Microsoft Threatened With Fines By EU Again 184
ukhackster writes "The EC is threatening Microsoft with yet more fines. This time, it's over the interoperability protocols that Microsoft has been ordered to open up to its rivals. The EC has examined 1,500 pages of information about the protocols, and concluded that they 'lack significant innovation'. This is pretty damning for both Microsoft and the patent system, as it has been awarded 36 patents covering this technology and has another 37 pending. Could this encourage someone like the EFF to start pushing to get these patents overturned? The EU has a FAQ about this issue, containing additional details on the subject.
Patents haven't been about innovation for years (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Patents haven't been about innovation for years (Score:5, Interesting)
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More complex protocols mean more work to implement them and more overhead.
It opens the door for other protocols to do the job properly.
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Re:Patents haven't been about innovation for years (Score:4, Insightful)
Where you see true monopoly, you almost always see government collusion.
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Care to cite any evidence, proof, backup?
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Re:Thank you mods, may I have another? (Score:5, Insightful)
The president of my company makes ~ $150,000 a year.
We live or die by our patents. We're primarily a soil remediation/washing company; we developed a technology completely different from anything else on the market. We do what other companies cannot do, and we do it cheaper than disposal/incineration.
If we didn't have a patent on our core equipment, we would not be in business. Why? Because several of our contractors have already tried to steal our design, and got bitch-slapped in court doing so.
Not that I totally disagree with you. I believe patents should cover a very narrow range of mechanical/technical innovation. Definitely not software concepts, and most likely not biotechnology, either. But can a small company like ours utilize the patent system to our advantage? Most definitely; if we didn't have a patented technology, we'd be out of business, because someone would literally steal our equipment (this HAS happened to us), reverse engineer it (this HAS happened to us), and we'd have no legal recourse, except possibly against the original theft, which would be difficult to prove.
Does the patent system need major reform? Yes. Do I think that the USPTO's standard of obviousness is ridiculous? Yes.
Do I think a patent system, in principle, is a good idea? Yes.
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I agree, patents are in general a good idea. But we need serious reform. Patent portfolios are used as a weapon to stifle innovation and dominate markets. Patents are granted for ridiculously obvious "inventions." The whole idea of patenting business processes and software is counter to the original concept of patents.
You are lucky
Re:Thank you mods, may I have another? (Score:4, Insightful)
That might sound harsh, but it's a reality. ...and here's why:
The *only* reason (based on what you've written) that you would go bankrupt in the face of competition is if you're not efficient and your competition is.
In other words, you believe you can only obtain profitable business by being the only player.
But wait! You're a _service_ business. You charge to provide the service of dealing with polluted soil. Even if your competitor 'stole' your technology they would still have operating costs, just like you do. Liberating your technology doesn't mean they can do it and you can't. That's the nice bit about ideas and such: we can all have them w/o taking anything away from anyone else.
As usual, I invite any-sayers to read this [ucla.edu] before applying flamage to my comments. And actually read it, dammmit.
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Or, he (his company) would go bankrupt because he can't compete with the superior assets/resources/cash his competition has. In other words, he gets robbed mafia-style ('this is my turf/business') just because he wasn't the first despite having a superior product/service.
And I read the link you gave and its terribly flawed. It acts under the assumption th
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If competitors could license the technology for a reasonable price and still operate more efficiently, then I'd agree with you, grandparent's company needs to shape up. As it stands, with the little information we're given we have no reason to assume that they're working inefficiently.
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Obviously, you have no knowledge of the real world, outside the software world. You say, "You provide a service." What exactly does that mean? We do something no one else does, something no other company wants to do. They prefer to build giant landfills and pile up all the contaminated soils in them; because it gives them never-ending revenue. By stealing out technology, and driving us out of the few projects we do manage to overcome in terms of government inertia, they could get rid of
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You are confusing a patent discussion with an environmental one. I fully support incentives to keep the world green. I don't support patents. These two ideas are in no way mutually exclusive.
However, this statement also leaves me with a couple of questions: if they don't actually do what you do, then why do they want your secrets? and beyond that, I suggest th
USPTO (Score:2)
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There must be more contaminated soil in your country than the volume you can process.
