This is interesting. I’ve been saying for a while now that both Apple and Microsoft are hard at work making Android as undesirable as possible. Sadly, they’re not doing this by making their own products better, but by trying to make it seem as if Android isn’t free due to patent costs and such. It looks like Barnes & Noble is the first company to openly say the same.
Microsoft is suing Barnes & Noble over the Nook, claiming it violates a number of Redmond’s patents. The company has been doing the same to many other Android manufacturers, and to me this has been looking like a concerted effort to artificially inflate Android’s price to right above that of Windows Phone 7. Well, what do you know, this is exactly what Barnes & Noble is openly stating in its response to the lawsuit. It’s… Juicy.
“Microsoft has asserted patents that extend only to arbitrary, outmoded, or non-essential design features, but uses these patents to demand that every manufacturer of an Android-based mobile device take a license from Microsoft and pay exorbitant licensing fees or face protracted and expensive patent infringement litigation,” B&N writes, “The asserted patents do not have a lawful scope sufficient to control the Android Operating System as Microsoft is attempting to do, and Microsoft’s misuse of these patents directly harms both competition for and consumers of all eReaders, smartphones, tablet computers and other mobile electronic devices.”
“Microsoft did not invent, research, develop, or make available to the public mobile devices employing the Android Operating System and other open source operating systems, but nevertheless seeks to dominate something it did not invent,” it further states, “On information and belief, Microsoft intends to take and has taken definite steps towards making competing operating systems such as the Android Operating System unusable and unattractive to both consumers and device manufacturers through exorbitant license fees and absurd licensing restrictions that bear no relation to the scope and subject matter of its own patents.”
There’s more juicy stuff in there, such as an account of how Microsoft and Nokia are planning on using their combined IP portfolio in an aggressive manner. According to B&N, this is illegal under antitrust laws. All in all, I’m not surprised at all about this. Microsoft missed the train in the mobile market, and now it needs to compete to get back in the game. It would seem the company is falling back into old habits, using dirty legal tricks to try to maffia companies into not selling Android devices.
It’s doubly sad because Windows Phone 7 is actually a great, unique and fresh smartphone operating system that can certainly compete on its own merit. These dirty tactics from Redmond are a massive blemish on the WP7’s team’s efforts, and more than ever, want me to get my hands on a decent Android phone and leave my HTC HD7 in the dust.
> It would seem the company is falling back into old
> habits, using dirty legal tricks to try to maffia
> companies
Falling back? M$ never stopped using dirty anti-competitive practices. It’s their bread and butter. Such as coercing manufacturers to bundle Windows with computers and many other examples.
I’d say “steaming ahead” rather than falling back. According to B&N:
“Microsoft has a scheme, Barnes & Noble asserts, to dominate Android and make it undesirable to device manufacturers and customers by demanding “exorbitant license fees and absurd licensing restrictions” — a license fee that it says is more than Microsoft charges for its entire operating system for mobile devices, Windows 7. Others have, it believes, signed it. Barnes & Noble says the deal with Nokia is in furtherance of this scheme.
The patents asserted are “trivial, not infringed and invalid”, Barnes & Noble says”
This is a new low even for Microsoft, I believe … to try to make Android devices pay more for a few “trivial, not infringed and invalid” patents than it charges for its entire WP7 OS.
This is so outrageous on the face of it that it makes Microsoft look utterly desperate IMO.
Edited 2011-04-28 23:14 UTC
I thought that they were prohibited from doing that as part of the anit-trust settlement with the government. They no longer can enter in deals with manufacturers that force them to pay for a windows license on computers that do not have windows on them.
> I thought that they were prohibited from doing that as
> part of the anit-trust settlement with the government.
That’s the catch. They were not! That was a major flaw in that anti-trust case, which mostly touched browsers and other things, but didn’t fix the bundling problem at all!
See details of this issue here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_refund
Edited 2011-04-29 17:56 UTC
For all of you screaming to save Android and B&N, nobody is trying to put them out of business.
I am pasting a comment by blogger Florian Mueller, an intellectual property activist, and he reviews B&N comments, and to me they sound empty and just trying to get a better deal from Microsoft.
Just look at how many players are paying royalties on many fronts and doing extremely well in their business. Why should B&N be any different or exempted from the same.
