Tory Party promises an Open Source Britain, if elected

March 8, 2007 Leave a comment

Matthew Aslett points out that in reality, politicians are leveraging Open Source in their campaigns. This runs contrary to the potential fantasy the Mr. Enderle cooked up. From the article:

Conservative shadow chancellor, George Osborne, has promised “that an incoming Conservative government would create a level playing field for open source software in the UK, in a move which could save taxpayers more than £600 million a year.”

Incredible scenes, as Glyn Moody has noted.

According to a speech made by Osborne at the Royal Society of Arts:

“What it is about is better and more effective government. The problem is that the cultural change has not taken place in government. There isn’t a level playing field for open source software. As it stands, too many companies are frozen out of government IT contracts, stifling competition and driving up costs.

“Taking into account the experience of companies and public sector bodies, it is estimated that the Government could save at least 5% of its annual IT bill if more open source software was used as part of a more effective procurement strategy. That adds up to over £600m a year. The internet age is transforming politics and has the capacity to transform government. Let’s start being open source right now.”

Osborne also announced the appointment of Mark Thompson, of the Judge Business School at Cambridge University, to advise the Party on how to make Britain the open source leader in Europe.

Now, there is no guarantee that the party will win (they haven’t in well over a decade) and the election might not be until as late as 2010, but the fact that Open Source has now made it into political campaigns is an indication of just how mainstream and accepted it is. If you’re still blindly flighting it (which is different than wholesale agreeing with it), you really are fighting a rising tide.

–jeremy

Filed under Linux, Main Page, Microsoft, Open Source

If you can't beat them, fine them (The EU's wrong policy on Microsoft)

March 8, 2007 2 Comments

While I’ve agreed with many of the decisions the EU has made with respect to Microsoft, I have to admit that I don’t agree with this one. From the article:

Neelie Kroes, antitrust chief for the European Commission, tried again last week to show Microsoft Corp. who’s boss. She declared that the software giant is overcharging other companies for access to technology that, in her opinion, doesn’t represent “significant innovation,” and threatened another massive fine: perhaps €1 billion or more. Ms. Kroes’s new assertion of power to assess innovation and to regulate its pricing should get the attention of businesses everywhere. When government officials feel comfortable second-guessing markets on such decisions, no business is safe and no property right secure.

Things like this should be decided by the market, not by Governments or courts. When a monopoly abuses its power, that’s one thing. In some situations like that, the court is the only one who has enough leverage to remedy things. I don’t think anyone, be they Open Source proponents or proprietary vendors, want courts and judges deciding what is “significant innovation” and what value should be placed on it. We’ll have to see how this plays out.

–jeremy

Filed under Linux, Main Page, Microsoft, Open Source

Google offers employees true choice on the desktop

March 1, 2007 Leave a comment

Sure, the fact that “when you start work at Google, you get to choose whether you want a Mac, Windows, or Linux computer” shows how fundamentally Google gets some things. That’s not why I find this article interesting though. There are two very good snippets in the article:

“It strikes me that the fact that this level of choice is so unusual is a fundamental reason why Linux is struggling to make an impact on the desktop.”

There are other factors of course (such as application availability) but the fact is that for many businesses, Windows continues to be the desktop operating system of choice simply because it is currently the desktop operating system of choice.

I don’t think this factor is taken into account often enough. Companies are averse to change, even if that change is good for them. The “no one ever got fired for purchasing $COMPANY” mentality is pervasive in upper level technical management at many companies. We don’t just need to create a better product – we need to overcome hurdles like the one above.

“For many uses Windows may well be the best solution, but its difficult to think of another business asset for which managers would not even consider an alternative when it comes to renewal time.
In this regard businesses are doing themselves a disservice. I am not suggesting that Linux is a better option, but I am once again arguing that businesses owe it to themselves to consider the desktop requirements of their users before making a sweeping decision about desktop requirements.”

This drives home a point that I have thought about before but failed to put so succinctly. Why is it that for most assets, there is a considerable evaluation process and procurement procedure, but when it comes to choosing a platform that will run a considerable part of your operational infrastructure you don’t even think twice about deployment options. A disservice indeed. The question becomes, how do you overcome these obstacles. In many areas, we already are. Desktop Linux is not one of them. Yet.