So the patent system has turned you into extortionists through a false "scarcity of resources" scam.
nice
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The primary barrier to adoption of our technology is inertia, not our patent.
And no, there isn't more polluted soil than we can process, because we're a technology company, not a construction contractor. We sell soil washing machines, and soil wash
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We're a small company. We've spent years developing this technology, and a substantial percentage of our (group) personal savings (which is a small amount; probably no more than one to two million). But this money was everything we had.
Why should we develop this technology for free? Why should we just give it away? Without a patent possibility, we wouldn't have started, the technology would not have existed, and the consumer would be worse off.
Do we believe our technolo
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"Germany's ThyssenKrupp, US-owned Otis, Kone of Finland and Swiss firm Schindler were fined for taking part in a market-rigging cartel.
ThyssenKrupp was handed the biggest fine in EU history for a single firm - 480m euros - as it was a repeat offender, the EU added."
The idea that the EU is only going after Microsoft is only espous
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Anti-success? It depends how you judge success. If you're only interested in the money value, and you're only looking at it from an individual capitalist point of view, then yes, patents are very successful. But for everybody else, they do things like prevent medication from getting to those who need it, prevent innovation by scaring / suing everyone else out of existence, prevent others from achieving the same discovery independently again, and ge
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no wait, some ideas are worth sharing whereas some cost me money and no-one is having any of it, it's mine, all mine.
Imagine a world where the patent office came first.
Then make yourself a wheel.
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Things were invented long before patents were around. Frankly, if companies can't compete on a level playing field, they can take their bat and ball and fuck off. Companies who can compete will pop up. That's the secret of supply and demand. The excuse "oh but how can we possibly compete if people steal our innovations" is a crock of shit. I could argue that it is THEY who are steal inventions from society. They were raised, educated, supported etc by society. Their jo
There's a similar story written by AP.... (Score:5, Funny)
Note this quote from the above story:
"This is a company which apparently does not like to have to conform with antitrust decisions," said EU Commission spokesman Jonathan Todd.
Next they'll be saying that the sky is blue and fish swim. Thanks for stating the obvious.
This and other insightful quotations...... (Score:2)
This, and other astoundingly insightful quotations in this months up-coming issue of DUH!
The actual qoute was... (Score:5, Informative)
In the 50 years of European antitrust policy, it's the first time we've been confronted with a company that has failed to comply with an antitrust decision.
I find that statement rather significant. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/6408391.stm [bbc.co.uk]
Re:There's a similar story written by AP.... (Score:4, Interesting)
Yea, we all know the sky is gray, and fish fly
(sorry, i live in Seattle, i couldn't resist)
Please, EU, i beg you, really i do, FUCKING KILL MICROSOFT! Because whatever you do, they will always just swindle by. Some fines? No problem, they can afford to pay them and still ignore you. Your best solution, is to destroy Microsoft in the EU by enforcing a fine they can not afford to pay, 1% of their yearly profits each day they continue to infringe. When they dont pay, simply confiscate their properties and money in the EU, if that dont pay for it, then remove their privilege to copywrite in the EU. If they dont comply, they will loose their entire business in the EU, and everything they own there. If they just so happen to have source codes in the EU, that would be open to the public domain effectively, effectively destroying Microsoft as a whole. There really is no point in play around with a company that has proven both in and outside the EU it wont play by the rules, get very serious very fast, or else risk them continue to ignore you, and possibly give ideas to other companies about ignoring you.
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And then Nokia Linux can take over.
I hope (Score:4, Interesting)
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I hope this sends a stronger "RTFM" message to the
EU once again (Score:4, Insightful)
But honestly, aren't they right? If any monopoly is locking others from access they always do it. Why should MS be different? They're effectively a monopoly in OS.
bullshit. (Score:4, Informative)
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I think you missed something there. If raising the price would bring in more money, why haven't they done it already? Corporations are out to make money, they'll always go for the price that brings in the most money. Since software has almost zero per-unit cost and these fines won't affect that price either t
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I think you're missing the point. (Score:2)
I think what you're missing is that this case is about *two* platforms; Microsoft Servers and Microsoft Clients. They communicate using proprietary *protocols* which are not APIs and are very often publicly disclosed (think NFS, TCP/IP, ODF etc.). I don't use Microsoft software a lot but I think this specific case is file serving protocols and printer services. If these protocols are public (I would say publicly downloadable; Microsoft seems to think $50
"Platform" is a Bull word (Score:2)
What you're missing is that Microsoft does not provide an OS; thats not what their business model is. Microsoft provides a platform.