Read below:
“A substantial part of Barnes & Noble’s filing focuses on allegations that Microsoft leverages its patents “to render the Androidâ„¢ Operating System and other open source operating systems uncompetitive and unpalatable vis-à -vis Microsoft’s own operating systems” (quote from paragraph 43 of the answer to the complaint). Two paragraphs later, Barnes & Noble mentions Microsoft’s patent agreement with HTC as an example. However, the HTC example clearly contradicts Barnes & Noble’s theory of Android becoming “uncompetitive and unpalatable”: earlier this month, HTC’s market capitalization surpassed that of Nokia (and previously that of RIM). If a patent license deal with Microsoft rendered Android uncompetitively expensive like Barnes & Noble claims, how come HTC is so very profitable?”.
You can read the whole blog here and make up your own mind. But to make up your own mind, some of you are disqualified already (MSFT fans, Android Fans, Apple Fans, Google fans,etc). This is only for the people that are interested in finding the truth in all arguments, not just trying to prove their point! You know who you are!
http://fosspatents.blogspot.com/2011/04/barnes-nobles-answer-to-mic…
FM is hardly the best person in the world to quote here.
His track record is IMHO pretty abysmal. He is not an Open Source Activist. He seems more like a Shill for the guys from Redmond.
If I were you I’d look at some of the other blogs/news sites for a more balanced opinion of Mr Meuller.
> Just look at how many players are paying royalties on
> many fronts and doing extremely well in their
> business. Why should B&N be any different or exempted
> from the same.
Hehe. It’s like saying, look how many are paying royalties to mafia bosses. Why X should be different? Isn’t it stupid not to pay to dark empire?
Don’t be ridiculous. No one is obligated to pay anything to those robbers. They will try to rob, and are happy when someone gives in. B & N had guts to show them their place.
Nice summary of the whole thing. +1
“Florian Mueller, an intellectual property activist . . .”
Let me fix that for you: Florian Mueller, a likely paid lobbyist for MS . . .
If you look at the things this guy post it appears as he is pushing an agenda for someone.
FROM: http://techrights.org/2010/04/11/florian-mueller-and-erika-mann/
“For those who are not aware, Florian Müller became a lobbyist, but whose lobbyist? More recently he became known for his attempts to derail the Munich migration to GNU/Linux.”
My advise don’t bother sending anyone his way you will likely get FUD.
Dude, are you serious? Florian has a crap record at predictions and accurate commentary. Go back to his blog page and stay there please.
I think Android are doing a pretty good job on their own.
It is my understanding from talking with a person close to the MS vs Android patent discussion with another vendor (not b&N) that the patents in question related to Exchange interoperability (ActiveSync), FAT/vFAT file systems. I have not used the B&N devices so I don’t really know if they would infringe those areas? Maybe there are some more patents that MS is trying to push down their throat? At least with Apple’s cases there are infringing patent numbers released to the public so people can make up their own minds.. to date I’ve not seen these from MS… can anyone show me them if they exist? I would love to know.
Well, the FAT/vFAT thing can be mitigated – so support does not necessarily mean infringement, but as it is still the primary file system of many flash chips (SD, CF, etc.) by default it certainly can be problematic.
That said, isn’t it about time the world adopted a new primary file system for these things? One that isn’t encumbered by patents (ala FAT/vFAT, and even exFAT)?
The primary issue is the fact that Windows doesn’t support any file systems that don’t originate in Redmond by default. And there’s not really any good (e.g. high quality) ext2/3/4 drivers for Windows either. So options are limited unless companies want to invest a lot of money. But then, wouldn’t that investment pay off in the long run? (Sadly they’re likely too short-sighted to see it.)
You are 100% (and beyond) right. The sad fact is that “in the long run” *is* preposterous when it comes to companies… their horizon, especially for the ones quoted on a stock market, is basically a trimester (or more accurately, “quarter”, as they say).
Edited 2011-05-02 11:22 UTC
Sad but true. They look at 3 things – quarter to quarter, quarter to same time last year, and projection of quarter to same time next year.
Sad too, most CEOs stay in the position <5 years. So there is no long term vision for the companies either. Without long term vision, companies can’t make long term goals, or do things that are best for the health of the company in the long term. Instead, they squander lots of money changing the corporate vision and goals every few years as the CEOs turn over.
So, expect Elop to be at Nokia <5 years; and expect the next CEO will dramatically shift the nature of Nokia again – likely away from Microsoft (unless another Softie replaces Elop), not necessarily in a better direction just in a different direction (e.g. reintroducing Symbian). That’s just the kind of thing where the money gets squandered.
