¡No Pasarán!
March 27, 2008 9:27 am GeneralThat is why a lot of free software people consider Miguel as some kind of “Pro-Microsoft Trojan horse”. That posting looks to me like rather impudent attempt to shift community attention from one real problem (patents-charged OOXML as ISO standard) to some set of other (also real but still) unrelated issues.
March 27th, 2008 at 11:03 am
Unfortunately so. If I were a dramtic kind of person I’d say that Miguel has lost his way, but as I’m not I’ll just say that Miguel has been the type of Open Source person that programmers aspire to be for many years now.
Here’s what I posted on Karl Lattimers blog (also on p.g.o)
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Best interests at heart? Miguel says his company has left the open source community and they’re making patent deals with Microsoft, Novell employees don’t sign the JCA for OOo, and there’s technical evidence that OOXML can’t be implemented due to it being such poor technical quality.
I’d shake Miguels hand if I ever met him but really his efforts for many years now haven’t been about open source, they’re about promoting OOXML and cross-platform support for patent encumbered Microsoft tech.
People looking for open source leaders have long since been looking elsewhere.
This shouldn’t be taken as any insult to Miguel, but it’s how he’s perceived by the majority of open source developers.
March 27th, 2008 at 11:04 am
Heh, my comment would make more sense if I change “has” to “hasn’t” 😉
March 27th, 2008 at 12:49 pm
Свушечка, ну што ты кипятишсо? 🙂
March 27th, 2008 at 2:53 pm
Alexandre: ай достал уже этот грязный коллаборационист! Пойду и на него Столману пожалуюсь!;)
March 27th, 2008 at 4:15 pm
Matt,
This is a recollection from what I have read on the blogs and the OOo discussions, and not an authoritative account, so you might want to do your own research.
Novell and the JCA for OOo basically comes down to the fact that if we sign that, all of our code can end up in a proprietary application like Lotus Notes, with *none* of the improvements making it back to the open source community.
It is basically a copyright assignment, but we consider that the amount of work that we do in this area is large enough that it *should* remain open source and that all of us using the OOo codebase should be on an equal footing, and IBM should not be the only one with special privileges.
So our changes are public, they are under the OOo license, and free for anyone to take (pretty much every Linux distro does), as long as they give back.
As for my comments about Novell, you are miss representing my comments. Novell continues to be one of the most active contributors to the open source community, and if you use the open source desktop, you are benefiting every day from all the work and effort that we pour into it.
Miguel.
March 27th, 2008 at 4:27 pm
Troskista y Comunista!
March 27th, 2008 at 6:09 pm
Miguel is a fucking traitor.
March 27th, 2008 at 11:23 pm
Miguel, surprizingly enough, in your comment there is no single mention about patents and patent-related agreements. Could you please make a statement regarding these issues? But without “this is a storm in the teacup, look at the real problems” attitude please.
March 28th, 2008 at 12:46 am
Sergey,
Am not sure what you are referring to about patents.. Perhaps some false claim propagated by the anti-OOXML camp.
OOXML is covered under the OSP. The only complain I have heard about the OSP is what would happen if future versions of OOXML were not under the OSP, a criticism that Microsoft has addressed (see Brian Jones blog for the announcement).
Not that it was a real issue in the first place, but one of the last things that some people clinched to.
Miguel.
March 28th, 2008 at 2:28 am
Do my own research? Miguel, you have no reason to think that I haven’t done my own research other than that it makes your argument stronger by attacking character as merely someone who regurgitates others arguments.
I’ve done my own research. That the company you work for has left the open source community and that you did a long time ago is my claim.
March 28th, 2008 at 2:32 am
Miguel,
The 4 year patent deal with Microsoft, obviously that covers things like SilverLight. The one that Microsoft don’t have to renew in 4 years leaving open source developers with something you’ve described as infringing and requiring patent coverage. The patent deal that isn’t compatible with the GPLv3 (as admitted by Novell in their SEC filings).
That’s probably the patent deal.