The word "Platform" is currently very fashionable but it has very little meaning.
Don't conflate interface with implementation (Score:5, Informative)
That's Microsoft's problem, confusing the interface specification with the source code implementing the interface. The EU is commenting on the interface, not the implementation. When they say the interface specification contains no protectable innovation, that doesn't mean that Microsoft's particular implementation of that specification doesn't contain any innovation but simply that that innovation isn't going to be present in the mere API spec.
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They don't conflate interface with implementation! (Score:4, Informative)
RTFA:
"The Commission's current view is that there is no significant innovation in these protocols."
The EC is saying that THE PROTOCOLS THEMSELVES should not be patentable. I suspect that they are rebutting Microsoft's argument that the PROTOCOLS THEMSELVES constitute innovation and therefore must not be divulged.
Homer Simpson is sane (Score:1)
Governments should not be like Christians [bible.cc].
Patents and Trade Secrets (Score:5, Interesting)
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The issue is APIs, not implementation, and APIs should not be trade secrets! The very idea of an OS having trade secret APIs is... well, I can't come up with words adequate to express how twisted that idea is.
In particular, the exact issue is that of Microsoft keeping secret APIs that it can use for its own applications, but others trying to write software for Windows don't get to use. This makes MS's software easier to write, and als
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MS is a european company, too. They have assets in several european countries, they have employees, everything. Those companies just happen to be 100% owned by some company in Redmond.
If you want to play in the EU, you better follow EU laws. If you don't like it, because it means giving up some "trade secrets" or whatever else - well, as you americans so often say: "like it or leave it".
Of course MS can't afford to do that, the EU market is b
Please explain (Score:2, Interesting)
The Commission unilaterally suspended enforcement of the obligations imposed by the March 2004 Decision pending the Court of First Instance's consideration of Microsoft's request for interim measures, which request was denied by the Court of First Instance on 22 December 2004 (MEMO/04/305). Both before and after that date, the Commission engaged in discussions with Microsoft about its compliance, and conducted a market test of Microsoft's proposals on interoperability (se
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People have managed to ground passenger jets with that trick before.
Hello? Mcfly? (Score:4, Interesting)
Sorry, couldn't resist ;)
Perhaps they might just take all their assets held in countries signed up to the EU? Microsoft don't operate soley from their secret headquarters in the Rockies - hording their gold in giant underground bunkers to which only Bill and Steve have the keys. They have offices, staff, equipment, bank accounts around the world. If they don't pay the fines they cannot operate in one of the two largest combined economies in the world, not to mention losing all the assets they have there, all the legal protections for their IP in that region, never being able to send any employees to the region or to regions with extredition treaties, etc, etc.
Or did you think Bill poped over with a big sack of money every time MS did a transaction in the EU?
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MS will comply with that. They may be a big company but they aren't big enough to fight a government. Keep in mind that MS doesn't control their European operations from outside the continent, they have several subsidiaries within the EU and have to pay taxes and whatnot anyway.
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If I was appointed to the evaluation, I would try to figure out if I am able to create a software able to communicate with windows's SMB (and friends) protocols from their spec. I don't see this as an impossible task really as long as I am given enough time, and it looks like they took some time for that since the issue with EU began. The formulation of the news report
Re:Please explain (Score:4, Informative)
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This is about pricing (Score:2, Informative)
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Maybe they actually read the documents?
Re:This is about pricing (Score:5, Informative)
Well, according to the actual article released by the EC [europa.eu], the documentation Microsoft provided was reviewed by the Monitoring Trustee [europa.eu] (Professor Neil Barrett, a tech expert chosen from a list of people provided by Microsoft) as well as TAEUS, the EC's technical advisors.