For anyone but Google and the phone manufacturers Android is unattractive for the very reasons most of those here love it, and I’m not talking about it’s “bucket of bums” interface.
If you take a look at the desktop OS market, the only ones who’ve really made a long term profit from it are a handful of software companies, the largest being the creator of the most dominant OS, and some of the hardware companies. And of course Apple, who’ve done their own thing.
Of those software companies who’ve done well over a long period of time, most are players in niche or specialist areas of the market. Database, games, vertical markets, etc. But in order to do that all have had to employ either copy protection or activation schemes that are both costly and require resources, simply because of how easy it is to pirate software.
Then Apple produced the App Store, which many here hate with a passion, but it answers these problems for developers, and we’ve already seen a massive number of developers make money from their creations for he first time. Arguably some maybe shouldn’t have, but that’s another argument. The reality is that Android, with it’s “Windows like” free-for-all mentality, is very unattractive from a development perspective to anyone other than those who have other means to pay the bills.
So while I don’t think Microsoft – or anyone for that matter – should be trying to enforce patents that are invalid, as a business proposition Android is already very unattractive to anyone other than Google, the phone manufacturers and a handful of big software / content companies – just like Windows…
Ok… Want some hard reality check?
AppStore is great for users, Apple and a handful of developers. Otherwise selling mobile apps is a dead end these days.
Oh how many mobile app startup companies I’ve seen go down during 1.5years. Literally every single one closed shop. The only ones that stayed in business are the ones that offer services to companies in building apps for them(as part of marketing campaigns or added value to other services). And quite a few of them had “best selling” and “featured” apps.
That leads to the “fun fact” – AppStore and Apple’s $1 app ecosystem results in income that can’t sustain mobile app development. And it’s not limited to AppStore, it’s Android Market also. Though it might put some food on a table of a single programmer, nothing more.
But hey, you have to actually live and breathe startup companies to know that. And those “We’ve made a million selling our app” stories are the exceptions that prove the rule.
By the way a million earned on AppStore results in 700’000 in cash. And with 5 people team it’s a good income. But look at who rakes in a million a month?(I doubt that they make a million in AppStore btw) AngryBirds! Can you beat them? No way in hell! Then calculate how much you need to make, as a legal entity, each month to get to a million. The incomes are very low…
While I agree with some of the points of your discussion I see (as an android user) that the number of quality pay for applications on android has been dramatically improving over the last 6 months. If the momentum continues there will be a great deal of money to be made through the market for even small developers. The key issue with any app store is how to distinguish yourself from the other apps, that is where the challenge lies for new entries into any market place on either apple, android, blackberry etc.. being a featured app may provide some inroads to profits however it is hard to keep that momentum when the application is not featured…
The good news is that many of the traditional big software companies have very little in the mobile space so it’s allowing the small guys to grow, where traditionally the cost to enter the market is too high for small developers.
Am I being naive in waiting and hoping for the n950 Meego phone?
I’m waiting patiently for it too. It’s either that, or I’m buying a second N900, but then if the AT&T / T-Mobile deal goes down, I’m basically screwed and think I’m just going to get a dumb phone.
Why would that be naive?
Harmattan phone is definitely coming out, as repeatedly affirmed by Nokia management. I use one daily.
I’ve been happy to see ongoing additions and updates in the Maemo repositories. Is there any backward compatibility from Harmatten or will it mean developers having to re-code and package existing software?
(Sadly, lacking updates in Ruby seem to have taken away my Metasploit functionality; a key selling feature in the Maemo line for me.)
If you write your code in QML, you have compatibility from harmattan to “real meego” and symbian. You can also install any odd linux libs to both Harmattan and MeeGo.
Repackaging and recompilation, well, that is required but tolerable.
cheers,
Here’s hoping though some of my regular packages are now easier found in my own archive having been left by the developers. I seem to have a growing list of apps that have simply stopped working on the N900 too (eSpeakCaller announces phone calls but the interface doesn’t load anymore, stale ruby has broken Metasploit, Wifeye doesn’t load anymore… odd, I don’t seem to be missing a firmware update but anyhow..) Guess it’ll depend on how many of the developers migrate forward with the new OS release.
Could also due with the OS getting bogged down a little less often but still loving the N900. If the new hardware is anything like the Nokia N0 spoof from the start of April it could be very compelling (especially with alternatives being more limited OS like Android and Ios).
