throwawaykf02

To save everyone the time, here's a typical Internet thread about Stallman:

- He's crazy!

- But he's right!

- Right? He's just been stating the obvious all this time!

- NSA surveillance!

- Hadn't anyone heard about Echelon?

- He stands for freedom of users!

- But users don't care about those freedoms, they just want something that works!

- He's antisocial and extremely rude!

- Autism spectrum.

- But he's not diplomatic at all, we don't want him as a spokesperson for Open Source!

- It's GNU/Linux, not Linux.

- See? It's nitpicking things like GNU/Linux that make even open source enthusiasts hate him!

- Only the userland is GNU anyway.

- GPL!

- Emacs!

- GCC!

- HURD!

- Toejam.

Microsoft was hated because they aggressively pushed out competitors in dishonest ways, because they intentionally made it difficult to interoperate with their software through proprietary protocols and file formats, and because they attacked open source.

To me that sounds a lot like "throwing their weight around" :-) As my post hoped to show, Google simply does it in different ways.

Well... if you believe Yelp, the SkyHook lawsuit and various antitrust complaints in the US and EU, "pushing out competitors in dishonest ways" is something Google is doing as well. And we all know how interoperable YouTube is with Windows Phone devices. And we saw how Google pressured OEMs into not supporting competing software (cf SkyHook, Acer).

So maybe not that different after all.

Some of your questions directly illustrate why "throwing your weight around" can be a good thing.

No doubt Microsoft supporters will say the same thing about Microsoft's antics :-)

Did Sun/Oracle accuse Google of "stealing" Java? Yes, but do you really want to live in a world where people can copyright APIs, thereby giving creators of popular APIs a large amount of control over everyone else?

Well, that's the purpose of IP, isn't it? If you create something popular that others find very useful, you deserve enough control to ensure proper compensation.

Otherwise you get what Google did to Sun. Sun sank millions in developing -- and billions in marketing -- Java to make it the dominant development language that it is and to create, out of nothing, a huge Java-savvy workforce. Google, to bring developers to their new platform, simply hijacked the ecosystem with nothing in return to Sun (now Oracle). Of course, Sun was very careless in its control of Java, but I think Google derived immense benefit from Sun's investment and is being extremely selfish in insisting on not respecting their rights.

I surely don't (and I say this as someone who has dedicated literally years of my life into designing APIs) but Oracle and Microsoft would like that world.

I too have devoted years of my life designing APIs. I see little distinction in the creative effort that goes into either code or API, and I think both deserve equal protection.

In fact, personally, I see Google's world as worse than Oracle/Microsoft's world. Google's arguments in the Oracle case, taken to their logical conclusion, literally remove support for all copyright protection for software. Part of their argument is that APIs are not copyrightable because they're "functional". You know what else is functional? All the code in the world!

But then, Google's software remains locked away in data centers, away from the world's eyes, further protected by trade secret. Of course, it sees no value in other types of protection, only liabilities.

Me, I'd rather live in a world where valuable works cannot be taken without permission, especially since a lot of my work is exposed to the world. I've open sourced a lot of stuff too, but which of my work can be taken freely should always be my decision.

I don't "expect" Microsoft to give away anything, but the fact that their business model depends on tightly controlling it makes them an inherently less open source-friendly company than Google.

There's nothing intrinsically wrong with being a "less open source-friendly company" either.

This somehow makes Google like 90's Microsoft?

You should have stopped there. Removing Cyanogenmod may not be it, but the rest of your post just opens it up for pointing out how Google is just like Microsoft.

How many operating systems or web browsers did Microsoft open-source?

Red herring. Selling software and Operating Systems is Microsoft's core business, and you expect them to give it away? How much software that is the core of Google's business has Google given away? I see nothing of the search, advertising and distributed systems infrastructure being open sourced.

How many forks of their software did Microsoft tolerate?

Hah, why don't we ask Acer that? The moment there's any leverage at all, Google will use it to squash forks. Conversely, has Microsoft ever tried to stop WINE or ReactOS? (Honest question, actually, I don't know.)