See the FAQ [europa.eu] for more information.
Shocking ... (Score:5, Insightful)
I mean, really
The reality of it is, I bet all of their protocols are ones which were "embraced and extended" over time. Hopefully, they'll be forced to play a little nicer with others.
Taking stuff someone else did, obfuscating it, calling it proprietary, and then patenting it is just in bad form. I'm glad to see someone finally taking them to task over this. I'm even more glad that, after they were ordered to cough up the information, the information they gave demonstrated that they hadn't 'innovated' anything.
Cheers
Microsoft owns that double-click, pay up! (Score:1, Offtopic)
Microsoft's patent number 6,727,830, "Time based hardware button for application launch," issued on April 27, 2004:
A method and system are provided for extending the functionality of application buttons on a limited resource computing device. Alternative application functions are launched based on the length of time an application button is pressed. A default function for an applic
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Thing is the "power" button on ma
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Aside from every laptop or ATX power button for the last 10 years you mean?
Throwing around a lot of invectives for someone who thinks timing a button press is innovative...
Prior Art = Piano
Microsoft vs. the Law (Score:5, Insightful)
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When dealing with anti-trust suits, Microsoft's tactic seems to just ignore the verdict in the hope it'll go away. The strange thing is, it actually appears to work...
I too feel that the EU hasn't done any real harm to Microsoft so far. I'd love to see some real action, for example banning their software sales in the EU altogether for some time, say one month. That would show everyone that EU is being serious, but also force the customers to think about alternatives. It might kickstart a significant level of interest in OSS even after MS returned to the market. Unfortunately, it may be that the EU organizations themselves are hopelessly bound to using MS products, an
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That's an interesting idea.... (Score:2)
If any computer OS/system contains a function A,B, or C, it must conform to API/protocols X,Y, and Z in order to meet applicable trade laws. IANAL so I don't if that would be feasable, but by creating laws that define usage of computing/networking functions, MS and all others would have to comply. This would remove the MS monopoly. I think that the Mass. ODF incident, Sarbanes-Oxle
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Do
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They paid people. Lots of them. Without the receiver showing the sum in his tax papers.
Which is why they have so very little troubles in the US.
Yay for eu while U.S. senate sucks up to big buck (Score:5, Insightful)
What eu did is something good. U.S. senate should learn to follow in its tracks.
you americans started to demean europe TOO much lately.
dont forget that, the ideas that sparked the united states revolution, the concepts of humanity, equality, republicanism and the like spread from europe especially with the 18th century writers like Rousseau, Voltaire, Diderot. If there werent these guys in the earlier parts of 18th century, many american founding fathers wouldnt field the same ideas with same strength in years coming up to 1774.
give some god damn deserved crecedence to europe dammit - some part of that soul which made 1789 still lives on in there - support them !
Re:Yay for eu while U.S. senate sucks up to big bu (Score:4, Funny)
Relevant LTU post (Score:2)
Almost everything happened in the Golden Age, right?
When writing CTM I was struck with how many of the good ideas in programming languages were discovered early on. The decade 1964-1974 seems to have been a "Golden Age": most of the good ideas of programming languages appeared then. For example:
There IS no significant innovation (Score:4, Informative)
If you look at what is covered by Microsoft's Published Protocols [microsoft.com] made available by entering into Royalty Free licensing agreement [microsoft.com], you will find yourself able to "to implement the Protocol(s) for which the applicable box(es) are checked on Exhibit A, and to use the corresponding Technical Documentation (as defined below) for that purpose." What are some of these Royalty Free protocols?
The list just keeps going on. I know this is royalty free but for the life of me I cannot figure out why I would need to sign a licensing agreement with Microsoft to implement any of these. A patent agreement maybe with Apple for AppleTalk or relevant parties to implement Bluetooth for example (not saying that I agree with software or protocol patents but this is the IP environment that we currently work in). Signing an agreement with Microsoft to be allowed to read documentation and implement someone elses protocol, WTF? No significant innovation. I would be interested to know if anyone has entered into this Royalty Free agreement.
