In a move that's going to raise a lot of eyebrows, Microsoft has joined the Open Invention Network to 'protect Linux and other important open source workloads from patent assertions'.
For those who haven't heard of the OIN, their mission statement is quite a simple and honourable one "The Open Invention Network is a shared defensive patent pool with the mission to protect Linux.". To find out more about the OIN see here.
Hold the phone, this isn't gaming news?
Correct. However, this is still very interesting and extremely surprising from a company that has been pretty hostile to Linux in the past. It's the kind of move that could result in some big shifts in the entire industry.
We know Microsoft’s decision to join OIN may be viewed as surprising to some; it is no secret that there has been friction in the past between Microsoft and the open source community over the issue of patents. For others who have followed our evolution, we hope this announcement will be viewed as the next logical step for a company that is listening to customers and developers and is firmly committed to Linux and other open source programs.
Surprising is one word for it! Honestly, I'm in shock at this news. Does this mean we can firmly put the "Embrace, extend, and extinguish" phrase to rest and replace it with Embrace, extend, and protect? With Microsoft joining, they're bringing with them around 60,000 patents.
Moves like that, makes me seriously think about how Microsoft have changed, especially since their previous CEO Steve Ballmer called Linux "a cancer".
I think it also shows how far Linux has come as a platform for all things too, especially with Microsoft having a "Windows Subsystem for Linux" along with their support for running Linux on their Azure cloud computing platform.
What do you think to this?
Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
Quoting: jarhead_hIf Microsoft wants to "protect" Linux, it's because they think that they can control it. As Linus stated rather famously, the desktop is the ONLY area of computing that Linux does not dominate. On the desktop that would be Windows. Now Linux has matured enough that Windows is about to have competition.
Microsoft bought it's way into the Linux Foundation, and months later there was basically a coup which removed Linus. The LF is calling it a sabbatical, but he's not coming back if they can help it. They have implemented a CoC which directly panders to identity politics over quality of code, which has had the desired effect of splitting the community down left/right lines and could well destroy it. And it's just a coincidence that Microsoft bought their way in a few months earlier. Oh and Microsoft bought Github.
And now this.
Linux will not survive this as Linux. Microsoft will either control it or break it into a thousand pieces. Red Hat and Cannonical might even be on board. Google sure as hell will be.
Linux kernel can survive anything, the GPL license is the guarantee. We may have to change the name (or they may have to change it), but the open source core will be there for ever and for everyone.
Microsoft is doing all this stuff because they know that cloud SaaS is the future for their desktop platform and Linux is thousands miles away at the server side than their current systems. It would have no sense to spend a trillion of money to get NT kernel to the place that Linux is, not to mention the cost of training and propaganda they would need. They know that it's a war that they cannot win, so everything points towards that they will start moving resources from their proprietary software to FOSS.
I don't like Microsoft products and enterprise strategies (not to mention that I don't plan to buy anything from them), but I think it would be stupid to not accept and use the free resource they could provide. In the FOSS (and mostly in the Linux kernel) is quite difficult that they could make any harm.
Anyway, it's still very early to get any conclusion. Not to mention that one thing could be their strategy for Azure and other way more different could be for the gaming department. I still believe that they won't help in anyway to make multi platform DX.
Quoting: GuestI expect them to turn Windows into a Linux distro + proprietary libraries/API/DE at some point. It will be cheaper for them to maintain, ...
Exactly
(I couldn't get myself to like the comment though)
YourPalMark Oct 10, 2018
Mountain Man Oct 10, 2018
not sue everyone. (not forcing everyone to pay royalites for your patents)
not being sued by everyone. (not having to pay for others patents)
Therefore, no trust from me for Microsoft, never, whatever they'll do under this company name, and I consider myself as open minded in comparison to the "no tux no bux" fraction.
Ont thing is for sure: Microsoft will not make open source better than it has become. So please stay away, dear MS parasites.
Edit: typo
Last edited by dude on 10 October 2018 at 8:00 pm UTC
Like jarhead_h mentioned , the CoC Linux added seems to value politics over code quality.
Maybe Microsoft smell blood and decided to make their move.
I doubt they are doing it out of the kindess of their hearts or because they had a change of heart.
Like Mountain Man mentioned it all comes down to profits and they don't have to be dicks about it , at least not now.
I wish we had some people working on legal in GOL. Curios how they can bend this to their advantage or if it is just a PR stunt.
But none of the takes on it really feels solid to me, I'm quite nonplussed.
One thing I will say: If they are planning something nefarious with this move, I'm not convinced it will work the way whoever is planning it thinks it will. MS have never really wrapped their heads around how Free Software, the GPL etc. work and their plans to mess with it have never to date been entirely effective. They always seem to underestimate or misunderstand Open's ability to work around Closed. I don't see why this time would be different.
Quoting: razing32Like jarhead_h mentioned , the CoC Linux added seems to value politics over code quality.Oh, god, let's not get into that again.
Patreon
PayPal
See more from me