–jeremy

Filed under Google, Linux, Main Page, Microsoft, Open Source

Hopefully my last Novell Microsoft Agreement Post; or Nobody reads this stuff

February 25, 2007 Leave a comment

I wasn't going to post any more about the Novell Microsoft Agreement. I don't have anything else to add and really what else can be said. Don has posted on this issue after Novell contacted him as a result of him comparing the deal to “eating a bug for money”. A couple items in the post are too good not to share:
From Novell's point of view, the deal is supposed to be about giving customers some peace of mind over being sued for patent infringement. But the document that is supposed to explain this to customers is missing some information, and the documents that are actually supposed to contain the missing information are secret.
I don't think this is some big conspiracy, just the result of rushing something through without reading it very carefully. Novell and Microsoft are too big to pull off a conspiracy, but they're both bureaucratic enough to do paperwork that ends up being full enough of dumb mistakes to be pretty much meaningless.
Simple things first. If you still believe people read this stuff, try reading it. Covenant to Customers has two obvious mistakes: Novell spelled “Novel” and the awkward “on account of a such Customers' use of specific copies”, which looks like the result of someone starting a singular-to-plural edit and not finishing. The page has been up since November 2 of last year. Not a big deal, but like I said, nobody reads this stuff.
Now go back and read “Covenant to Customers” again. You get a bunch of Capitalized Words, some of which show up in the definitions section, and some of which don't. One of the terms is “Clone Product”. You don't get sued for running a Covered Product, but Covered Product doesn't include Clone Product, and Clone Product isn't defined. So which of the products included in the SUSE distribution are Clone Products? I asked, but that list is not available.
Not too encouraging when the company name is spelled wrong in the document. I can appreciate that novel is a word, so will pass a spell checker, but it would certainly seem to validate the nobody reads this stuff claim. He then goes into specifically what the Patent portion of the agreement protects you from:
You have a Covenant, so you're all squared away, right? But the Covenant says it covers Covered Products, and Covered Products doesn't include Clone Products, and you don't get a copy of the definition of Clone Products. Covered or not? You're just as mystified about the answer to “Will Microsoft sue me?” as you were before.
Another good one: “Microsoft reserves the right to update (including discontinue) the foregoing covenant pursuant to the terms of the Patent Cooperation Agreement…” Yes, the Patent Cooperation Agreement that you don't get to see.
Put it all together, and you get, “We promise not to sue you for running some but not necessarily all of the software you get from Novell, unless we stop promising not to sue you, and we won't tell you which software you get from Novell we might sue you for now, or under what circumstances we'll stop promising not to sue you for the rest.”
In others words, not much. His conclusion is right in line with what myself and almost all others have been saying:
That sense of wanting to win by product, not by litigation, is what protects you in the short term. What protects you long term is that the IT industry is just a series of recruiting contests. A company wins recruiting contests by serving good fajitas and letting an employee get a $70 laptop power supply without spending $200 in time on getting approval to buy it. A company loses recruiting contests when it's seen as succeeding through legal attack, not great product. Who wants to work on a product that customers have to be sued to buy? If a company's litigiousness makes it miss a round of recruiting, it misses the round of product that those recruits would have built, and game over.
Anyway, the check is cashed, the bug is eaten, Microsoft seems equally likely to sue you for running Linux no matter where you get it — not very — and if all goes well, a lot of that money will go to the many helpful, hard-working developers at Novell who are doing useful work. I guess what I learned here is that the patent deal doesn't really give Novell customers any special assurances.
Microsoft almost certainly wasn't going to sue you before. This agreement makes them no less likely to sue you. In reality, it probably did give Ballmer more fodder, which will have some impact. If you do see Microsoft start to sue, to me it means they think they are worse off internally than we think they are from an outside perspective. That's not saying a while lot. Companies with viable business plans and sustainable products don't depend on litigation for future growth. Just ask SCO.
–jeremy