Protocols not included in this list are subject to other licensing and royalty agreements. An implementation of a General Server without restricted protocols [microsoft.com] has a royalty rate [microsoft.com] of 5% for a software product and 2.5% for an embedded product with a minimum royalty of $40 per server or $0.40 per user. Per server licensing would put the minimum product price at $800.
Included in this is permission to implement propriety Microsoft protocols (.NET Remoting TcpChannel Protocol, FrontPage Server Extensions Remote Protocol, Microsoft Media Server Protocols, Windows Group Policy Protocols, etc) which may include significant innovation as well as others that are existing protocols that have been extended. These include:
None of these appear to be licensed separately, they are only available as part of task based [microsoft.com] licensing bundle. The protocols in the list above also don't have any significant innovation, they are just minor extensions or combinations of, existing protocols. I agree with the EU, these should not be patentable (nor should any protocol) and that the royalty is excessive.
Firsts (Score:2)
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Exactly.
This is the EU desperately looking for some reason, any reason, to levy a hefty fine, not so much for the revenue, but to show how "tough" they are. This is a joke. Fining someone because you don't think their patents are innovative? The EU is really scraping the bottom of the barrel on this one.
The EU is the single most democratic movement in the history of the earth (yes, even more so than the US). The requirements for the rights a country's citizens have to be allowed are remarkable stringent.
Microsoft's monopoly has nothing to do with democracy and everything to do with tyranny.
To me, they're following the spirit _and_ the letter of the law. How common is that?
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Re:Or... (Score:4, Informative)
False. MS is having gov. do their bidding for them. In particular, upper reaches of gov. tell sub groups that they will run windows. The upper group have a cash or reward incentive to do it. In America, it is called lobbying or simply doing business as usual. In other countries, it is called bribery and is illegal.
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You don't seem to realize that a lot of slashdotters don't mind -- as long they're the ones holding the guns.
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Which you didn't do as the government documents that you didn't follow were in a Microsoft format.
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Re:Or... (Score:5, Informative)
I would disagree.
Now, the EU is saying that, according to the terms MS agreed to about how to value the stuff based on the amount of innovativeness in it, MS hasn't really done anything innovative. And, furthermore, how dare they try to charge so much damned money for something which, really, isn't all that different from the stuff that already existed. They're being caught in their embrace, extend, then break model of 'competition'.
This is not the EU 'scraping the bottom of the barrel', this is about trying to enforce a previous judgement against MS -- one which they continually try to evade both the letter and spirit of: that of allowing for more interoperability between MS products and anyone else.
They might take the step of invalidating the patents held by Microsoft. Which would say "hey, wait a minute, those magic proprietary protocols you have and claim people need to spend big bucks on are just open protocols you have intentionally made incompatible, and are trying to prevent people from implementing to preserve your monopoly-like status".
This is all about MS continuing to defy court rulings which say they're not allowed to enforce a software monoculture -- especially when all they did is minorly change existing protocols (or, take an existing idea and do it slightly different) and then patent them in order to make sure nobody else can communicate with their stuff. You know, continuing to do the exact same offence they were found guilty of doing in the first place -- and the enforcement which they've been trying to re-interpret to their own benefit for quite some time.
Microsoft is doing their usual obfuscate and delay tactics. The EU is starting to say "enough, do what we told you that you had to do".
Cheers
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Probably not ... software patents are not valid in Europe anyway. Taking a non-step is easy for European politicians. In fact, they are experts at it.
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Either way, it's unlikely that the daily penalty wou
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Mistake 2. This is not a joke. This is justice being applied firmly to the behind of a company that is guilt of abusing it's monopoly advantage.
Mistake 3. This is not about how innovative their patents are. This is how innovative their protocols are. A patent can be taken out on a implementation of a protocol, but not the protocol itself. What the EU is
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The actual press release [europa.eu] would be a very useful start to find out what all this is really about.
