This suggestion is a good one, but I have a better proposal.
The problem here is that Microsoft is free to cherry pick the best innovation that is coming out of the open source community while the reverse not being true. If Linux reinvents some feature already published by Windows, Linux vendors could get sued for patent infringement and have to settle with hefty license fees. Windows, on the other hand can and do copy improvements coming out of Linux community. See for example : containers.
For people to use a piece of technology, it should provide something that no other piece of technology provides. Linux community can patent serious improvements and give a world-wide license to anyone who wants to publish an open source version of the technology. Microsoft gets locked out ( totally fair, since the reverse is already true ), and Linux has a killer feature worth switching for.
If Microsoft wants to implement the feature, they can license it from Linux foundation. Linux foundation can redistribute this money back to corporations which paid license fee to Microsoft. Or they can put that money into Core Infrastructure Initiative
- Patent-encumbering things is really unpopular in the open source community, because you need to give a patent grant to every user. So as soon as MS download linux, you've given them a patent license. Well done.
I think you've got a difference in philosophy to contend with here. If I were a Linux Foundation developer, I would be extremely offended if someone suggested I patent one of my ideas. Software patents are ludicrous and extremely harmful to the software world. I would immediately quit any job which contributed to the creation of them. I can't speak for any Foundation developers, but I'd be surprised if very many of them felt differently.
Sure, and it's great to take a moral stand, but those folks shouldn't pretend that moral stand is constructively helping the situation (and they often do!)
IE if someone wants to say "I find this abhorrent and refuse to participate", that's 100% okay. But that stance doesn't actually help change the situation to one that is better.
Containers is a poor example since it has nothing to do with "Linux community". Containers, Unikernels, Library OSs or whatever you want to call them, have been a staple of operating system research for decades. Pretty much no feature on any current OS is really all that innovative.
Even so, give the extremely large pool of talent at their disposal, there is nothing that Microsoft would not able to implement on their own. Whats typically the case is they often wait for something to become popular and then enter the market with their me-too. Not knocking their strategy, it certainly works because they are good at making incremental improvements (esp in the core OS/kernel space)
Neither is FAT was/is innovative. This doesn't nullify patent or first adopter arguments. In context of Linux container is good example of Microsoft trying to piggyback on Linux.
Yeah, the thing with the FAT patent is ugly and is going to leave a black mark on MS for a long time. But is your argument that MS joined the Linux foundation so that nobody would sue them for using containers? I highly doubt that is the case since nobody has expressed any interest in suing over patents. In any case it would probably be IBM or Sun or one of those old-school commercial UNIX companies that have patents on this stuff. Whats more likely the case that MS wants to make sure that people who don't want to use Windows would still use their Azure services. This is mostly a token amount to show that they're serious about supporting Linux based workloads.
All the rest of the post seems good, except this: A trade association should not permit its members to fight among themselves.
Surely a trade association which prevents "fighting" between its members is a cartel? Whatever you think about software patents, MSFT is not doing anything illegal. The real problem is (yet again) the existence of overbroad, non-specific, long-duration software patents.
How does a standardization body, like the C++ Standards Committee, distinguish itself from a cartel. I bring them up because they have mentioned this in several talks from the latests Cppcon.
Has the Linux foundation taken similar steps? Do those steps prevent the exclusion of an actor clearly working in bad faith like Microsoft.
> There is little indication that the rest of the company shares the Azure product group’s commitment to open source, especially not the patent licensing group.
I think the Open Sourcing of .net, PowerShell, VS Code and Ubuntu Bash in Windows 10 would also be obvious inclusions?
And I can tell you, as a person who was out there fighting this for one of these companies, that it was very lonely, and still is.
I can tell you that when i've been out there fighting the good fight, people like MS have been actively opposed to changing the status quo (as has pretty much every other software industry company except possibly newegg :P)
They don't always come out and say it publicly, but they do so privately for sure.
Why do you believe nothing has changed?
Do you really think if companies representing many hundreds of billions of dollars in revenue went to congress and said "fix this" they wouldn't?