Android does excellent work itself making it look bad, I totally agree with comments. Android is still an Alpha product. Java is slow on my powerful desktop machine, why do they think it is fast on a small mobile device, common. The development api and sdk is pre-historic
Microsoft are with their usual tactics, no news there. But Apple? Apple may be “scared”(well they shouldn’t, but they are), in a marketing war, but it’s not their intention of making Android less valuable proposition. Their intention, as it seems, is to have their “jewels” to themselves. And in some cases is blocks progress…
I can’t say I’m pro Apple, because I’m not, but they are the neutral company out there to use(abuse sometimes) a capitalistic system to make money and stay on top as much as possible.
It is not the OS that Matters it is the experience. I wanted to like Android, But their commercials were ass (warplanes dropping Phones – robots? ) the product felt loose and nasty and glued\stapled together the whole thing seems like the old M$ v. Apple debate, but too many years later. Java is not very relevant (that is nto me trying to get into a flame war) it was designed for a different age and that dawn has faded into the embers of dusk. It was almost as if the Geniuses in charge of this said ‘Well lots of programmers know Java’… and missed the entire point. Simply knowing a language does not correlate to knowing how to program well, anymore than knowing Photoshop will make you an Artist (Full on sidebar – we are all artists, as long as we feel it)~=~Back to the point is just because you have a voice doesn’t mean you can sing. And Having a lot of UN-Passionate developers is what killed Windows. Back in the Windows 3.x days you had programmers who could and did write shareware gems and for EVERY excellent app there were 10 clones and for every mediocre app there were 20-50 clones and the bottom of the economy was like the floor of a cinema-multiplex filthy, sticky & nasty.
And regardless of if you like apple or not their users\consumers are passionate about their products. So it stands to reason that developers for this platform will be much more passionate about it. Even to the point of being passionate about technologies that Apple seems indifferent about – like AppleScript and Automator – really powerful tools. (A kid can write a full on backup program for their Nana in an afternoon) and in automator a Nana can write her own app. So again I posit that it is not the OS or the API that matter it is the experience. Users really just want tiny apps that GTFOutta the way and let them get things done. Features? Why not just make the app faster cleaner and cheaper?
I do not imply that my iPhone is perfect. AND I have been an Apple user I guess for decades and I will tell you that Apple is far from perfect. I am little more than a revenue stream to the board in Cupertino. My phone crashes daily. But is back up in less than three seconds. The amount of time that it takes to look both ways before crossing the street, I cannot tell you what percentage of these events are caused strictly by me using my phone to dev up on. -BUT and here is the import thing I that i get a whopper of a return on the investment of money and time to get it to work AND so does Apple.
Build a better mouse trap and the world WILL beat a path to your door.
So why harp on about Java if you’re about experience? Being Platform/Processor independant is probably the best reason to use Java on phones. RIM is probably going to benifit most from that and it’s not going to hurt android either.
http://www.linuxtoday.com/infrastructure/2011042300139NWBZMO
Yeah i’ll make sure to tell Microsoft that the last couple of decades was for nothing because windows is dead.
No it doesn’t, it means they have passionate users.
appinventor.googlelabs.com/about/
We use it in the classroom. You don’t need to know a single thing about Java and the tutorials are great.
http://www.appbrain.com/app/pet-the-kitty/appinventor.ai_all4him.He…
Yup
What’s really funny is that you seem to think you’re more than a revenue stream to any company you do business with.
and when did i say that?
we’re all in the same boat here.
I am anti Apple, or just – anti mainstream, because what I like most is the “simplicity”. But – your post is very accurate. Some time ago I told to the Amiga community, that Apple (iPhone, iPad) is the new Amiga. Amiga was so cool, because of its design AND the ecosystem. Users were passionate, it had cross app scripting, which allowed users to rather simply do cool stuff. If Apple has any such cool things, kudos to them 🙂
Thank you! I needed a good laugh today.
Although you’ve been downranked, I agree with you. Apple is the one that is making Android the valuable proposition.
So we all know software patents are controversial, and many people believe they shouldn’t exist.
In the current world they do exist, and they do grant patent holders monopoly rights – including the right to set license fees at any level or deny licensing completely (at least in the US.)
Reading B&N’s filing was a little surreal. It said so many things that were just smokescreens to the real issue – does B&N market a device that infringes on a specific patent? That, ultimately, is what the court will have to decide. Whether or not this meets B&N’s concept of fair or ethical is not relevant.
