work. I'd love it if Google said something like..."All right , no soup for you" and then just delisted everything that had anything to do with them. I doubt they'd care much about infringement then.

It's all bullshit. They don't care about their copyrights until they think they can squeeze money from someone. When YouTube was just YouTube, there was just as much copyrighted stuff there ans there is now. "Google has deep pockets now. They must be infringing something of ours. Let's get em." It's bullshit, plus Google hasn't even started to realize the profit from YouTube advertising. If you were producing a sitcom, wouldn't you want clips of your crap to go viral on YouTube? It's got much better chance happening there than it does on mystupidsitcom.abc.disney.com that's for sure.

Re:More fun from TFA

[iluvcapra (782887)]

I'd love it if Google said something like..."All right , no soup for you" and then just delisted everything that had anything to do with them.

That comes dangerously close to Google abusing its search monopoly.

on mystupidsitcom.abc.disney.com

You mean mystupidsitcom.abc.disney.go.com. They paid a lot of money for the "go.com" TLD, and damn it they're gonna use it!

Re:More fun from TFA

[93 Escort Wagon (326346)]

"In essence, Google is saying to you and to other copyright owners: 'Trust us -- you're protected. We'll keep the digital copies secure, we'll only show snippets, we won't harm you, we'll promote you,' "

It's also an interesting criticism coming from Microsoft, since with just a few wording tweaks that's exactly what Microsoft tells consumers when it comes to things like Trusted Computing.

Re:Microsoft's half finished sentence.

[j00r0m4nc3r (959816)]

asks the copyrights owner for permission

They ask permission like the mafia asks permission.

mmm...

[rbochan (827946)]

mmm... glass houses...

Who's more evil?

[truthsearch (249536)]

And Microsoft takes a "cavalier approach" to their users, to privacy [msversus.org], to the free market... so who's more evil?

If Google really didn't care they could do far far worse to abuse copyright than anything they've done so far. Microsoft is just placating an audience.

Yeah...

[Moggyboy (949119)]

Microsoft guy: "And... and... stop creating tools that people actually find USEFUL and giving them out for FREE, goddamnit! And... and... ummm... Google is a stupid name... and... ummm..."

English?

[adavies42 (746183)]

Is this submission even English? "The Microsoft Corporation", "The attack, such as it were", "who have a copyright lawsuit against Google for the last sixteen months"--none of these are right. And to top it off, it ends in a sentence fragment.

Yesterday, today, tomorrow

[vivaoporto (1064484)]

Yesterday: Microsoft watches with disdain while $company break through unknown waters
Today: Microsoft attacks $company initiative as being illegal, immoral and bad for business in general
Tomorrow: Microsoft try to embrace the very same business model of $company, only with a layer of DRM on top of it, and try to leverage it using the profits of the OS and Office division.

Nothing different from all other endeavors from our good old Microsoft. Who didn't have it coming?

Content is not the holy grail it's made out to be

[MikeRT (947531)]

What people like this fail to understand is that content is just one part of the puzzle. Content is cheap; just look at the number of books that are rejected for publication every year. If every author who got rejected said "fuck it!" and published their content online, Google would be swamped with free books. Having published content is also not even a sign of quality per se, as it is a sign that there is a possible market for it.

Google does create value, which is what the real issue here. Value is what matters in economic terms. They are increasing the value of the content that they index by making it more readily available to the public. If they are making money off of this without violating the exclusive right of copyright holders to control publication of their content (aside from fair use and mandatory licensing), then no one is being hurt, and no one is a leech. Being a leech implies that they are siphoning off value, a la file sharing, rather than clearly adding value by making the books more available and useful.

I'm not much of a Google defender, but the reality is that they are not mooching here. Mooching implies parasitism, which clearly they are not guilty of.

As an author

[tomstdenis (446163)]

of two books that have sold upwards of 2000 copies (yipee I suck!) I have to say, STFU Microsoft. The day my books came out they were on the torrent websites (thanks to my publisher releasing the book in ebook format the same day). Google archiving the book would have ZERO effect on my sales (which are low because nobody knows who I am, and I suck at teh English) and in effect may actually help them if key passages are searchable.

If publishers want to stop piracy of texts, STOP RELEASING EBOOKS THE SAME DAY FOR CRYING OUT LOUD.

Tom

teacup calling the teapot fat

[mastershake_phd (1050150)]

Companies that create no content of their own, and make money solely on the backs of other people's content, are raking in billions through advertising revenue and I.P.O.s," said Mr. Rubin, who oversees copyright and trade-secret law.

Is either buying out your competitors or putting them out of business "creating content"?

Of course...

