6 ms·

PJ called it alright. No offense but Groklaw's behaviour against Florian has been nothing short of disgraceful and extremely immature. Who cares if Florian is

PJ called it alright. No offense but Groklaw's behaviour against Florian has been nothing short of disgraceful and extremely immature. Who cares if Florian is being paid by Microsoft et al ? It happens all the time amongst bloggers and doesn't mean jack to me. EVERYONE is biassed in some way. Whether through money, previous experiences or external pressures. As a reader you should always consult multiple sources. It's been really disappointing watching the great work that Groklaw do be sullied by all these personal attacks.

joe_the_user 14y ago
Florian wasn't just an anonymous blogger before he was outed. His "bully pulpit" was the blog once named "Free and Open Source Patents" (FOSS) and he leveraged some earlier open source advocacy to lend credibility to his shilling in the present case. http://www.fosspatents.com/ http://www.fosspatents.com/ (Notice that the name is now seems to be changed at the site). One can however, easily find references on the web billing Mueller as an expert on "Free and Open Source Patents". Edit: Added "seems" at bottom
rapind 14y ago
Really? Who cares who's paying your news source? Isn't possible bias one of the most important issues when it comes to trusting a source? There are degrees of bias and as a reader why would you want to waste your time reading from a source known to have a massive conflict of interest? I definitely appreciate knowing about a source's bias.
- flomo 14y ago
  It's certainly fine to know about it, IMO, but all of the internet taunting seems immature and unnecessary.
  - rapind 14y ago
    I can agree with that. Good point.
  - deleted 14y ago
    [deleted]
  - fpgeek 14y ago
    Part of the taunting now is in response to his past behavior. Florian repeatedly refused to talk about his funding and insisted it was irrelevant (he has a history at lwn.net among other places). Now that we know the full context, people on the other side of that argument naturally want to underline it.
zmmmmm 14y ago
The problem with Florian Mueller is that he positioned himself for a long time as an independent analyst and has continued posing as such with many various media outlets and continues to be quoted that way. We all expect Oracle and Microsoft's lawyers and PR team to argue their case and nobody blames them for it. But somebody who deliberately tries to distort and influence a public issue through misinformation and deception - they absolutely deserve to be called out for it and criticized. (And for what it is worth, Mueller actually provided genuinely informative coverage of many of the issues - which made him all the more effective).
beedogs 14y ago
> Who cares if Florian is being paid by Microsoft et al ? Are you out of your mind? I do, for one. A lot of people think this is a significant issue.
fpgeek 14y ago
If nobody cared about Florian's funding, why did he consistently refuse to talk about it until recently?

joe_the_user 14y ago

Florian wasn't just an anonymous blogger before he was outed. His "bully pulpit" was the blog once named "Free and Open Source Patents" (FOSS) and he leveraged some earlier open source advocacy to lend credibility to his shilling in the present case. http://www.fosspatents.com/ http://www.fosspatents.com/ (Notice that the name is now seems to be changed at the site). One can however, easily find references on the web billing Mueller as an expert on "Free and Open Source Patents". Edit: Added "seems" at bottom

rapind 14y ago

Really? Who cares who's paying your news source? Isn't possible bias one of the most important issues when it comes to trusting a source? There are degrees of bias and as a reader why would you want to waste your time reading from a source known to have a massive conflict of interest? I definitely appreciate knowing about a source's bias.

flomo 14y ago
It's certainly fine to know about it, IMO, but all of the internet taunting seems immature and unnecessary.
- rapind 14y ago
  I can agree with that. Good point.
- deleted 14y ago
  [deleted]
- fpgeek 14y ago
  Part of the taunting now is in response to his past behavior. Florian repeatedly refused to talk about his funding and insisted it was irrelevant (he has a history at lwn.net among other places). Now that we know the full context, people on the other side of that argument naturally want to underline it.

zmmmmm 14y ago

The problem with Florian Mueller is that he positioned himself for a long time as an independent analyst and has continued posing as such with many various media outlets and continues to be quoted that way. We all expect Oracle and Microsoft's lawyers and PR team to argue their case and nobody blames them for it. But somebody who deliberately tries to distort and influence a public issue through misinformation and deception - they absolutely deserve to be called out for it and criticized. (And for what it is worth, Mueller actually provided genuinely informative coverage of many of the issues - which made him all the more effective).

beedogs 14y ago

> Who cares if Florian is being paid by Microsoft et al ? Are you out of your mind? I do, for one. A lot of people think this is a significant issue.

fpgeek 14y ago

If nobody cared about Florian's funding, why did he consistently refuse to talk about it until recently?