Linux violates more than 228 patents!

[TechnoPro]

SINGAPORE (Reuters) -- Microsoft Corp. warned Asian governments on Thursday they could face patent lawsuits for using the Linux operating system instead of its Windows software.

The growing popularity of Linux -- an open-code software that is freely available on the Internet and easily modified by users -- is a threat to the global dominance of Microsoft's Windows.

Linux violates more than 228 patents, according to a recent report from a research group, Microsoft Chief Executive Steve Ballmer said at the company's Asian Government Leaders Forum in Singapore.

...

CNN article here.

Sorry if this is a repost, but this issue troubles me. I look at Linux as a positive disruptive technology, one that will force MS to build up their technologies to even higher levels. But to hear Microsoft attack Linux for legal reasons as opposed to an intelligent presentation of fact based on the technical merits of Microsoft's products, that's simply ridiculous. Who is Microsoft to warn anyone? They should, IMHO, instead be pitching the superiority of their product offerings and giving a reasonable price to these countries.

Is this just another strong-arm tactic that a big company can freely get away with?

I haven't heard much in the way of SCO vs. IBM saga, so I perhaps erroneously thought the issued had quietly gone away. I guess I am mistaken. Is there still a debate going as to the origins and legitimacy of the Linux source code? Can this issue be resolved so that Linux can continue to grow, unfettered by this litigation?

Mind you, I am a die-hard Microsoft fan... Just this "warning to Asian countries" really got to me.

 

[n0cmonkey]

It's not a repost really, but it is old news (that's been posted before ).

IIRC, Linus advised or encourages developers not to look into patent issues so they don't know if they are violating any or not.

Novell is currently kicking SCO's butt, I think.

Microsoft won't be able to use much US law against people in Asia, no matter how good their lawyers are.

I personally believe it though, this Intellectual Property tactic is getting annoying. It's trying to kill innovation in the name of the almighty dollar. Eventually everyone will see that the emperor is naked, has always been naked, and will always be naked. Until then, screw'em. I'm using BSD.

 

[kylef]

Before everyone starts taking these things out of context (probably too late), you should actually go and Read the Actual Transcript of what Ballmer said.

This was posted to Slashdot yesterday and predictably made all of the Slashbots go nuts. But, as is typical, very few actually RTFA.

Take off your tinfoil hats. Despite one of the biggest patent portfolios in the industry, Microsoft doesn't aggressively launch infringment suits. Instead, the patent portfolios are generally seen as a way to negotiate cross-licensing deals with other major vendors, and a way to COUNTER-SUE when someone brings infringement litigation against Microsoft.

 

[doornail]

Balmer was misrepresenting a patent study done by Dan Ravicher. Here are Ravicher own words on the issue:

"The most important finding is that Linux infringes on zero patents that have survived reviews in court. The 283 patents that the kernel could infringe have all gone unchallenged so far. There is a chance that a court could find the patents invalid -- so the conclusion that there are 283 ways in which patent holders could bring suit against kernel developers, users, and distributors is flawed."

http://www.groklaw.net/article...tory=20041118224916429
http://www.oreillynet.com/cs/user/print/a/5073

 

[kylef]

Originally posted by: doornail
Balmer was misrepresenting a patent study done by Dan Ravicher. Here are Ravicher own words on the issue:

"The most important finding is that Linux infringes on zero patents that have survived reviews in court. The 283 patents that the kernel could infringe have all gone unchallenged so far. There is a chance that a court could find the patents invalid -- so the conclusion that there are 283 ways in which patent holders could bring suit against kernel developers, users, and distributors is flawed."

That's not why people are raising a stink about this. People are insinuating (as the original poster suggested) that Microsoft (Ballmer in this case) is threatening Asia with litigation should it choose to adopt Linux.

If you read the text of what Ballmer said, you will see quite clearly that those claims are unfounded.

What Ballmer actually said is more like this: "It is not necessarily true that the licensing costs of Windows are significantly higher than those of Linux, because any usuable form of Linux will have some IP that is not free, and you could reasonably be expected to pay for that at some point. In any case, the licensing costs of Linux are not clear at this point in time, so it's an oversimplification to say that the licensing cost issue is settled."