[RyanFenton (230700)]

Aren't the processes of indexing servers, and the exclusive right to make copies of information inherently in conflict? Same thing with a system that by default allows anyone to share any information publicly, like the phone system, open public speech, or, in this case, the Internet. I don't think the 'copy right' was originally intended to apply beyond books and blueprints anyway, but the way it has grown, I don't know how one would get a representative view of our world without breaking copy rights along the way in at least many small ways.

That's why there have classically been exceptions allowed for sampling information, why one case of illegal copying haven't been used to call every tangential person involved in the copy from being punished, and that the original intent of copyrights, to 'promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts", has classically been the focus, rather than just blindly punishing people, who naturally tend to share information.

Ryan Fenton

Is this April 1st?

[tkrotchko (124118)]

This sounds like an April Fools article.

Next Article:
    RIAA concerned about musicians being ripped off by lopsided contracts

After that:
    Auto Makers insist Congress must tighten emissions and fuel economy standards.

strange relationships

[bcrowell (177657)]

The really weird thing about the google lawsuits is that the publishers suing google are also google's business partners. It's basically a dispute between business allies that's being handled partly in the courts. There's speculation that the outcome will end up being harmful to fair use. Google has tons of cash, and can afford to pay the publishers a certain amount of money to end the suit, even if they really have a good fair use defense that might eventually have held up in court. If that happens, then everybody else's fair use rights could be diminished, because it will be seen as normal that you have to pay for what really should be fair use. Google could end up with a de facto monopoly on indexing books, because competitors wouldn't have enough money to pay the publishers what google paid. (This is mostly paraphrased from a long article in the New Yorker, IIRC.)

Anyone Else Seeing a Pattern Here?

[jeevesbond (1066726)]

GNU/Linux

1. Microsoft attempt to compete with GNU/Linux via conventional methods: reducing cost (releasing free [microsoft.com]--as in beer--versions of products), advertising that TCO is higher for Linux than Windows [microsoft.com] (it's a lie, but what else should we expect them to say?)
2. Conventional methods fail so Microsoft falls-back to good old fashioned dirty tricks: making spurious allegations [slashdot.org] about 'intellectual property'.
3. ...
4. Profit!

Google

1. Microsoft attempts to compete with Google via conventional methods: producing a competing [live.com] services [microsoft.com] with similar capabilities. Then advertise the services as usual, and throw in a bit of IE7 integration in the name of 'choice'.
2. Conventional methods fail so Microsoft falls-back to good old fashioned dirty tricks: making spurious allegations [nytimes.com] about 'intellectual property'.
3. Throw chair across room
4. ...
5. Profit!

Personally am getting a feeling of: 'same bilge, different day' from Microsoft.

MSN search cache?

[mph (7675)]

"Google takes the position that everything may be freely copied unless the copyright owner notifies Google and tells it to stop," Mr. Rubin said. Microsoft, he said, asks the copyright's owner for permission first.

I just checked search.msn.com [msn.com] and it has a cached copy of my webpages. I don't remember Microsoft asking me for permission. (Not that I mind, but it's at odds with Rubin's statement.)

Attack from the MS legal dept

[shadowspar (59136)]

The fact that threats against Google are being launched by Microsoft's legal team instead of their engineering department tells you all you need to know.

Such as it were, indeed

[P0ldy (848358)]

Perhaps this comment is superfluous since the only person backing you up is an Anonymous Coward, and maybe that's you attempting to vindicate yourself. However, no reply attacking your intelligence, right though they were, gave the reason why the phrase is correct. "Such as it were" is an example of the subjunctive. It's a mood. Pick up a grammar book if you want further explanation. The selfsame mood is the reason for the phrase "Were I to go out...". What?? Were I? You don't say I were. You say I was! Yes, it's the subjunctive, and it's a part of so many languages and would still be important even if it were as little used as it is in English.

Re:It is so sad

[UnknowingFool (672806)]

If Microsoft would spend all the cash they give to lawyers on R&D, they might actually produce decent product. Instead, they pump out crap after crap after crap.

MS spent $1+ billion in R&D last quarter so it's not for lack of funding. It's not that they don't have brilliant people. It's that MS as a corporation has conflicting and competing goals. Their different divisions could come out with great products but on the whole, their products must not undermine the whole corporation. Namely they must do everything to ensure Windows is the only operating system, Window Media the only media format, SQL server the only SQL database, etc. The Office division could do a port to Linux. There is some money to be made, but that would undermine Windows. Zune could have been tied to more open formats but that would hurt Windows and the Media division. And the list goes on.

Sony has the same problem. Their MP3 players could have been great and taken the market from Apple but they had to protect their content division. Thus the first versions used proprietary formats that all but crippled them.