MS is not doing anything except that which patent holders do as a matter of course. The issue is not whether MS are behaving badly. The issue is whether the patent system should, as a matter of policy, be changed to accommodate B&N’s objections – like, limitations on license fees, licensing determined having regard to the scope of the patent on the product as a whole, etc. B&N are trying to have a reform discussion in a courtroom. My hunch is this will not end well for them.
If you notice, B&N’s filings are full of statements to the effect of “the patent is not applicable or the devices do not infringe it”. So, they are saying that there is no infringement and this is just a tactic Microsoft is using to extort money from everyone in the industry, using the courts as a means of threat.
Can’t Google do anything to defend Android against these dirty tactics from Apple/Microsoft?
Edited 2011-04-29 03:57 UTC
Is this case the start of Microsoft anti-trust 2.0?
http://blogs.computerworlduk.com/open-enterprise/2011/04/microsoft-…
It sure seems like as good a place to start as any.
Hats off to Barnes & Noble for telling it like it is. I was going to quote B&N but so much of what it has said is true and pertinent, I’d have to quote the lot.
When are the politicians going to wake up and prevent these software monopolies and cartels using the patent law to stifle innovation, bully, intimidate and prevent competition so that they can foist their own rubbish products on us at exorbitant cost.
I’d say the politicians are wide awake and well aware of the lobby money flowing in from the monopoly craving deep pockets.
The question may be “when are the politicians going to do the right thing for the citizenry they claim to represent instead of for the non-human incorporated legal entities who’ve bought them outright?”
I find it funny when Android device vendors spew hate at Microsoft and Apple especially when it comes from the likes of B&N and their ‘Nook’ device. I find it funny they whine when given these two things they’ve sabotaged thenselves rather than anything to do with Microsoft’s so-called ‘handy work’:
1) B&N US only policy – do they really believe that the only people interested in their product reside in the US?
2) They finally update their firmware to Froyo almost one year after its availability – excuse me but how about shipping it back in November 2010 with it instead.
I swear some device vendors in the US deliberately set themselves up to fail with f-cking stupid policies such as ‘no shipping outside the US’ and ‘lets not upgrade out firmware in a timely manner’. Really, is there some sort of inside joke that I don’t know of where American businesses have an on going bet on who can declare bankruptcy the fastest by being ignorant of customers outside the US?
Sorry B&N, it has nothing to do with Microsoft and everything to do with you, your pathetic management and complete lack of realisation that the internet makes commerce international. Either ship the damn thing world wide on one day or do us all a favour, shut up shop, sell off all your assets and give the funds back to the shareholders because it is abundantly clear you don’t know what the hell you’re doing.
Edited 2011-04-29 09:51 UTC
Not this crock of shit again. Why should they ship outside of the US? Is that a law? You are not entitled to their equipment, you know. You seem to be under the impression that shipping worldwide is an easy thing to do – it isn’t. Every country has its own regulations, testing requirements, and other legal issues to work out. The legal implications alone are massive – not even Apple can ship worldwide from the get go, and with new products (like the Nook), it’s even harder – let alone wireless products, which have to abide by even more laws and regulations.
It often doesn’t even make sense to ship worldwide. Import taxes and shipping costs are insanely high for many countries (I can know, I regularly get bills into the hundreds of euros for simple equipment shipped from the US). This means that shipping worldwide makes your products a hell of a lot expensive than products sold from a local branch – which, of course, takes EVEN MORE time to set up.
For B&N it’s even worse, since they’d have to set up the B&N store as well. This opens up a whole new can of worms. For instance, here in The Netherlands we have our own inter-banking online payment system, which also needs to be supported and understood, both technically and legally. You don’t figure all that out without setting up a local branch, with local lawyers and experts.
You rally seem to lack a grasp of basic economic principles when it comes to these matters, as you bring it up time and time again. Sure, it sucks some products do not make their way to New Zealand (or The Netherlands), but that’s just the way things are.
The Nook was an e-reader. Not a tablet.
Edited 2011-04-29 10:48 UTC
There is nothing stopping the said company selling directly to the public and telling the customer that they’re responsible for any taxes, tariffs required when importing said product. I import things all the time, they go through customs, I receive a letter stating that customs requires me to pay $X for a product being imported (GST and/or duty), I ring up the courier company and provide my credit card details and voila what I have imported is released and delivered to me.