 

[VirtualLarry]

The irony is that any usable version ofWindows, uses IP that was originally developed under and for *nix systems. (BSD TCP/IP stack most notably). It's quite disturbing on the whole, that MS is beating this drum, whether truthfully or not. It tends to paint their prior background of patent non-agression in a bit of a different light. IMHO, they're not going to hold back any more, because the only way to "kill" Linux, if that's even possible, is via patent infringement lawsuits - whether real, or imagined, due to MS FUD. They use fear as a weapon in the marketplace, and they use it well. The fact that they've already also been looking at patenting some of the more basic internet-protocol RFCs, in tandem with this FUD Linux drum-beating, is especially worrysome. It's as if, because MS couldn't "own the internet" via the sales of their products, they are now going to go the legal route and prohibit nearly any and every effective competitor, if they can manage to hold the legal cards to a few key protocols.

Ironically, if they do manage to patent those protocols, then those humorous spoofs about MS patenting ones and zeros and basic elements of language, wouldn't be all that far off.

This madness has to stop, NOW!

 

[TechnoPro]

Originally posted by: VirtualLarry
The irony is that any usable version ofWindows, uses IP that was originally developed under and for *nix systems. (BSD TCP/IP stack most notably). It's quite disturbing on the whole, that MS is beating this drum, whether truthfully or not. It tends to paint their prior background of patent non-agression in a bit of a different light. IMHO, they're not going to hold back any more, because the only way to "kill" Linux, if that's even possible, is via patent infringement lawsuits - whether real, or imagined, due to MS FUD. They use fear as a weapon in the marketplace, and they use it well. The fact that they've already also been looking at patenting some of the more basic internet-protocol RFCs, in tandem with this FUD Linux drum-beating, is especially worrysome. It's as if, because MS couldn't "own the internet" via the sales of their products, they are now going to go the legal route and prohibit nearly any and every effective competitor, if they can manage to hold the legal cards to a few key protocols.

Ironically, if they do manage to patent those protocols, then those humorous spoofs about MS patenting ones and zeros and basic elements of language, wouldn't be all that far off.

This madness has to stop, NOW!

MS FUD? And I thought I knew most of the acronyms...

Wouldn't another viable Linux "killer" be to release amazing software? Secure, stable, fast operating system and apps? I guess I'm a firm believer that people will pay when something is that good. Maybe I'm wrong...

 

[drag]

Originally posted by: kylef

Originally posted by: doornail
Balmer was misrepresenting a patent study done by Dan Ravicher. Here are Ravicher own words on the issue:

"The most important finding is that Linux infringes on zero patents that have survived reviews in court. The 283 patents that the kernel could infringe have all gone unchallenged so far. There is a chance that a court could find the patents invalid -- so the conclusion that there are 283 ways in which patent holders could bring suit against kernel developers, users, and distributors is flawed."

That's not why people are raising a stink about this. People are insinuating (as the original poster suggested) that Microsoft (Ballmer in this case) is threatening Asia with litigation should it choose to adopt Linux.

If you read the text of what Ballmer said, you will see quite clearly that those claims are unfounded.

What Ballmer actually said is more like this: "It is not necessarily true that the licensing costs of Windows are significantly higher than those of Linux, because any usuable form of Linux will have some IP that is not free, and you could reasonably be expected to pay for that at some point. In any case, the licensing costs of Linux are not clear at this point in time, so it's an oversimplification to say that the licensing cost issue is settled."

I think people are interpreting it as a implied threat. He refered to the person seeking damages as "someone".

Number two, on licensing costs I would say two things. First of all, I don't know that it's clear to anybody what the licensing costs are for open source. Today, people say, well, isn't it just free, but we don't know in the long run. Open source software does not today respect the intellectual property rights of any intellectual property holder. There was a report out this summer by an open source group that highlighted that Linux violates over 228 patents. Some day, for all countries that are entering WTO (World Trade Organization), somebody will come and look for money to pay for the patent rights for that intellectual property. So the licensing costs are less clear than people think today.

It's kinda like if you cut me off in traffic and I yelled at you "you know, someday, someone is going to beat the crap out of you for doing that!". That is a implied threat.

He didn't say Microsoft would be the ones seeking damages, but he didn't rule Microsoft out either.

It's a vague thing, political speech. It was either a mistake to say what he said or it was something calculated, because these software patents are a very touchy and scary political issue and saying what he said was something that would obviously provoke a reaction.

After all the patent system is a mess and software isn't realy something that should be patented. It's already protected by copyright and that's something that is COMPLETELY different from patents.