Certainly big pharma does everything they can to block it[1], but these industries are now worth about the same (~400 billion worldwide as of a few years ago).
It's really because there is no unified front in the software industry, but there is in pharma, etc.
This is one of the reasons i gave up and let it go further to crap - even if you were to publicly expose everyone's hypocrisy, it wouldn't change anything (the population they care about writ large just doesn't give a crap), and until these companies actually care about changing anything, nothing will happen.
[1] They want zero change because it's safer. You could say "software patents are special and expire in 5 years", but then what's to say the the next step isn't "pharma patents are special"
Why not declare a new patent pledge [1] against hiring anyone who applied for a software patent after, say, July 1 2017?
Plenty of time for notice, there are enough software developers who are both smart and care enough about this issue that it shouldn't cause your hiring pool to suddenly shrink, those who keep finding justifications to apply for software patents are going to start using such a pledge to justify not applying for them, and most of all, the resulting changes for Big Tech is an excellent win-win situation for everyone concerned. Because I am guessing whatever revenue they do end up losing will be more than made up with the goodwill (and thus developer mindshare) they will accrue once they get all their employees on board.
One good reason not to have this hiring rule is that many employees work under contracts that require them to cooperate with patent filings; I had one that required me to cooperate even after I left the company.
Note that Google hasn't committed to not be litigious with most of it's good patents. They've signed their patent pledge for a very limited scope of patents which looks good for PR purposes.
Bear in mind, patent extortion tends to look good as a business model once your main revenue source is starting to wane. So while Google may be behaving with patents today, they've been amassing a pretty large library... and the advertising market is expected to start going downhill fast.
It's hard to get an accurate number on how many patents Google owns (Google's search results are unhelpful, I'm sure they know, but they aren't sharing), but considering they picked up 17,000 from the Motorola acquisition alone, we can assume safely that Google is reserving the right to be a patent troll.
"Note that Google hasn't committed to not be litigious with most of it's good patents.'
Google has released 4000+ open source projects[1] under the apache license, which has a pretty broad patent grant, something you seem to be completely ignoring.
This includes things like tensorflow, the maps geometry library, etc.
I'm not sure what you consider "the good patents", but for most developers, it's the stuff we open source.
[1] This is just the 30 day active number, the total number over the 11 years i've been at Google is closer to 12k, last i looked.
Re: Apache license. But that only really covers the patent as far as the specific open source work in question. Implementing the content of said patent independently would leave you open to being sued by Google, right?
The question is, if Google has this open patent pledge, right, why are only 245 patents in it of the tens of thousands they have? Dare I suggest you ask Larry Page if you ever get the chance, why is Google so afraid to put it's money where it's PR spin is? If Google TRULY believes what it says, it'd act on it.
"Re: Apache license. But that only really covers the patent as far as the specific open source work in question. Implementing the content of said patent independently would leave you open to being sued by Google, right?"
Maybe? But i'm not sure what the point is?
This is true of literally every patent granting open source license
I mean, i'll be honest, this basically sounds like whining to me.
Nothing is ever enough.
As for the open patent pledge, it's pretty simple: Nobody has ever cared enough to desire more patents there.
Seriously. 99% of people don't go around trying to reimplement the stuff we do, they use the implementations we give them. Where they haven't, and it's serious, Google has tried to pledge patents. This has happened pretty much never. In fact, i can't think of the last time someone asked.
Optimizing heavily for the 1% case makes no sense.
Past that, OPN says "The OPN Pledge is designed to supplement existing OSS licensing alternatives ..."
(IE it's designed to supplement our permissive licensing).
In any case, it sounds like you have an axe to grind here, so i'm pretty much out, since i'm sure no answer i give you will ever satisfy you.
The answer "Hey, we're working on getting all our patents into our patent pledge" would totally satisfy me. But let's be honest: It's never going to happen.