Now let's ask some more relevant questions:

1. How many times has Google been investigated and fined by the FTC and DOJ for illegal business practices?

2. How many times has Google been investigated by US and EU government agencies for privacy breaches?

3. How many times has Google been investigated for anti-competitive behavior in the US and the EU?

4. How many times has Google been accused (and sued) by smaller companies for unfair business practices?

5. How many times has Google been accused of intentionally providing poor support for a competitor's product?

6. How many times has Google been sued for infringing somebody else's IP?

7. Has Google been sued by Sun for "hijacking" Java?

8. Has Microsoft been made to pay damages for abusing standards-essential patents?

9. Has Microsoft been sued for colluding in anti-poaching agreements?

Some things Google has escaped (e.g. antitrust in the US), and some don't apply to Microsoft (abusing FRAND patents, anti-poaching collusion, illegal pharma ads), but most apply to both: investigations, settlements and fines in the US and EU for anticompetitive conduct, privacy breaches and illegal business practices; accusations of crippling competitors' products (Netscape etc. for Microsoft, competing service providers like Yelp, YouTube/Maps on Windows Phone for Google); accusations of stealing IP and unfair business practices (e.g. Apple's UI lawsuit and i4i for Microsoft, Author's Guild and SkyHook for Google); and so on.

Anecdotally, having been privy to some negotiations with Google in two separate companies, they very much throw their weight around.

I wouldn't even bother responding to stuff like this, but it's getting upvoted on HN which is depressing.

As much as you'd not like to admit it as an employee -- and it may not be apparent to the rank and file from inside -- there are very clear parallels in how both companies behave. Google is certainly throwing their weight around these days, which is precisely why Microsoft was hated in the 90s.

Ahh, that is very helpful, thanks. So my evaluation of their answer was premature, but I guess no more premature than those who would take it as an indication that "B&N sure showed Microsoft".

Also, by my dangerously semi-informed understanding, B&N's defense looked really weak (see previous comment on same topic: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6540902). I'd still like a real attorney to weigh in on my opinion, though.

So I really don't buy the "B&N scared Microsoft into bribing it" story. To me, it seems more like a "B&N tried a Hail Mary shot at getting an antitrust thing going against Microsoft, and when that failed miserably, they sold a cheap stake in their ebook business" story. Consider that ebook content is something Microsoft's ecosystem didn't (and still does not) have compared to Apple, Google and Amazon's ecosystems. Consider also that this ebook content comes without the lawsuits and publisher-wrangling the others had to go through.

So, $300M for a quick entry into a market where its competitors are incumbents seems like Microsoft got a pretty decent deal, and I think that patent lawsuit provided leverage.

Hmm, since we're on the topic, and IIRC you have experience in these matters, could you take a quick look at this comment of mine, and let me know if my take on it is inaccurate: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6540902

Essentially, I looked at B&N's reply to Microsoft's complaint and it looked really weak to me. I wanted to know if my evaluation is wrong.

As an aside, the whole thread above that comment is pretty similar to this subthread.

Hah, even "something that was selling well" is not a description that could be applied to Kin.

This link, which goes into some detail about the Skyhook lawsuit, paints a starkly different picture:

http://www.theverge.com/2011/05/12/google-android-skyhook-la...

Google may have allowed Verizon and AT&T maps because, of course, they are the ultimate gatekeepers. But they still demand data for their own services and forbade SkyHook completely. The article lays it all out.

In light of that, your point agrees with mine: Google did not allow denying their apps with data, which sounds reasonable for Google. But for Nokia that would be selling phones that improved the service of a direct competitor. Google certainly forbade SkyHook from getting any data, so very likely Nokia faced the same problem, which would have meant they'd be giving Google data without being able to use it themselves.

See my comments in this thread: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6668578

The situation for the people Gates is thinking of is very, very different from what we can even imagine.

Regarding Asha: I hear Asha is doing crazy well in low-end markets. Not sure how Microsoft can leverage it, but I'm sure they are aware of this.