I can see patenting a software idea if it's actually new and revolutional, but that's not how software works usually. It's a gradual, evolutionary thing. Software Patents threaten innovation, even Bill Gates would agree with me:

from Bill Gates Challenges And Strategy Memo, May 16, 1991

This is a category of challenges we face that I don't feel are widely recognized.

PATENTS: If people had understood how patents would be granted when most of today's ideas were invented, and had taken out patents, the industry would be at a complete standstill today. I feel certain that some large company will patent some obvious thing related to interface, object orientation, algorithm, application extension or other crucial technique. If we assume this company has no need of any of our patents then the have a 17-year right to take as much of our profits as they want. The solution to this is patent exchanges with large companies and patenting as much as we can. Amazingly we havn't done any patent exchanges tha I am aware of. Amazingly we havn't found a way to use our licensing position to avoid having our own customers cause patent problems for us. I know these aren't simply problems but they deserve more effort by both Legal and other groups. For example we need to do a patent exchange with HP as part of our new relationship. In many application categories straighforward thinking ahead allows you to come up with patentable ideas. A recent paper from the League for Programming Freedom (available from the Legal department) explains some problems with the way patents are applied to software.

Apperently Microsoft decided the best way to solve these problems is to patent as much as they can before other people do.

I think, and most other people think, that the best thing to do is reform the software patent proccess, probably make it invalid on the most part.

 

[VirtualLarry]

Originally posted by: TechnoPro
MS FUD? And I thought I knew most of the acronyms...
Wouldn't another viable Linux "killer" be to release amazing software? Secure, stable, fast operating system and apps? I guess I'm a firm believer that people will pay when something is that good. Maybe I'm wrong...

Nah, if MS actually was able to pull that off, no-one would ever upgrade again, and the mighty MS market battleship would sink to the bottom, unable to sustain it's own weight.

 

[kylef]

Originally posted by: drag
I can see patenting a software idea if it's actually new and revolutional, but that's not how software works usually. It's a gradual, evolutionary thing.

I am going to say this one more time: MS patents things defensively, unlike IP potfolio companies like Eolas. Sometimes these patents are for things that really are interesting, and sometimes they are not.

ALL legitimate companies patent their ideas aggressively precisely because if they don't, another company will come along and sue them for infringement. It's a matter of self defense: patent, or get sued into oblivion. If a company CAN be granted a patent to add to its portfolio, why not? It's not always clear which patents will be useful 10 years down the road. But perhaps that patent will give the team a legal recourse to either defend itself in other infringement cases, or to counter-sue in an attempt to force a cross-licensing agreement.

The problem is, that was traditional corporate patent warfare. Today it's much worse than that. Today, you never know when Eolas will come along from no where and, even though they don't even sell a product, claim damages from you exceeding $1 billion and receive an award of $521 million.

But we're getting way off topic here debating software patents themselves! Ballmer did NOT threaten litigation. To get a threat out of his words, you have to read so far between the lines that you might start seeing secret subliminal messages too.

Ballmer's point is that some things require licenses. Take, for example, MPEG2 decoders for DVD software. Or the MPEG4 audio codec (AAC) made by Dolby Laboratories. Such decoders are patented software, requiring per-decoder licensing fees overseen by the Motion Picture Experts Group. If you are running a free version of Linux that somehow includes these components, then you have not paid your license. It is reasonable to expect that some companies will not be as nice as Microsoft has traditionally been on this issue, and will actually ENFORCE their patent portfolios offensively (and not just defensively). Ballmer basically is just saying, "There is no precedent here, and the future is not clear about the legality of such situations." I don't see what's so controversial about that statement!

Originally posted by: VirtualLarry
IMHO, they're not going to hold back any more, because the only way to "kill" Linux, if that's even possible, is via patent infringement lawsuits - whether real, or imagined, due to MS FUD.

I'm amused that people here in this thread are claiming that Microsoft is responsible for the FUD here. That's hilarious! The original Slashdot post on this was classic FUD. "Guess what, Microsoft's CEO just threatened to sue Asian companies if they adopted Linux! Yep! He said that Linux violates 200+ patents! This is just what we feared: Microsoft is going to start suing everyone running Linux now!"

Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt are exactly what fanned the flames to make this article newsworthy in the first place. And frankly, it's getting to the point where the Slashdot crowd is starting to look like the Boy who Cried Wolf.

Drag, your citation of Bill Gates proves my point EXACTLY. Let me quote:

"The solution to this is patent exchanges with large companies and patenting as much as we can."

