4 ms·

> if MSFT gets royalties from these patents it would be irresponsible (to their shareholders, and employees) for them to ditch them Actively enforcing patents

> if MSFT gets royalties from these patents it would be irresponsible (to their shareholders, and employees) for them to ditch them Actively enforcing patents like these hurts Microsoft's relationship with developers, hardware manufacturers, the open source community etc.

mwfunk 11y ago
Sadly that means that there is likely one group of people in MS saying, "enforcing these patents gives us a large revenue stream that we don't have to do anything to maintain" (except for paying lawyers, but lawyers probably form part of the core of this group). On the other side, there is likely another group of people in MS saying "hey guys, if we give up this massive guaranteed cash flow we could receive an impossible-to-predict-or-measure amount of goodwill from ill-defined groups of hypothetical people who might all just hate us anyway no matter what we do, and even if it does make them like us more we're not sure if it will really make a difference in the long run." Now, I would be squarely in the latter group, because I think it's the right thing to do and is consistent with the kind of company that MS appears to be trying to transform itself into, but I've gotta think that that's a very tough case to argue to anyone who is actually in a position to make that call and is therefore held responsible for the outcome. I would try to make a much more convincing argument than the strawman I presented, but since it's all about intangibles, someone with an opposing viewpoint could probably make just as convincing of a case by framing my intangibles as that strawman, and there's not a whole lot anyone could say to refute it. It's a local maximum seen throughout the industry- I think there is a growing realization outside of the usual niches (open source advocates, HN readers, etc.) that software patents are doing more harm than good, but in the individual isolated cases it still comes down to people arguing internally that an organization should give up a guaranteed revenue stream in exchange for theoretical goodwill that may or may not actually benefit the company in any tangible way. Lots of people hate stupid patents but patent holders would rather change the system for everyone, than go out on a limb and make a sacrifice like that with no guarantee that their competitors would follow suit. I don't envy anyone trying to fight the good fight in that environment.
lagadu 11y ago
The group of people that still hates Microsoft by and large will always hate them until they die. Even if they opened up the patents they'd still be hated for "being evil". There's next to nothing to gain from doing and there's billions to lose.
- low_battery 11y ago
  I guess if they really stop "being evil" a lot of people would give them another chance.
- tluyben2 11y ago
  Nah, people were giving them another chance already. I for one don't 'hate' them, I find Windows (and Outlook and let's not talk about Sharepoint) not a good product and thus not worth the money and with them 'being evil', I did not really understand why anyone would use it. With all the open source and other good strategy decisions by Nadella I was changing my opinion some what. It seems they should take that all the way to make me (and others) to not frown when someone says they pay for their products. Still something is better than nothing so they did become less evil in some respects, however their open source strategy seems about getting devs closer again and devs are some of the only people who care deeply about patents.
  - lagadu 11y ago
    > I find Windows (and Outlook and let's not talk about Sharepoint) not a good product and thus not worth the money This is exactly what I mean. Them opening up the patents wouldn't change your bias against their products (justified or otherwise isn't relevant) like you just described, making it a business decision with very, very limited gains and billions in losses.
    - abiox 11y ago
      you seem to say that windows is objectively good and worth the money, irrespective of their circumstance. otherwise, what could "wouldn't change your bias" mean?

mwfunk 11y ago

Sadly that means that there is likely one group of people in MS saying, "enforcing these patents gives us a large revenue stream that we don't have to do anything to maintain" (except for paying lawyers, but lawyers probably form part of the core of this group). On the other side, there is likely another group of people in MS saying "hey guys, if we give up this massive guaranteed cash flow we could receive an impossible-to-predict-or-measure amount of goodwill from ill-defined groups of hypothetical people who might all just hate us anyway no matter what we do, and even if it does make them like us more we're not sure if it will really make a difference in the long run." Now, I would be squarely in the latter group, because I think it's the right thing to do and is consistent with the kind of company that MS appears to be trying to transform itself into, but I've gotta think that that's a very tough case to argue to anyone who is actually in a position to make that call and is therefore held responsible for the outcome. I would try to make a much more convincing argument than the strawman I presented, but since it's all about intangibles, someone with an opposing viewpoint could probably make just as convincing of a case by framing my intangibles as that strawman, and there's not a whole lot anyone could say to refute it. It's a local maximum seen throughout the industry- I think there is a growing realization outside of the usual niches (open source advocates, HN readers, etc.) that software patents are doing more harm than good, but in the individual isolated cases it still comes down to people arguing internally that an organization should give up a guaranteed revenue stream in exchange for theoretical goodwill that may or may not actually benefit the company in any tangible way. Lots of people hate stupid patents but patent holders would rather change the system for everyone, than go out on a limb and make a sacrifice like that with no guarantee that their competitors would follow suit. I don't envy anyone trying to fight the good fight in that environment.

lagadu 11y ago

The group of people that still hates Microsoft by and large will always hate them until they die. Even if they opened up the patents they'd still be hated for "being evil". There's next to nothing to gain from doing and there's billions to lose.

low_battery 11y ago
I guess if they really stop "being evil" a lot of people would give them another chance.
tluyben2 11y ago
Nah, people were giving them another chance already. I for one don't 'hate' them, I find Windows (and Outlook and let's not talk about Sharepoint) not a good product and thus not worth the money and with them 'being evil', I did not really understand why anyone would use it. With all the open source and other good strategy decisions by Nadella I was changing my opinion some what. It seems they should take that all the way to make me (and others) to not frown when someone says they pay for their products. Still something is better than nothing so they did become less evil in some respects, however their open source strategy seems about getting devs closer again and devs are some of the only people who care deeply about patents.
- lagadu 11y ago
  > I find Windows (and Outlook and let's not talk about Sharepoint) not a good product and thus not worth the money This is exactly what I mean. Them opening up the patents wouldn't change your bias against their products (justified or otherwise isn't relevant) like you just described, making it a business decision with very, very limited gains and billions in losses.
  - abiox 11y ago
    you seem to say that windows is objectively good and worth the money, irrespective of their circumstance. otherwise, what could "wouldn't change your bias" mean?