Microsoft May Shut Down Most of the Internent

mushroom · #1 (**permalink**) 11-07-2004, 02:19 PM

Well that is the implication.

Quote:

Is Microsoft Ready to Assert IP Rights over the Internet?
By Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols
November 5, 2004

Has Microsoft been trying to retroactively claim IP (intellectual property) rights over many of the Internet's basic protocols? Larry J. Blunk, senior engineer for networking research and development at Merit Network Inc., believes that might be the case.

Blunk expressed these concerns about Microsoft's Royalty Free Protocol License Agreement in a recent note to the IETF's Intellectual Property Rights Working Group. Specifically, Blunk suggested that Microsoft seemed to be claiming IP rights to many vital Internet protocols. And by so doing, "Microsoft is injecting a significant amount of unwarranted uncertainty and doubt regarding non-Microsoft implementations of these protocols," Blunk said.

From: http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1759,1714680,00.asp
They have a link to the poison pill if you wish to read the so called license.

MathsIsFun · #2 (**permalink**) 11-08-2004, 05:27 AM

Quote:

"Many of the listed protocols are [IETF] RFC [request for comment] documents, including but not limited to the core TCP/IP v4 and TCP/IP v6 protocol specifications," he said in his note.

Oh no, cannot be so!

MS was so slow to adopt the internet - they missed the whole thing and had to play catch-up. I recall Mr Gates saying "we will turn the company on a dime" when he realised MS had overlooked it.

They did a good job catching up, though, and squashed Netscape.

So now they claim they invented crucial elements of it?

jawn_tech · #3 (**permalink**) 11-08-2004, 11:34 AM

Thanks for sharing the article!

I remember when it was being said that the creators of .jpg, and other graphic extensions had a patent on the invention, and everyone who used graphics on their site would have to pay a royalty... that never materialized and I doubt it will.

Between them, MS, and Al Gore, there's no telling who really came up with what -- but the 'open and sharing' community won't have it I'm sure.

MathsIsFun · #4 (**permalink**) 11-08-2004, 05:25 PM

MP3 should be licenced. http://www.mp3licensing.com/

I was working on a shareware music library and wanted a plug-in to play MP3. That's when I found out I should be paying to be able to decode the files.

Hey, it was only $0.75 per unit.

But wait - "Annual minimum royalties are payable upon signature and each following year - US$ 15,000.00 per calendar year"

$15,000 ?? So I did the only sensible thing - gave up.

Let that be a lesson to us all!

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