Exactly! Can you say, "cross-licensing agreements" and "defensive patent portfolio"??

 

[drag]

Drag, your citation of Bill Gates proves my point EXACTLY. Let me quote:

"The solution to this is patent exchanges with large companies and patenting as much as we can."

Exactly! Can you say, "cross-licensing agreements" and "defensive patent portfolio"??

I wasn't dissagreeing with you. (that's also why i incorporate the ENTIRE quote. I thought it was obvious what I was saying. Hence the "even Bill Gates agrees with me" part) I was pointing out that it's legitament to say that what Balmer said could be interpreted into a veiled threat.

(listen. If RMS came up in front a group of international people and said you have to be very paranoid about using Microsoft software because somebody will sue you for buying it and using it, what would you think?)

Seriously. Who is the intended audiance? Do you think that China gives a crap about IP? In their country there is no such thing as intellectual property, everything belongs to the state.

MS would be stupid NOT to hord patents, everybody else is doing it. You have to do it if you want to survive. You have to make the best of a screwed up situation.

However it's also stupid for free software people not to be paraniod about MS + others using Patents as a weapon against them. It's already happenned in a limited extent.

The solution is not to get all pissy at Microsoft, the solution is to get rid of software patents.

 

[drag]

Ballmer's point is that some things require licenses. Take, for example, MPEG2 decoders for DVD software. Or the MPEG4 audio codec (AAC) made by Dolby Laboratories. Such decoders are patented software, requiring per-decoder licensing fees overseen by the Motion Picture Experts Group. If you are running a free version of Linux that somehow includes these components, then you have not paid your license. It is reasonable to expect that some companies will not be as nice as Microsoft has traditionally been on this issue, and will actually ENFORCE their patent portfolios offensively (and not just defensively). Ballmer basically is just saying, "There is no precedent here, and the future is not clear about the legality of such situations." I don't see what's so controversial about that statement!

Nothing is conterversial about that statement. However I'd also like to point out that groups like Debian and Fedora are more paranoid about IP and do a better job at protecting it then most closed source software.

How many times have you heard/seen people bitch and moan about Debain being pricks about what they allow into the "free" vs "non-free" catagories of their OS and how political it gets.

How many people complain about Fedora not being able to play MP3's or watch DVDs? Or being able to use certain wifi cards that you can in Mandrake?

This is because groups like Fedora and Debian make doubly sure not to violate any liscencing/patening issues that they have heard of and now about. Both groups build their systems on completely and 100% free software and that can be trusted to be free because they are fanatical about it.

Why do you think everybody uses Gzip when LZM compression was aviable.

Now there are mixups and slipups time to time, but that happens in all software and there is nothing you can do about it. For example some of the wav/sounds files in WinXP are built using pirated applications. But you can avoid the seriousness off it.

Now there are limits to what you can do because the patent software situation is f__ked and there is just nothing you can do sometimes.

Gentoo and other operating systems sometimes do redistributes shifty things. Nvidia's propriatory drivers, or redistribute shareware software sometimes without mentioning it. I realy wish people would pay more attention about things like that. There is going to be a lawsuit someday because people are flippant about these things and it's going to suck.

As far as buying a OS like Redhat ES that does incoporate some restrictive software, I don't see how that is any more risky for a business then buying Win2003 or Solaris.

The main issue is redistributing it for free, which you can do with no worries with Debian, Fedora and a few others.


(Just a FYI)

 

[doornail]

Microsoft is a convicted monopolist. That means a court found them guilty of criminal dirty tricks against their competition. Are you sure you want to extend them the benefit of the doubt?

I doubt very much they'll sue, since suing with a weak patent means you'll probably lose your patent. What they want is lots of alarming sounding articles designed to scare IT managers from touching Linux for fear of litigation.

 

[kylef]

Originally posted by: drag
However I'd also like to point out that groups like Debian and Fedora are more paranoid about IP and do a better job at protecting it then most closed source software.

I would agree with that statement in general. However, the patents I'm talking about are not even widely known, because no company has yet enforced them. Just look at Eolas: until they sprung their surprise lawsuit, Microsoft had no idea it was "infringing" on them. What is preventing a similar company from doing the same thing to major Linux users?

There are LOTS of patents out there that no one is even aware of. Microsoft, for instance, holds all kinds of patents on the FAT32 file system which it has never enforced. Or how about the mechanism used to implement long filename support on FAT16? Yep, it's patented (it actually did require some pretty creative solutions to maintain backwards compatibility).