Filed under Linux, Main Page, Microsoft, Novell, Open Source

Show Us The Code

February 25, 2007 Leave a comment

Just stumbled across the Show Us Your Code site. I think it's well intentioned, but misses a few things. First and foremost (and take this as constructive feedback please), if you are going to publish an open letter that you want to get taken seriously, you really need to grammar check it. My grammar on this blog isn't always great, but that's because I write it in kind of a conversational style – ie. this is how I talk. When I hand in articles that will be published, you may notice the style and tone is quite different.
On to the content of the site. First, it's not really the code we need from the angle I see it. It's specifically the patents that they feel we have violated. That's a small but fairly important distinction. Also, looking at It lacks logic, especially when you consider that there are developers around the world who would be more than happy to work with Microsoft to resolve this issue. From the view point of Ballmer, it doesn't lack logic (although it may be lacking from an ethical standpoint). You see, he can bluster on about this topic without showing any actual code or naming any patents and in the Enterprise just that slight chance of being sued in the end makes a difference. In the past, it made a huge difference. The reality is that people are wising up to this and the impact now is substantially decreasing. In the near future, it should be negligible. Look at the SCO case. It didn't stop many people from adopting Linux (although I'm sure it did stop some). It did however stop many companies from talking about their Linux adoption. That should not be underestimated.
Now, I've said before that I doubt Microsoft will move forward seriously with any patent cases. It simply leaves them too open to a MAD-like patent war situation and they don't want that. I've always found it odd how Microsoft has been positioning themselves around IP and patents in the Open Source world anyway. Looking at past litigation, I'm not aware of any Open Source company that has been found guilty of infringing other peoples IP anywhere near as much as Microsoft. I'd like to be corrected on this if I am wrong, but the recent $1.5B (yes BILLION) judgment is just one of many against Microsoft. You think they'd realize just how broken the system is. You think they'd want to fix it. But the reality is, they have the money to lose. The long term threat of losing their advantageous monopoly like position is surely much more worrisome.
–jeremy

Filed under Linux, Main Page, Microsoft, Open Source

Ballmer repeats threats against Linux

February 21, 2007 1 Comment

Novell execs must cringe when they see things like this:
Steve Ballmer has reissued Microsoft's patent threat against Linux, warning open-source vendors that they must respect his company's intellectual property.
In a no-nonsense presentation to New York financial analysts last week, Microsoft's chief executive said the company's partnership with Novell, which it signed in November 2006, “demonstrated clearly the value of intellectual property, even in the open-source world.”
The cross-selling partnership means that Microsoft will recommend Suse Linux for customers who want a mixed Microsoft/open-source environment. It also involves a “patent co-operation agreement”, under which Microsoft and Novell agreed not to sue each other's customers for patent infringement.
In a clear threat against open-source users, Ballmer repeated his earlier assertions that open source “is not free”, referring to the possibility that Microsoft may sue Linux vendors. Microsoft has suggested that Linux software infringes some of its intellectual property, but has never named the patents in question.
Ballmer said: “I would not anticipate that we make a huge additional revenue stream from our Novell deal, but I do think it clearly establishes that open source is not free, and open source will have to respect the intellectual property rights of others just as any other competitor will.”
He almost makes it sound like the real value to Microsoft, and the real intention of the agreement, was simply to posture for further protection money from others. I wonder how Novell feels about that in retrospect. Matt Asay asks: “Steve Ballmer: Was this the friend Novell wanted?” I think the answer to that is now clear.
I still wonder if Microsoft realistically thinks they can sue. The amount of potential litigation that could get thrown back is substantial. Red Hat seems to be one of the more likely Microsoft targets, but don't forget that the likes of IBM depend on Linux sales for large chunks of consulting money. It's even more interesting now that Oracle is selling what is in essence a RHEL clone. At this point in the game, I wonder how effective this kind of FUD slinging really is anyway. A few of years ago, many people were fooled. These days, that's certainly changing. Ballmer, it would seem, is not changing with the times. It's unfortunate, as some parts of Microsoft seem to be be attempting to.
–jeremy

Filed under Linux, Main Page, Microsoft, Novell, Open Source, Oracle, Red Hat

The Dell Idea Storm

February 20, 2007 2 Comments

Dell recently released Idea Storm, “Where Your Ideas Reign”. Basically, it's a Digg like site where you can submit ideas and feedback and other Dell community members can vote on them. I'm not sure Dell know what was in store for them. The top ideas, in order, as of now:
Pre-Installed Linux | Ubuntu | Fedora | OpenSUSE | Multi-Boot
Pre-Installed OpenOffice | alternative to MS Works & MS Office
NO EXTRA SOFTWARE OPTION
linux laptop
No OS Preloaded
Have Firefox pre-installed as default browser
Build computers not loaded with extra software
So five of the top seven suggestions have to do with Open Source and the other two (which are really the same suggestion worded differently) has to do with the amount of pre-load junk that people don't want. The thing is, Dell has always said that there was no real demand for Linux (or even no OS) options. While the demographic of a person who would use Idea Strom certainly skews things a bit toward the more technical, the “no demand” issue is clearly no longer much of an issue. Additionally, I've seen it claimed that Windows ended up being cheaper than Linux for OEM's like Dell as a result of all the money they get from companies wanting to pre-load their software on Windows. This is stuff like AOL, Earthlink, free trials, etc. However, it's clear that consumers don't want this stuff. The question now becomes, will Dell listen… and if they do what repercussions will that have on the current OEM stranglehold than Microsoft has. If Dell starts to offer Linux as checkbox option on all of its models, it's only a matter of time until other vendors follow suit. The good news here as that some of the very latest crop of Linux releases are actually ready for prime time desktop use. Things like Compiz/Beryl, XGL and that bit of polish that have been missing are here. We still need to get through the codec issues, but some distributions even have that sorted. This should get interesting.
–jeremy