I'm not sure that was bunk in Nokia's case. When they realized that Symbian had to go, they also realized that the vast bulk of the company was organized around that one OS. And if sources are to be believed, most of that deadweight was fiefdoms jealously guarded by entrenched groups, which meant they were not going to be conducive to "pivot" to a new direction. Now they had to shed that humongous deadweight and produce a competitive "modern" smartphone. I think it's entirely possible that in that situation whatever resources you have left, you may well have no choice but to bet the farm.

Nokia may have used Android to force Microsoft into a buyout, but I doubt they were going to seriously pursue it, for one big reason: that would have entailed compulsorily licensing Google Maps, which is a direct competitor to their own mapping division. You may think that doesn't sound so bad, but consider this:

1) It dilutes the billions they paid for Navteq.

2) As the SkyHook lawsuits have shown us(IIRC) Google demands all location data produced by Android devices to improve their own geo services. As such, Nokia would have ended up building devices that end up improving a competing service.

3) Considering the mapping division is one of only three divisions Nokia held on to, it's undoubtedly important to them long term. I am not sure, in their eyes, the pros of having an Android phone out there would have outweighed the cons of improving a competing mapping service.

I also mention illiteracy. They lack even the basics to grasp any knowledge they could find online, or the capacity to imagine how they could use it, let alone being aware of what "online" is. My point is that their situation is so drastically alien to us, that ways we imagine they could leverage information simply does not apply to them.

For instance, the basics beyond food and shelter. Something we take for granted, like, say electricity, is not easily available to them. To get them Internet, you have to first get them power.

And then you have to convince them to let their kids peruse the Internet, because that's not going to earn money for their next meal, whereas going out and working in the fields or a construction site is.

The ironic thing is, many of them are aware that education is important, but in a very shallow way: to them, if it doesn't come with a degree attached, it's a complete waste of time. Not only is that mostly true for their situation, they lack the foundation to even imagine that they could actually apply the knowledge themselves to improve their own lives. Education is the ticket, but it's so much more complex than "here's the Internet, go learn."

It's hard to appreciate their situation until you spend enough time in the poorer parts of a third world country and see this day in and day out.

Many people are making the leap from "access to information" to "better lives" without proper explanation of how that would work. Sure, for us it's obvious, but we're not the demographic Gates is talking about. The poorest of the poor have drastically different problems, and it's not obvious to me that they're something information can solve. "Student researching school report" seems like a good example, but much of this demographic don't even have the opportunity to go to school. And considering a full 50% of India lives below the poverty line, that's a humongous demographic.

And whatever problems can be solved by information, the poor are already making do via cheap mobile phones and their own ad hoc social networks. Which is probably the only thing that's viable for them, considering many can't even read properly and so speech is the best form of communication for them.

You could say that Internet access will create new industries and opportunities and the economic benefits will "trickle down", but 1) the timeframes are much larger (as Gates says), and 2) in my limited experience, very little seems to trickle down below the lower middle class. In fact, in India, the lower classes decry the "IT outsourcing" revolution, because prices went up across the board because the middle class suddenly had more disposable income. This did create a bunch of new jobs in the service industry, but on the whole the price increase only made things worse for the very poor.

I'm on a mobile device, so I cannot research as much as I'd like, but this is just a patent application, not an issued patent, and more encouragingly, a quick glance at USPTO pair shows that is was abandoned in 2010. It was abandoned following a non-final rejection by the examiner.

Now it doesn't mean that it's dead for good, since abandoned applications can often be revived, but given that it's Microsoft, who has enough resources to pursue even trivial patents, and that it has been 3 years since it was abandoned, I'd be cautiously optimistic.

On the other hand, it has been referenced by a bunch of other patents, indicating they cover similar subject matter, so you should look into them too.

PS being open source won't save you from infringement.

Let me argue why I think this is patent is not too bad, and actually interesting in some ways not typically discussed.