Patent licensing that only benefits people using Google tech is exactly the sort of hypocrisy Google and others accuse Microsoft of. (Manufacturers who ship Windows Mobile generally don't get sued for violating Microsoft's patents, AFAIK.) Obviously, since Microsoft's OS would implement it's own mobile device tech, the sorts of protections afforded by Google via Apache licensing probably doesn't protect Microsoft from a suit by Google, for example.
What is the harm in Google pledging all of their patents, if they have no intention to ever use them offensively?
"The answer "Hey, we're working on getting all our patents into our patent pledge" would totally satisfy me. But let's be honest: It's never going to happen.
"
It's not supposed to happen?
The same way that one does not have to give up all their worldly possessions to be a good catholic.
"Patent licensing that only benefits people using Google tech is exactly the sort of hypocrisy Google and others accuse Microsoft of."
Except that's not what it is, and spinning it this way just shows you keep trying to find ways to hate it.
It's patent that benefits people using the code google gave them.
If you take the code from a google patented project, and use it, derive from it, whatever, you end up with patent protection.
Which, as i said, 99% of people do, including Microsoft, so your next example is simply wrong.
These companies simply don't usually do what you are saying is the issue.
IE
" Obviously, since Microsoft's OS would implement it's own mobile device tech, the sorts of protections afforded by Google via Apache licensing probably doesn't protect Microsoft from a suit by Google, for example."
Is neither obvious, nor correct. In fact, they just use our implementation in the cases i'm aware of.
The last time someone came to us and said "i want to use the patents but not the code", was webm. So we created a spec, and gave patent license to all implementations of the spec, google created or not.
Can you provide a real example instead of theoretical cases? I can state, affirmatively, that anyone who has come to us with a serious need, we've solved it, AFAIK.
Can you provide a counterexample?
"What is the harm in Google pledging all of their patents, if they have no intention to ever use them offensively?"
What's the benefit?
There are lots of possible harms, like the inability to use them defensively in certain situations (no pledge is perfect, it's not possible to create something without loopholes), the inability to maintain the status quo of patent peace, etc. There's a lot of risk here.
You seem to have this black and white view where this is zero risk, and it's just silly to me.
It's like saying: What's the harm in destroying all of the US nuclear weapons if they never plan on using them offensively?
You act as if this is a zero risk proposition, but it's not.
The benefit is being able to trust they won't be used offensively. Being able to trust those patents were open for use, and not at risk of being weaponized, is a major benefit.
You have to bear in mind, for probably 99% of Google's patents (as I said, we don't really have an exact official number including acquisitions), Google is entirely capable of either selling them to Intellectual Ventures et al. or going patent troll themselves when the market turns against them (or their business model becomes illegal).
The fact that so far Google has been accommodating with a small number of patents and currently claims to be against using patent litigation. What Google engineers preach and what Google legal does (see also: support for the Trans-Pacific Partnership) are two different things. In fact, much like Microsoft, as we can see with a combination of open sourcing and patent litigation.
Why are you addressing a hypothetical theory that has absolutely no basis? Why not address a real issue like Microsoft extorting Billions from Android OEM's for their obsolete, junk filled prior art ridden patents?
The most of the world doesn't have them in a first place, so no need to ban anything. It is just that USA is so horribly protective nation, that rest of us have to deal with this as well. E.g. want to sell your NZ stuff in states? Well, better to pay some protection money then.
The majority of "software patents" have already been invalidated by the Supreme Court. But I doubt Microsoft is acting like that and giving OEMs a "discount" on their royalty extortion.
At this point, thanks to peer pressure ("hey, if everyone pays up, then maybe we should, too") no company seems to dare to even negotiate these contracts anymore, let alone sue Microsoft over it. It's a tragedy.
Peer pressure is how Microsoft managed to get everyone to pay them up. They started with small "wins" against small and lesser known manufacturers, building up that extortion list that they could show to others as some kind of sick "social proof". Then they moved to small, but known OEMs, like HTC, and eventually, they took down the giant, Samsung as well, with the "everyone is already paying up" strategy. And once they got Samsung, it was over - whoever was left, or newcomers, "had" to pay Microsoft, too, and wouldn't dare question the royalties anymore.