Heard of this thing called international shipping – yeah, well, you can actually ship your product internationally on day one. Heard of this thing called custom clearance? well that is handled between the receiving party and courier company. As for regulatory requirements then don’t sell to those countries, if those countries want thousands of oxygen thieving bureaucrats wasting time then so be it, just don’t export to *THOSE* countries.
As for software updates, if it connected to the internet then it needs to be updated – if you can’t work out why then you should give up whilst you’re ahead.
Edited 2011-04-29 11:35 UTC
Thom,
The cost of shipping kit from the US to Europe is IMHO a totally invalid argument.
Sure it costs to an arm and a leg for ONE item.
If B&N were to sell the Nook in Europe it would not be shipped as individual items from the US. IT would come on a ship in a container direct from the makers in Asia. Just like every iPad or HTC Android Phone.
The cost of shipping those items in bulk is (on a per item basis) pretty small.
As a citizen of the EU/EEA Thom, does it not get frustrating that US Tech companies ignore a market that is quite a bit larger than the uS domestic one? Naturally there are some items I’d rather they kept inside the 50 states (monstrous pickup’s for one).
When I worked for a US company (in Boston) it was a realy struggle to get them to even think about selling outside the lower 48 states let alone Alaska & Hawaii… Europe? Oh No thay said even though Boston to London is about the same flying time as Boston to LA.
*facepalm*
This would require setting up a local branch. This costs lots of money and lawyers. Then the devices need to be tested in each and every country. Then the software needs to be localised. Then the B&N store has to be set up in Europe, and localised for each country. Support networks need to be built in each country, and localised.
You, too, seem to have little grasp on the economic principles behind selling products in new markets.
Not really, no.
They are an exclusively American bookstore, what else would they do? It’s not logical for them to release it worldwide! Amazon on the other hand is a different story…
How having an old OS version compromise a book reader? Really? When people say that about phones that were touted as devices to run apps, I agree that latest version is important. But when the intended functionality of the device is not compromised by old version of software, who cares?.. So there is advertised functionality vs failure to deliver that functionality. Nook is for reading books and it does it well…
If patents really mattered: Ericsson (not sony-ericsson, wich is a later spin off) could crush ALL cellphone manufacturers with their portfolio of patents… I do not see this happening at all, but if patents were real and truly honored we would not have a single cellphone network today that did not use ericsson stations exclusivly or how ever that is spelled.
just a note, is osnews turning into mobilephone/laws about mobile phones news?
Mobile is the new wave and the future of most computing. Just like a lot of people no longer have desktop computers, very soon a lot of people will stick to something even more portable than a laptop. It’s called progress.
Not sure of that… 13″ laptops and small netbooks have been here for some time already, yet not everyone has switched to them. Although fine for web browsing or as an easily transportable powerpoint display engine, they still feel a bit small for a wide range of work.
Now, current tablets have the same size as a netbook, but with significantly lower input resolution, and phones have even smaller screens… At some point, the question must be asked : won’t we reach the frontier of screen-based devices which a human being can work on ?
Edited 2011-04-29 15:05 UTC
I think it’ll be more like the core device – the processing and data storage unit – is mobile and the interface input and output are interchangeable.
Something like what Moto Atrix, but starting with a smaller package and having a Token(reflective LCD with with phone keyboard) -> Smartphone(large touchscreen) -> Tablet/Slate/Whatever you call it -> Laptop -> Desktop. All powered by the processor contained in the Token.
Yup, I’ve already seen this perspective mentioned by someone else on this site (maybe you ?), and indeed it’d be very nice. Finally, an acknowledgement that at the core, personal computing devices have a lot in common !
That being said, there are some challenges before this happens.
-The technical one : Achieving cross-device OS compatibility as wide as from phone to desktop is an impressive challenge. To sell well, we’d have to do more than just port the kernel and core services, and have software scale all the way too. Which in turn requires scalable UIs and functionality. I think it’s doable (at least between PCs and larger tablets), but it would require quite a bit of work. Fascinating problem.
-The commercial one : Why would a company sell you one computer when they can sell you three and have you buy your software three times ? Stopping the little holy war and finally marketting all the various spawns of personal computing as a single computer would probably lead to a reduction of profit.