Now, Microsoft has never sued anyone who has implemented FAT16/FAT32 (take just about any flash device manufacturer, for instance) and likely never will, period. But did the companies using FAT consider getting Microsoft's permission first? Did they consider that MS might want licensing royalties?

Of course not. And I can virtually guarantee you that there are LOTS of other things inside Linux that are similar, in places you would least expect. And there are IP Holding companies out there (ahem, SCO) whose entire business model is to make money out of these patents.

Debian and Fedora would need to remove even more functionality to avoid such suits. And at what point would they cease to be viable alternatives to non-free OSes? It's unclear.

This is because groups like Fedora and Debian make doubly sure not to violate any liscencing/patening issues that they have heard of and now about. Both groups build their systems on completely and 100% free software and that can be trusted to be free because they are fanatical about it.

This is a laudable effort, and reflects well upon the open source community. They absolutely must play by the same rules as everyone. The more they continue this effort, the better they will get along with the established business community.

Now there are mixups and slipups time to time, but that happens in all software and there is nothing you can do about it. For example some of the wav/sounds files in WinXP are built using pirated applications.

This is news to me! What sounds in Windows XP have been "built using pirated applications"? Let me know and I'll be sure they're removed immediately!

As far as buying a OS like Redhat ES that does incoporate some restrictive software, I don't see how that is any more risky for a business then buying Win2003 or Solaris.

It's not, but that's Ballmer's point too: it's not free anymore.

And you'd better be sure that ALL possibly infringing features are removed, or Eolas will ruin you...

 

[drag]

I know the patent thing is bad. But there is nothing you can do about it, so it's not even worth trying. If somebody has something that stands up in court and is whilling to come forth and do something about it, or at least make it well known then IP issues can be worked around.

The way things stand now with software patents you can't go out of your way to avoid them. It's completely impossible to protect yourself from them. The best thing you can do is if you happen to run a multi-billion dollar industry and can hire enough lawyers you can hord massive amounts of patents yourselves that you can use to protect yourself.

Of course for the 75% of the united states that don't happen to work for a big corporation that means that they are now completely incapable of making any software that they can be sure violates no "IP".

That means no more independant programmers, no small business programmers, no programmers making free software, no programmers making intraweb applications. No nothing. If patents end up being used as weapons to protect markets then the only people that could afford to make software is going to be places like Microsoft, IBM, Oracle, and a few other companies. It's a impossible situation.

I personally don't expect it to get that far. People like Microsoft has more to loose then anybody. I am sure that they are in violation of hundreds of different "IP". So it's like a mutally assured destruction sort of thing. Of course the biggest loosers in this crappy situation is going to be innovation and the American public that depends on developing software technology to keep competative with the rest of world.

And remember that it's not the point that Linux can be obtained at no cost, the major benifit to big end users like governments and such is that it's open sourced and redstributable. That, in theory, helps make it more capable OS then something that is closed source. (all other things being equal)

As for Microsoft's use of files made from warez'd apps, here is the article and it's in German, but you don't realy need to be german to understand what it is saying. http://tecchannel.de/news/software/18149/index.html

9 wav files distributed as part of Window Media player contain a watermark towards the end of the file that contatins the string:
"LISTB INFOICRD 2000-04-06 IENG Deepz0ne ISFT Sound Forge 4.5".

Deepz0ne is a cracker group that specializes in providing cracks to work around built in software limitations.

I am suprised you haven't heard anything about this yet. I am sure that you can find a good english translation with a google search. I haven't confirmed this with myself because I don't have a copy of WinXP laying around anywere. It could be only the German version has it. What do I know? Not that I care a whole lot either way. The people who wrote the article may be full of crap, or the software was bought but it was easier to crack it then activate it, or they (the people that made the sound wavs) didn't even work for Microsoft and MS didn't think to run a hex editor on all of their sound wav files.

And Eolas can suck it for all I care.

 

[n0cmonkey]

Patent defensively? Bull. No one does that. It's all political, and just because they happen to use them defensively now, does not mean they won't use them as a weapon tomorrow. You can think I'm talking about whatever company you want me to be talking about. They're all ass.

OpenBSD has the right view on things. There's a patent? Here's something that doesn't infringe and DOES IT BETTER. (ie. CARP).

