Someday in the distant future, your grandkids will be hugging their Microsoft Robot Friend, browsing the Weboverse on Internet Explorer 29, and going to a rock concert held by Steve Ballmer's head, and they'll have never known the evil, nasty Microsoft we grew up with. Starting today, Microsoft has dropped a bit of a bombshell on the computing community by jumping on the "open" bandwagon and altering the way they do business with third-party developers. According to a wordy press release issued by the company, the Redmond giant will begin embracing an open attitude by publishing documentation for all of its "high-volume product" APIs free of charge, will detail patents it holds and applications that cover its protocols (to avoid nasty, Linux-like
mixups, we assume), and will provide a "covenant not to sue open source developers for development or non-commercial distribution of implementations of these protocols." Sound like big news? They've got a lot more to say on the matter -- hit the read link and learn all about cuddly new Microsoft.
posted February 21st 2008 11:46AM
Yah because they had record profits last year and has more money in the bank then some small to medium sized countries GDP....yep....MS is dead in the water. Doomed I say doomed. *rolls eyes*
The cake is a lie! The cake is a lie!
Personally, I see this as a legitimate effort by Microsoft. The industry is shifting in a new direction and they were never one to be left behind. Mounting pressure from the EU will also be a key factor in this actually taking place. For the second time in my life (Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation), I applaud Microsoft for trying to leave their old image behind.
I'll admit to a little skepticism; MS has rarely as a company done anything for purely altruistic reasons.
Interesting, though, that this follows on the heels of the new "DreamSpark" program, which is intended to provide pretty much every student on earth with MS development tools like Visual Studio 2008 Pro and Expression Studio...
I think MS has seen the writing on the wall, and come to understand that remaining proprietary will eventually back them into a corner. They're not idiots.
I'll admit to a little skepticism; MS has rarely as a company done anything for purely altruistic reasons.
Interesting, though, that this follows on the heels of the new "DreamSpark" program, which is intended to provide pretty much every student on earth with MS development tools like Visual Studio 2008 Pro and Expression Studio...
I think MS has seen the writing on the wall, and come to understand that remaining proprietary will eventually back them into a corner. They're not idiots.
hell just froze over
No wonder I am so cold! (and no I don't use Vista)
All that popped into my head was that scene in "Mars Attacks!" where the Martian is carrying the translator which is looping, "Don't run! We are your friends!" as they are killing everyone in sight.
Microsoft is going to have to do more then say they are committed to openness for many people to believe them. Years of proprietary totalitarianism and the recent snafu they are pulling with IE8, because of their disdain for standards, have left people wary.
Trust is not easily earned.
do it vince, do it
non-commercial? that means if I make a program using those so called "free" APIs I can't use it at work? that's crap.
It's a Phantom launch title, I hear
In the interest of disclosure, I am a Microsoft employee, but I am sharing my own views and not speaking on behalf of the company. The thing I see as "new" is the call-to-action for employees and the clarity of the principles. When sets of principles like this are promoted from the top, such as the "Four pillars of Trustworthy Computing" (http://www.microsoft.com/mscorp/twc/default.mspx) they get a lot of attention internally, and, as a result, they inform the design of products. But it's not an overnight thing.
"Microsoft is providing a covenant not to sue open source developers for development or non-commercial distribution of implementations of these protocols. These developers will be able to use the documentation for free to develop products. Companies that engage in commercial distribution of these protocol implementations will be able to obtain a patent license from Microsoft, as will enterprises that obtain these implementations from a distributor that does not have such a patent license."
Is this compatible with any open source license? I have to imagine this was done to sound good to EU regulators but be worthless to open source. That's not to say this isn't good news for smaller developers who are interested in developing commercial products, but it's mostly worthless to the rest of us.
Everybody take cover!! It's a sign of the apocalypse!!
*runs and hides*
Quoting only parts of the document changing its meainng for your own pleasure and vilification needs does not make sense..
Here's the part on opennes and sueing -
To enhance connections with third-party products, Microsoft will publish on its Web site documentation for all application programming interfaces (APIs) and communications protocols in its high-volume products that are used by other Microsoft products. Developers do not need to take a license or pay a royalty or other fee to access this information. Open access to this documentation will ensure that third-party developers can connect to Microsoft’s high-volume products just as Microsoft’s other products do.
• As an immediate next step, starting today Microsoft will openly publish on MSDN over 30,000 pages of documentation for Windows client and server protocols that were previously available only under a trade secret license through the Microsoft Work Group Server Protocol Program (WSPP) and the Microsoft Communication Protocol Program (MCPP). Protocol documentation for additional products, such as Office 2007 and all of the other high-volume products covered by these principles, will be published in the upcoming months.
• Microsoft will indicate on its Web site which protocols are covered by Microsoft patents and will license all of these patents on reasonable and non-discriminatory terms, at low royalty rates. To assist those interested in considering a patent license, Microsoft will make available a list of specific Microsoft patents and patent applications that cover each protocol.
• Microsoft is providing a covenant not to sue open source developers for development or non-commercial distribution of implementations of these protocols. These developers will be able to use the documentation for free to develop products. Companies that engage in commercial distribution of these protocol implementations will be able to obtain a patent license from Microsoft, as will enterprises that obtain these implementations from a distributor that does not have such a patent license.
If you havent figured it out already - you dont need to pay anything to use the protocols as long as they are not covered by any patent, for commercial or not. And they will provide which protocols are covered by patents.. what else do you need, someone to come in and type your code for you?
So, FINALLY, Engadget admits, that Microsoft will still be the #1 company in 2029 when my grandkids are hugging Microsoft robot friend huh?
Off Topic:
I'm kinda getting pissed at your people for telling things bad about Microsoft !
They give out free stuff to developing countries as well. It's the same idea, get people to buy in early. Perfectly legit, but really in the spirit of openness (like, say, real free/open source software) if their protocols aren't completely interoperable and open.
"but really in the spirit" should be "but NOT really." Anyone who's actually looked at or used the OPEN source code of another app knows the difference. Night and day.
And I posted this as a reply to another message, why isn't it linked?
All I have to say is that Microsoft has done a whole slew of "bad" things in the past which in turn has contributed to their incredible size of today. That being said I am glad that they are finally starting to move toward doing "good" things for the market and users in general. Some may say "too little too late" but I'm going to stick with "it's never too late" and hope that they actually follow through.