Among other things, it explains very early on what the fines are for:
The European Commission has sent a Statement of Objections (SO) to Microsoft for failing to comply with certain of its obligations under the March 2004 Commission decision (see IP/04/382)
Now if you could remove your head from that orifice of yours so that you can put your eyes on th
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Re:slightly queasy (Score:4, Informative)
Look at the comparable technology and if its not priced below it then perhaps they are being unreasonable.
Except that this doesn't involve technology. The EU is making a statement about the specifications, not the implementation. The specification for the TCP protocol isn't a TCP protocol stack, it's only MS that wants to call it one.
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If the competition are failing because of your illegal actions, then yes, they should.
Re:slightly queasy (Score:5, Interesting)
Except, some of us might remember Microsoft co-opting things in plain sight.
Microsoft has been demonstrated in the past things like taking Kerberos, releasing a morphed version [networkworld.com], and then try to claim it's a trade secret. Thereby, the extensions they made to an open standard are suddenly proprietary. Think also, of submarine patents, where you sit around with a bunch of people, decide how it should be done, and then secretly make a permutation of it, file for a patent, and then block everyone else from using it.
This is about MS providing the protocols to allow interoperability -- I suspect we're in the middle of getting better evidence that those 'proprietary' protocols which can't interoprate with other things are nothing more than other protocols they borrowed and intentionally broke compatibility with. They're going to be substantively similar to precursor technologies.
If you're going to claim that you have trade secrets that you would be damaged if other people see, and those trade secrets turn out to be versions of things which were developed by other people, the damage you're getting is to your credibility. Because, once people figure out that the only reason it's different (and secret) is to lock everyone into your product.
Co-opting other people's technology and then claiming it's a proprietary trade secret is basically crap. Refusing to provide the details under the continued guise that your 'innovative technology' is even more crap.
No, it's bullshit actually. If, in the example of Kerberos, the protocol was part of a publically available RFC (ie. free), then charging outrageous money for something you didn't really innovate but are pretending you did is hardly selling your stuff at "30% below market value". It's a cash grab at best -- fraud and extortion might also be said of this practice.
The people making this judgement are people selected from a list MS said it could live with of people who understand technology.
Don't let MS fool you -- this is about basic networking protocols which MS has intentionally made incompatible with everyone else for the purpose of making it break. This has nothing to do with innovating anything.
Cheers
Re:slightly queasy (Score:5, Insightful)
If you obtained a monoploy and dealt fairly you presumably wouldn't lose a trial about your unfair trade practices. But Microsoft did, in fact, lose such a trial. This is the penalty phase of that trial, not a ruling that being applied to someone dealt fairly and happened to be best.
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In Denmark, it has been discussed if software for making a chicken in an oven perfect is patentable. And I think the discussion ended with a no. But an oven that uses the software to make perfect chickens are patentable.
Re:Protectionism. (Score:4, Insightful)
There is no bias in reality against foreign companies when it comes to EC anti-trust cases. In fact, the biggest anti-trust fine was given to a German company in connection with an lift and escalator cartel. And second this investigation wasn't initiated by the EC... it was a complaint from SUN Microsystems that triggered the whole thing. Which is, as I'm sure you know, very much an US company.
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I know of a UK company that was raided by government officials (DTI) on instruction by the EU after it colluded with others on the price of monomers. Yes, you can get bitchslapped even if you are in the EU. The EU has a responsibility to step in when there is an abuse of the normal market system and to monitor things when there are only a few suppliers.
Where Microsoft went wrong was not just effectively ignoring the EU at the earlier stages but then repeat offending. If you ignore a legislator they don't
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Well, then you are ill informed.
The EU is first and foremost a trade organization, the entire point of the EU is to ensure that we have an open market with unrestricted competition.
There are many examples of huge fines leveled at European companies that violated antitrust laws.
Unlike the US government the EU is not just there to prop up big business, i
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The EU is fining Microsoft because SUN made a complaint against them which the EU found to be true, since then they have been attempting to make sure Microsoft is conforming to the sanctions the EU laid against them for what they had done.
The EU is not a nation, it is a trade organisation set up to facilitate trade amonst it's member states and takes action against a lot of EU companies.
Microsoft agreed how much it should be charging for it's protocols