Microsoft's New Openness: Danger Ahead for OSS Developers?

by Sam Dean - Mar. 04, 2008Comments (5)

In the wake of Microsoft's announcement of new openness and interoperability initiatives, market researchers at Gartner are warning open source developers to tread carefully. In particular, a report from Gartner warns that underlying patents could create litigation risks if open source developers decide to play fast and loose with the documentation and APIs that Microsoft is making available. Are the warnings to be taken seriously? 

"Do not use Microsoft's documentation unless you have rigorous processes to keep track of applicable patents," the report advises."Keep work that depends on these patents separate from other OSS work, to avoid exposing downstream distributors and users to litigation risk." For open source developers working on commercial projects, the advice is sound, but I'm not so sure Microsoft is looking for lawsuits with its new moves.

I happen to be in agreement with Om Malik's assessment that Microsoft's proposed deal with Yahoo! is making it wary of the EU and the Justice Department, and that that is a large part of why it is moving to new types of openness. This week's news of a hefty fine for Microsoft from the EU shows that such concerns are warranted.

Yahoo!'s entire site runs on FreeBSD, and it has embraced open source within its own applications to the extent that if Microsoft is serious about Yahoo!, it will be forced to be much more open. It would run counter to that trend, and it would be extremely poorly timed bad public relations for Microsoft to follow up its "we are the world" announcement with strings of lawsuits.

Nevertheless, it is an incorrect reading of what Microsoft has announced to assume that Microsoft is not protecting its patents. It has opened APIs and documentation up, but underlying patents can still be enforced if open source developers are not careful.

In addition to its interest in Yahoo!, and the scrutiny that the EU and Justice Department will apply to that, Microsoft stands to gain other things from being more open. "This move is not wholly altruistic," says the Gartner report. "Microsoft surely will entice many OSS developers to port applications to Windows in addition to Linux." The breadth of applications available has been part of why Windows has had so much dominance since its early days, and Microsoft does have traction to gain if the open source community produces compelling applications for Windows in particular.

Do you think Microsoft will be lawsuit happy as it extends its new openness?


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Julio Dominguez uses OStatic to support Open Source, ask and answer questions and stay informed. What about you?



5 Comments
 

Humbug! Microsoft has always believed in 'embrace and extend'. They have always tried to kill the system that will basically strike at the core of their business. If they do go with Yahoo, they will have a TON of Open Source to contend with, and can then learn about the superiority of Opensource.


Bill, you don't have to wait for Service Pack 3 for your latest set of bug fixes, buddy!


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You have the tail wagging the dog here. Microsoft has been becoming more open-source friendly for several years now. It has much less to do with the EU and more to do, I suspect, with Bill Gates no longer having a day-to-day involvement with the company.


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Um, yo, where's the login link? There should be one on the bottom of the page.


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Good point about putting a login link at the bottom of the page. We'll work on that.


Thanks

Sam


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I agree that Microsoft has been becoming more open in recent years. I can't believe that they would chase small amounts of litigation money at this time over these issues, though--would be terrible PR.


Sam


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