So in New Zealand, software is not patentable. I think it was back in 2013 or 2014 where they were banned.
Supreme court decisions in the US really bother me because of how far reaching they can be. They can only be overturned by a constitutional amendment or another supreme court decision.
Marriage equality in the US is great, but it also came down to a supreme court decision. If it had gone the other direction, getting an amendment added in today's climate would be extremely difficult.
We've seen lower courts rule code as speech (in the create encryption/ITAR wars of the 90s):
..but if a higher court, or the Supreme court, ruled to enforce software patents, it would create a huge block to development and innovation -- and there would be big questions about open source projects which are free as in speech. Would individual users be required to pay patent fees to use oss tools?
In some extremely shortsighted view the cost to settle might be lower than the cost to fight it. Surely the cost to settle them all is more expensive than the cost to fight now.
This is the exact same logic as a "don't negotiate with kidnappers/terrorists" stance. Once you negotiate with one you give validity to those tactics and others will try.
Giving in to either kind of blackmail makes it impossible to profit in the long run. This is exactly why Newegg fought and crush patent trolls and why HTC and Samsung should do the same.
And is there an alternative to software patents? One of the examples (linked to the case against TomTom) is related to Fat32. I can imagine that if you "invent" a filesystem and everyone is enthusiastic & starts using it - you have the right to be paid for your work?
As far as I know, no one advocating abolishment of software patents sees the need for an alternative. Fat32 is not in common use because people are enthusiastic about it, but because it's easy to implement, and it's compaitble. At a technical level, it's no different from trying to patent a database schema.
Anyone who has ever ventured into home brew OS development will probably tell you that it is fairly hard not to invent a FAT-like file system (file allocation table). I'm strongly against software patents, period but even if you think they should be granted in some cases...I feel like FAT is actually too trivial. I guess one could argue that using a pair of tables is innovative etc. etc.
The thing about software is that it gets two bites at the IP cherry. If you write some filesystem code: you get copyright in it. If you take out a patent, then if I write a compatible implementation, you claim rights to my work.
> I can imagine that if you "invent" a filesystem and everyone is enthusiastic & starts using it - you have the right to be paid for your work?
We tried this. It led to the current insanity with software patents and software trolls. I also don't see any indication that innovation would stop if patents didn't exist (see: everything done in the Linux kernel). The trade-off is clear: patents do more harm than good. Get rid of them.
Taking a rights based approach to patents is not the right one, we should look at outcomes instead.
Independent inventors rarely seek patents and their best bet to contest the patent is to sell it to a patent troll, companies tell their employees to never read patent filings to not be willfully infringing and truly novel patented ideas are simply avoided until the patent expires or alternative methods are found (eg ECC crypto).
I'm sure you can find some cases where patents have served as a social good, but I expect them to be outweighed by all their negative outcomes.
The sad thing is that the patents are not even on the filesystem, but on the workaround they had to put it to support long file names. And even that wasn't a novel concept - OS/2 had already added long file names to FAT, just in a different way.
Aren't patents exactly for protecting a particular way of doing things, instead of applying to concepts?
Not to defend software patents, I still think they're a stupid idea, but for patents prior art applies to the exact workings of something, not the general idea and concept.
Embrace open source and Linux by publishing projects on GitHub and joining the Linux foundation, while simultaneously sucking the lifeblood out of it by being a patent troll.
Generally, when you want a company to open source more things, you should cheer for them when they do. Regardless of any other things they are engaged in.
Personally speaking: I love that they are open-sourcing more things. Great! Amazing!
I still hate them as a company, and would discourage the use of their software. I know it's complicated, but just because they do some good things (which should be celebrated) doesn't make them a good company overall.
The attitude I've seen on HN that I personally dislike is typically of the "No, they've totally changed! Look, they are pushing open-source software!"
But they haven't. Not if they are still strong-arming via patents.