 

[n0cmonkey]

Oh yeah, and software patents are the the pillow smothering grandpa USA for the inheiritance.

 

[drag]

Originally posted by: n0cmonkey
Oh yeah, and software patents are the the pillow smothering grandpa USA for the inheiritance.

You know it's sometimes hard to tell when your being sarcastic.

 

[n0cmonkey]

Originally posted by: drag

Originally posted by: n0cmonkey
Oh yeah, and software patents are the the pillow smothering grandpa USA for the inheiritance.

You know it's sometimes hard to tell when your being sarcastic.

I have that problem in real life too...

Software patents will be stifling US innovation, and for what? A couple of dollars here, a lawsuit there (with the goal being $$).

In other parts of the world developers will not be hindered by something as abstract and silly as a patent on math. They will be free to innovate, develop, and explore. US developers will be sitting on their thumbs, wishing they had a license to spin.

 

[IEC]

Originally posted by: n0cmonkey
It's not a repost really, but it is old news (that's been posted before ).

IIRC, Linus advised or encourages developers not to look into patent issues so they don't know if they are violating any or not.

Novell is currently kicking SCO's butt, I think.

Microsoft won't be able to use much US law against people in Asia, no matter how good their lawyers are.

I personally believe it though, this Intellectual Property tactic is getting annoying. It's trying to kill innovation in the name of the almighty dollar. Eventually everyone will see that the emperor is naked, has always been naked, and will always be naked. Until then, screw'em. I'm using BSD.

HAHA! Nice allusion lol.

 

[kylef]

Originally posted by: drag
As for Microsoft's use of files made from warez'd apps, here is the article and it's in German, but you don't realy need to be german to understand what it is saying. http://tecchannel.de/news/software/18149/index.html

9 wav files distributed as part of Window Media player contain a watermark towards the end of the file that contatins the string:
"LISTB INFOICRD 2000-04-06 IENG Deepz0ne ISFT Sound Forge 4.5".

Unfortunately, I can't find an English tranlsation, and I can't figure out precisely which file they're referring to in Windows Media Player. If the file was obtained from a vendor or content provider (which is likely, as very little media content is done in-house), then the culprit will be tracked down. That's assuming we can, in fact, locate these string(s).

Thanks for pointing this to my attention. I will absolutely follow up on it.

We have an entire team now scrubbing the content in everything from fonts, graphics, documentation, and strings embedded in binaries to make sure there is nothing offensive or politically incorrect that is released in a Microsoft product. Microsoft is not always the content originator, which makes that task more difficult sometimes. But violations like this, when uncovered, are not tolerated.

 

[drag]

I think it's safe to say that MS has known about this for a while. Not that they did it on purpose or anything, but this article has been around for a while again and even made the rounds on slashdot (suprise suprise).

Probably be fixed with a patch, I figure, if it's true. I am a fairly sceptical person when it comes to stuff like this (not that I care a whole lot either.)

Here is the article that slashdot linked, it's a bit more informative.
Google translation:
http://www.google.com/translat...e=Unknown&oe=ASCII

 

[n0cmonkey]

Originally posted by: kylef

Originally posted by: drag
As for Microsoft's use of files made from warez'd apps, here is the article and it's in German, but you don't realy need to be german to understand what it is saying. http://tecchannel.de/news/software/18149/index.html

9 wav files distributed as part of Window Media player contain a watermark towards the end of the file that contatins the string:
"LISTB INFOICRD 2000-04-06 IENG Deepz0ne ISFT Sound Forge 4.5".

Unfortunately, I can't find an English tranlsation, and I can't figure out precisely which file they're referring to in Windows Media Player. If the file was obtained from a vendor or content provider (which is likely, as very little media content is done in-house), then the culprit will be tracked down. That's assuming we can, in fact, locate these string(s).

Thanks for pointing this to my attention. I will absolutely follow up on it.

We have an entire team now scrubbing the content in everything from fonts, graphics, documentation, and strings embedded in binaries to make sure there is nothing offensive or politically incorrect that is released in a Microsoft product. Microsoft is not always the content originator, which makes that task more difficult sometimes. But violations like this, when uncovered, are not tolerated.

Keep all those BSD strings in there. I like them.

(SFU specifically, I never bothered to check anything else ).

 

[Theguynextdoor]

Ugh...this sounds so much like politics.

 

[n0cmonkey]

Originally posted by: Theguynextdoor
Ugh...this sounds so much like politics.

It is.