Filed under Linux, Main Page, Microsoft, Open Source

Red Hat joins Microsoft interop initiative

February 14, 2007 Leave a comment

A post in CBR points out that Red Hat has joined Microsoft's Interop Vendor Alliance. As the article points out though, this seems to be related to JBoss only (remember that JBoss was already working directly with Microsoft on interoperability). There is no mention of any other Red Hat related bits, such as RHEL or RHN. From the article:
While Red Hat has vowed not to pay Microsoft an “innovation tax” via a patent deal with the software giant, it has proven that it is not averse to working on interoperability and has signed up as a member of Microsoft’s Interop Vendor Alliance.
The IVA was formed in November with 25 other software and hardware vendors to ensure that their offerings are able to interoperate with Microsoft's Windows operating system and applications.
IVA members included Novell, of course, as well as other open source vendors including Sun, SugarCRM, XenSource and Centeris, as well as BEA, Business Objects, Citrix, Software AG, and Quest Software.
Missing from the list of open source vendors Microsoft had already struck an interoperability deal with was JBoss, despite their November 2005 integration agreement.
Red Hat’s decision to join the IVA makes sense given that agreement, and appears to be limited, at least at first, to the JBoss middleware stack.
Matt Asay says that the need for a group like this underscores that the market is currently broken in ways. From his post:
The strange thing in this announcement, and in the existence of the VIA, is that we have to talk about interoperability at all. It is precisely because the system is broken – with intellectual property rights driving vendors apart, rather than together – that something like this VIA is even remotely interesting.
But still I wonder if an industry alliance is the way to resolve the problem. Yes, you need scale/network effects to make something like this work. But in a large room filled with vendors who inherently distrust each other, I don’t see much interoperability emerging. Just lots of meetings about interoperability.
If the goal is to get one-on-one interaction, what good does the Alliance provide? Not much, in my view.
Since JBoss and Microsoft were already working together, it's hard to say what additional will be gained by this. It may have simply been to formalize the relationship and get a little PR, which is fine. What I wanted to point out here and what I think is important for some Novell execs to realize is that you don't see anyone freaking out about this… despite the fact that Microsoft is involved. The response by some seemed to be that the only reason the community reacted to the MSFT-NOVL deal the way they did was because it was a deal with Microsoft. Hopefully this points out that was definitively untrue. Working with Microsoft in places that are genuinely mutually beneficial is fine – some would even say it makes sense. After all, interop is absolutely key for customers and customers are really what it's all about in the end.
–jeremy