First here's the broadest claim (formatted for readability):

A non-transitory computer-readable medium that stores instructions executable by one or more processors to perform a method for attracting users to a web page, comprising:

instructions for creating a special event logo by modifying a standard company logo for a special event, where the instructions for creating the special event logo includes instructions for modifying the standard company logo with one or more animated images;

instructions for associating a link or search results with the special event logo, the link identifying a document relating to the special event, the search results relating to the special event;

instructions for uploading the special event logo to the web page;

instructions for receiving a user selection of the special event logo; and instructions for providing the document relating to the special event or the search results relating to the special event based on the user selection.

It's certainly not revolutionary, but patents rarely are. It was filed in 2001 and finally issued in 2011, being rejected multiple times along the way. That may have been partly due to them trying to claim too much and partly the "reject by default" unofficial policy then-director Dudas had instituted within the USPTO during his reign. (Patent practitioners encouraged to chime in here.) Nevertheless, what has emerged is not really too bad (for a certain perspective of "bad") because it's a) pretty narrow, and thus, b) highly unlikely to infringe by mistake. As such, this is not a good example of the patent system being broken, even though at first glance it does not seem very novel.

But I could also make an argument for novelty! Google Doodles probably is pretty novel because Google was -- as far as I can tell -- the first company to systematically modify its logo this way. Sure, several brands modify their logos once in a while, e.g. during Christmas, but Google took it to a whole new level, and in doing so, cultivated a fun and carefree personality for their brand. There's an interview with an early Google employee where he says he was horrified by this practice because it went against everything he was taught in Brand Management 101. I know nothing about brand management, but if true, it makes a case for non-obviousness. Furthermore, this undoubtedly system fulfills the title of the patent, because many people, including myself, often visit the Google homepage just to check out the doodles. It's undeniably a beneficial feature for their business.

Unfortunately, "systematically modifying a company logo to create a fun-loving brand perception" is not what they patented. For various reasons, such as being a business method and a rather abstract concept, such a claim would be difficult to get through. (Yes, even in the USPTO.) Maybe they tried anyway, which may be why it took 10 years to issue. But what they actually got was the claim above, which is simply a collection of steps to change the company logo during special events and link it to search results that really only applies to web search engines. It says nothing of the execution and artistic chops required to pull it off properly. It says nothing about brand management and the unique brand perception it created. There are only certain things a patent can protect.

And I'm honestly not sure why Google worked so hard to protect this with a patent. There are easier ways to inflate a portfolio, and even if we assume it to be a "good" patent, it's worthless. Because after 10 years and tens of thousands of dollars put in, Google now has a patent that nobody else will infringe simply because it's something that probably only Google can pull off with their brand.

OK, out of curiosity, I actually went ahead and read http://www.groklaw.net/pdf2/MSvB&Nanswer.pdf, specifically the parts where they address the patents being asserted.

Now, I'm usually used to reading office actions or reexamination-related documents, whereas this is a response to a lawsuit, so things may be different...

But I gotta say, wow, this looks really weak to me. Let me explain why.

Here's what I usually see when I see prior art presented against a patent: The argument first quotes the claim in question, and for each element in the claim, it cites one or more pieces of prior art, and then they quote (or at least identify via line numbers etc.) the relevant sections of the prior art reference and argue why it invalidates the claim or claim element.

The B&N document mostly just says, "Pfft, this patent covers nothing more than X, and X was already being done in 2000" without any reference to back it up. In only a few places do they cite actual prior art references, but again, they just throw the reference out there without any explanation as to why or how it is pertinent.

Again, like I said, this is not an office action but an answer to a complaint, and detailed arguments may not be part of these. It'd be great if a patent lawyer could weigh in.

Yes, but the article (and the "sponsored comment" at the end) also say that before the CAFC happened, it was a different, though equally painful, patent mess.

Too late to edit, but as pointed out down-thread, I'd like to note that my use of the word "convicted" in this post was inaccurate, as this was a civil case. The correct wording should have been something along the lines of "A federal jury ruled in favor of Microsoft and ordered Google to pay 14 million in damages."