A bit off-topic but the image used suggests that MS have officially adopted the ninja cat riding a flame-breathing unicorn meme [^0]. They even added special emoji to Win 10 [^1].
I wonder if they paid the original artist. Maybe the original artist should've patented the idea of a cat riding a unicorn. Oh wait that would be stupid and ridiculous.
While downvoted for its lack of substance, the parent post does really capture the heart of the matter. Microsoft (or any other for-profit company, really) as an organization does not think in terms of being a friend or enemy of open source; that's a fiction projected upon it by people fixated on the idea of open source as a ideology (e.g. RMS) instead of a tool (e.g. Linus Torvalds). To paraphrase the famous quote by de Gaulle: "Corporations have no friends, only interests."[0]. Microsoft thinks in terms of "In this specific situation, do we make more revenue by cooperating with open source or by competing with open source?" and that decision is made on a team-by-team and product-by-product basis. On this basis, it's easy to see why they continue to work to get revenue from their patent portfolio while still doing things favorable to open source elsewhere.
> it can only be estimated (and doing so involves a decoder ring according to Ed Bott who suggests about $8bn of Microsoft’s revenue comes from IP licensing).
Are those software patents? If yes, that's a horrendous amount of racket they profit from. It's basically a massive tax on innovation.
Linux Foundation indeed should have a requirement for members not to assert patents except in defensive fashion. Or they can at least require them to join the OIN.
I don't think the Foundation is particularly key to Linux development in general; they don't mandate anything, they're there to do a bit of bureaucracy nobody wants to do (IP etc) and pay a few salaries for a handful of key hackers so they can work with a degree of freedom from commercial pressure.
This is mostly a PR exercise from Microsoft. John Gossman has better things to do than sitting in more pointless meetings; his appointment to the board is just another way of screaming AZURE LOVES LINUX and WE LOVE OSS SO MUCH WE PAID 500 GRAND. RedHat doesn't need to do that. Their 500K are better spent employing the likes of Poettering so they can define what Linux actually is.
It seems to me the mobile makers were all too happy to pay these "licensing fees" without contesting too much (they're still stuck with "hardware maker" mentality)
Because frankly, $5 to MS on licensing costs per mobile is completely ridiculous. Add to this other licensing costs (like video, MP3, etc)
The maddening thing is that this fee would likely be wiped in a second, if only they could move on from FAT as the default FS for development purposes. In many ways, the hardware world is stuck in the early 2000s simply because of conventions developed through the production chain.
The alternative was to burn some millions on lawyers, possibly ranging in the hundreds, in attempt to contest it. With no guarantee that they will win, and a fair chance that their products would be blocked from the market during the years that the process would likely take.
> The alternative was to burn some millions on lawyers, possibly ranging in the hundreds, in attempt to contest it.
It's doable if all racket victims would pool their resources against the aggressor (MS). Trolls lose when faced with massive opposition. Their whole tactic is based on individual intimidation.
How is everyone here not agreeing to and upvoting this? Because the alternative means you're okay with the fact that Microsoft gets to be part of the Linux Foundation, while continuing to extract billions of dollars a year from makers of Linux and Linux derivative devices, based on bogus patents, most of which have already been invalidated by the Supreme Court's Alice decision.
The problem here is that Microsoft is free to cherry pick the best innovation that is coming out of the open source community while the reverse not being true. If Linux reinvents some feature already published by Windows, Linux vendors could get sued for patent infringement and have to settle with hefty license fees. Windows, on the other hand can and do copy improvements coming out of Linux community. See for example : containers.
For people to use a piece of technology, it should provide something that no other piece of technology provides. Linux community can patent serious improvements and give a world-wide license to anyone who wants to publish an open source version of the technology. Microsoft gets locked out ( totally fair, since the reverse is already true ), and Linux has a killer feature worth switching for.
If Microsoft wants to implement the feature, they can license it from Linux foundation. Linux foundation can redistribute this money back to corporations which paid license fee to Microsoft. Or they can put that money into Core Infrastructure Initiative