Filed under Linux, Main Page, Microsoft, Novell, Open Source, Red Hat

Novell-Microsoft pact not about interoperability, says Open Source leader

February 12, 2007 Leave a comment

Don Marti recently posted an outstanding interview with Jeremy Allison. One item covered in the article was rumors that some companies have been paying Microsoft for patent licensing to cover their use of Open Source, even previous to the recent Novell deal. From the interview:
LinuxWorld: One of the persistent rumors that’s going around is that certain large IT customers have already been paying Microsoft for patent licensing to cover their use of Linux, Samba and other free software projects. And the Novell deal — isn’t it just taking that and doing the same kind of thing wholesale?
Allison: Yes, that’s true, actually. I mean I have had people come up to me and essentially off the record admit that they had been threatened by Microsoft and had got patent cross license and had essentially taken out a license for Microsoft patents on the free software that they were using, which they then cannot redistribute. I think that would be the restriction. I would have to look quite carefully. So, essentially that’s not allowed. But they’re not telling anyone about it. They’re completely doing it off the record.
The problem with the Novell deal is — Novell gave Microsoft what Microsoft dearly wanted, which is a public admission that they think that Linux violates the Microsoft patent. So, that’s the difference between this and the sort of off-the-record quiet deals. This one is public. This one is Novell admitting, “yes, we think that Linux violates Microsoft patents.” Now, of course, Novell has come out and said, “no, that’s not what we said at all. We don’t think that.” To which, of course, Microsoft publicly humiliated them and said, “oh, yes, that’s really what you were saying.” It’s kind of funny. They couldn’t even wait until the press conference was over to start threatening users with a Linux system.
LinuxWorld: Watching Novell management being subjected to this was like watching a child eating a bug for money. It’s embarrassing.
Allison: It is humiliating. I was horrified to say. It was humiliating. Yes. It really is like, “Go on. Eat a bug. Go on. Go on. Here’s some money. Eat a bug.” Yes, sad but true.
This isn't something I've heard a lot about, but you have to hope it's untrue. If we're talking about public companies, I don't think shareholders would look too kindly on paying potentially large sums of money to Microsoft under the table for highly questionable reasons. We'll have to see if any concrete evidence of this surfaces. If it does, I'd expect a lawsuit.
The interview covers a variety of topics including Jeremy stepping down from Novell, his recent work on CIFS, some patent talk, additional Microsoft coverage and even some talk on burritos. Additionally there is also some really good GPLv3 commentary including some common misconceptions (one of which I had fallen prey to). The interview concludes with:
Allison: No problem. I’m looking forward to seeing you in New York.
Of course, he's talking about the LinuxWorld OpenSolutions Summit where I'll be in the “Ask the Experts” segment along with Jeremy Allison and a host of other great people including Donald Becker and Evan Prodromou. If you'll be near NYC on Feb 14-15 make sure to stop in. I'm looking forward to the Summit and it's really an honor to have my name associated with each and every person on the “Ask the Experts” panel. See you all in a couple days.
–jeremy

Filed under Google, Linux, Main Page, Microsoft, Novell, Open Source

The Contradictory Nature of OOXML (Part II)

February 10, 2007 Leave a comment

[Ongoing coverage of this story] Andy continues his excellent coverage of the OOXML ISO process. From his post:
In that first blog entry, I concluded that Microsoft had won the first point in the contest over whether its document format would become a global standard or not. With the deadline past, who would be found to have won the next?
Well the results are in, and an unprecedented nineteen* countries have responded during the contradictions phase – most or all lodging formal contradictions with Joint Technical Committee 1 (JTC), the ISO/IEC body that is managing the Fast Track process under which OOXML (now Ecma 376) has been submitted. This may not only be the largest number of countries that have ever submitted contradictions in the ISO/IEC process, but nineteen responses is greater than the total number of national bodies that often bother to vote on a proposed standard at all.
[*Update: make that twenty]
When it is recalled that any national body responding would first have had to wade through the entire 6,039 pages of the specification itself, and then compose, debate and approve its response in only 30 days, this result is nothing less than astonishing. Truly, I think that this demonstrates the degree to which the world has come to appreciate the importance of ensuring the long-term accessibility of its historical record, as well as the inadvisability of entrusting that heritage to a single vendor or software program.
There is further coverage of what actually constitutes a “contradiction” here. I'd say this level of response, especially in such a short time frame, is quite telling. It remains to be seen how Microsoft will respond, but the writing is on the wall. World Governments have learned that being beholden to a single vendor is just bad practice. Additional information on the numbers and what they mean.
In related news:
But while this global drama has been playing out, I've learned that a third US state is considering requiring use of open document formats by government agencies (Massachusetts and Minnesota are the other two to date). That state is Texas, where a bill has been introduced to require that only “open document formats” should be permitted. The bill is designated SB 446, and was filed on February 5 (the full text is reproduced at the end of this blog entry).
How does the Texas bill define an open document format? As stated in the bill, such a format would need to be based upon Extensible Markup Language, would need to have been previously approved, and would be required to meet the following criteria:
(1) interoperable among diverse internal and external platforms and applications;
(2) published without restrictions or royalties;
(3) fully and independently implemented by multiple software providers on multiple platforms without any intellectual property reservations for necessary technology; and
(4) controlled by an open industry organization with a well-defined inclusive process for evolution of the standard.
While a couple of those requirements are a bit nebulous, number 3 is not and would currently be a death knell for OOXML. We'll have to follow this bill and see how it does as it makes its way through the process. It should also be interesting to see if any additional states follow the lead of these three.
–jeremy
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Filed under Linux, Main Page, Microsoft, Open Source

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