How is asserting these patents in court, or using them to get an import ban via the ITC, an example of how the patent system is supposed to work

I thought I did so in point 3.

(Edit: removed bit about copyright because it could quickly derail this thread into a copyright/piracy thread.)

... (B&N actually argued that they weren't invented at all, at least not by Microsoft) that should have never had a patent issued for them in the first place,...

Here's a good starting place: Barnes and Noble's response to Microsoft's ITC complaint: http://www.groklaw.net/pdf2/MSvB&Nanswer.pdf

Yes, the patents really are terrible.

Really? You're going to take the defendant's word to show that the "patents really are terrible"? I'd like you to find a single defendant in a patent lawsuit who didn't think the asserted patents were terrible.

... you argue that once they do agree to a patent license they are getting to license totally awesome things?

No, they'll just get a license to do things covered by the patents that they were allegedly doing anyway. Said things may or may not be totally awesome. And if they're not very useful, why do them in the first place?

In any case, you sound reticent to start reading the patents.

No, I actually did go and read the pertinent parts of the patents linked above. They're actually better than the really terrible ones I've seen from that era. But I cannot make an off-hand judgement on their overall quality because that would require reading the patents, and the file-wrapper, and the prior art, and...

But, wait. Did you read the patents? And the file-wrapper? And the prior art? Or are you just accepting an opinion given by hilariously biased sources?

First, Motorola's h.264 and 802.11 license demands didn't happen until after Microsoft filed suit[1]. They were asking for a ridiculous rate, but let's get the timing right.

You're right. I got the timing wrong because both Microsoft's lawsuit and Motorola's license demand letters happened in the same month (Oct 2010) but Microsoft did sue first. Most coverage just mention the month, so I thought the demand letter went first, in response to which Microsoft sued over patents, then filed a breach of contract suit later. I had to look at the actual ruling to find the specific dates, and yes MS shot first.

Second, no one was convicted; it was a civil case over breach of contract. No one gets convicted in those.

True; I used "convicted" simply because it is easier. Is there a simple term to use when the court finds in favor of the plaintiff in civil cases?

Finally, it wasn't a statutory fine

Agreed, again, poor language use on my part.

To be fair, something that gets the extreme cases of bill-splitting right probably deserves a patent, if not a Nobel. After all, Bistromathics is the most powerful computational force known to parascience...

Not an essay, but did post a slightly more expansive comment just upthread :-)

I find it absurd that FRAND patents are practically valueless

They are not really "valueless", but are weaker simply because their holders pledged them to FRAND license terms in order to get them into a standard. Most standards-essential patents aren't "essential" because there's no other way to do the same thing, but because they're part of a standard that everyone must adhere to in order to be inter-compatible.

As such, patent-holders always have the option of not having them be part of a standard. However, in these cases, they made the bet that getting a small but guaranteed royalty was better than not having it used in a standard, and likely not being used anywhere at all and thus being truly valueless.

Please, by all means, explain how demanding the same fee they would for licensing Windows Phone itself[2] for such ridiculously terrible patents is exactly how the patent system is supposed to work.

1. Those are just 5 patents they asserted in that one lawsuit. The portfolio they actually license probably has hundreds and maybe even thousands in it. They only asserted these 5 because a) it's practically impossible to sue over more than a few patents, and b) they thought these were the likeliest to get B&N on.

2. I am not sure what the "ridiculously high license fees" were... Were they ever even revealed? To my knowledge, the actual terms of any of their Android deals is not known to this day, and the $10/phone figure is complete speculation. This is true of almost any IP licensing deal by any company in the world ever. These deals are typically closely guarded trade secrets. My hunch is, MS is actually licensing for a lot less than $10/phone, and is instead negotiating for a stronger commitment from manufacturer's on the Windows Phone front.

3. Patents give holders a right to sue others if they infringe. Infringers can try to avoid lawsuits by negotiating a license. Or they can argue that they don't infringe or the patent is invalid, which often (but not always) ends up in court. That is how the patent system was designed to work. Microsoft chose to use it by negotiating licenses for the most part. Apple chose to not license and used their right to sue instead. Now one may complain about the quality of the patents involved, but...