-The ethical one : There are some practices which are seen as relatively okay in the small device world, but not yet in the desktop world (software distribution vendor lock-in, no root access and no way to install other OSs, remote kill switches for software or whole devices, handing private data to multiple third parties…). If we were to switch to a unified device, would we ditch this mess, or extend it to the whole computer market ?
-The mentality one : In order to sell as much hardware and software as possible, several manufacturers have done their best to have their users believe that computing devices are different at a fundamental level (read : desktop is intrinsically complicated, touchscreen is the best interface for smaller hardware, a tablet is more than a gigantic smartphone, etc.). Part of this brainwashing comes around claiming that software that’s not specifically tailored for one form factor is a piece of crap. If this went deeply in the mind of users, wouldn’t they stay away away from a flexible computing device ?
I can only say “Hallelujah!”
It’s not my idea. I “saw”* it in a Google TechTalk about butch and femme mindset years ago. It was a drawing by a 10 y/o girl shown in comparison to a boy’s drawing on the same matter.
* – Well most butch people in tech actually neglected to notice and creatively extrapolate
For me, progress is:
– my hand-top now including a cell radio and delivering horsepower equivalent to my last notebook
– my notebook now running the same OS install as my desktop and delivering horsepower equivalent to my last desktop
– my desktop now delivering horsepower not available in a current notebook computer
I’m sure not going to be stopping the time and hardware intensive tasks running on my machine mid-way through just because I’m changing locations.
I’d say progress is the increasing functionality and power of all chassis shapes and sizes over time. Though, real progress may result from fixing the abused, consumer hostile and antiquated legal frameworks now used regularly to stifle real progress.
“Microsoft did not invent, research, develop, or make available to the public mobile devices employing the Android Operating System and other open source operating systems, but nevertheless seeks to dominate something it did not invent,” it further states.
Actually, I don’t think Microsoft’s claim is that it did any of the above for Android or other open source operating systems, but rather that those same open source operating systems are violating patents that Microsoft holds and therefore did not themselves ‘invent, research’ part of what they’re providing.
The software patent stuff is totally screwed up, but depending on what Microsoft is claiming, they could be totally correct, and B&N saying that Microsoft didn’t write Android and therefore has no standing may be both incorrect and irrelevant in the legal sense.
As for the entire system, well… you lost me at ‘1-click’ shopping. Really? Geez.
If the issue is with Android then B&N seems like the wrong defendant since they simply adopted Android as a commodity component of there product; it was Google who implemented the allegedly infringing functionality. But.. Microsoft wants to extort the easier targets not confront the legally responsible target who could actually push back. No different than any other school yard bully really.
“These dirty tactics from Redmond are a massive blemish on the WP7’s team’s efforts, and more than ever, want me to get my hands on a decent Android phone and leave my HTC HD7 in the dust.”
You might not even have to get a new phone
http://www.mobilecrunch.com/2011/04/06/video-hackers-kick-windows-p…
Google, as the creator of this operating system called Android, always seems to get good press by not being linked to this operating system, released an operating system that included a zero day vulnerability, and if anyone tries to improve a product made by Google, they do not say anything, because everyone is scared witless to suggest anything that might be viewed as negative because they are one of the largest search engine? You want to talk about anti-trust issues and strong arming tactics by reading in between the lines?
This press release comes on the heels of a large negative drop in the stock of Google?
Interesting. Android is not upgradeable on many devices? Interesting. Patents are not worth fighting for? Interesting. If you work for Microsoft, you want a wishy washy, weak armed legal department trying to keep you employed? Interesting.
This looks like a press release among countless other attacks because Microsoft does things that makes it hard or impossible for Congress to regulate while benefiting the consumer? Interesting, this free enterprise stuff? Microsoft released a political cloud operating system and application? Interesting.
Ever notice how free Linux applications and systems look a lot like Microsoft Systems and their web site? Interesting…
No operating system will dominate the market, and professionals in the IT industry see this as nothing more than professionals feeling sorry for themselves, instead of making cool stuff, or are bored people that write press releases, trying to stir up the pot, because their job is to make juicy gossip pieces that make adults loose their minds?
Interesting questions, for the public to ask themselves….the truth, is out there.
In my humble opinion, this article is nothing more than a political smoke screen, meant to manipulate public opinion by leaving out the questions I have just asked?
Have a nice day. Lots of Linux fans, like Microsoft Products, and they do not understand the grand standing and manipulation of the press? Follow the money, and the questions not answered?
Edited 2011-04-30 11:22 UTC