4. ...On what basis did you judge those patents to be "terrible"? Really, I am curious as to what you think the patent covers and why it's terrible. I ask because the default for tech media or HN is that all patents are "terrible" but when I drill down into it, most people are woefully uninformed about how they work. It's actually quite difficult to truly evaluate the quality of a patent. From a legal perspective, it requires reading not only the patent, but the entire file wrapper including all the cited prior art, the office actions and the applicant's responses. From a layman's perspective, judging the novelty of something, especially if it's old, is difficult because it's very difficult to envision the state of the art at the time of filing and appreciate what is being claimed; things too easily appear obvious in hindsight, and some of the patents on there are from 1994!

As linked above:

http://searchengineland.com/bing-why-googles-wrong-in-its-ac...

This is from the same site that published Google's original accusations, so I think it's less likely that it's a PR piece.

See also the sibling discussion with jmillikin.

My personal belief is that it was copying, yes. There is no other legitimate reason to phone home which results a user clicked on in a competing search engine.

It phones home with all the links a user clicks, not just on a competing search engine. The legitimate reason is that users have chosen to do so in order to "enhance their surfing experience". The reason may be BS but users are given an option. Suggested Sites is explicitly opt-in and IIRC (can't verify, on a Mac), the toolbar installer defaults the checkboxes to opt-in but presents a screen to opt-out during installation. So at least users are given a choice. Websites that use Google Analytics and similar products don't even do that. (Except if you're in the UK and have to obey the "cookie" law.)

I would argue that a website operator has less of a right to say what happens to the data about users' behavior than the users themselves. So, in my opinion it's fair game for Bing to use that data.

You could argue users are technically clueless and don't know what they're opting in to, but again, even giving them an option is more than what website operators and Google (and Facebook and Bing itself) does all over the Internet.

If Chrome reported which links people clicked on to Google, there would be an uproar (and rightly so). In terms of malicious behavior, tracking a user's clicks on web sites and sending them to a third party is only one step above a keylogger.

Google itself tracks which of the links on its search results users click, so that they can use it in their search rankings. And, of course, Google also tracks users across the entire web so that targeted ads can follow users across sites. Just because it's the web page itself that does the tracking rather than the browser does not mean you are not tracking them. Why is one "just a step above malicious" and the other perfectly alright even when the end result is exactly the same?

Microsoft shaking down Android vendors

Please can we stop saying this? I can write a whole essay on how licensing patents is the norm in tech industries, and how Microsoft (and Apple) are using patents exactly as they were meant to be, and so on.

But since you're a Google employee (IIRC), I'll just point out that it was Google that was actually convicted and made to pay 14 million for doing what you are accusing Microsoft of doing.

I did mention that MS "cast the first stone" in the comment I linked. However, if you look deeper, Motorola had started with the outrageous demands (which they got convicted for) even earlier, and MS sued preemptively. They definitely sued first, but when a lawsuit is inevitable, it's tactically better to sue first, because e.g. you can choose a more favorable jurisdiction etc.

So if the demands were so outrageous that they got fined millions for it, can you still say they were using them "defensively"?

Do you have an alternative explanation for how the results for those particular obscure random text strings propagated from Google to Bing?

How about this link from the very article you quoted?

http://searchengineland.com/bing-why-googles-wrong-in-its-ac...

I know you work for Google, so you must have the technical competency to see the nuance; can you say with a straight face that this was "copying"? Is it any different from the tracking Google of Facebook do across the web via their various products?

Like I said, the truth is more nuanced, but people only remember the scandalous version.

Amit Singhal

You're right, my bad. I completely misremembered.

See the whole "Bing rips off Google's results" thing. No less than Stephen Colbert fell for it and the truth never got as much publicity. People still believe Bing scrapes Google.

Interestingly, the whole thing was instigated by Vic Gundotra, who's ex-Microsoft...