OFF TOPIC: HOWTO: compromising Microsoft

[Rick A. Hohensee]

The prominent proposed solutions to the Microsoft problem I have seen and
which are apparently currently under arbitration are narrow, superficial,
will not provide a substantive general remedy, shackle Microsoft to no
real benefit, and will lead to horrible complexities further degrading the
possible effectiveness of said remedies. Interested nations have an
approach available that can be implemented unilaterally by legislation or
by executive order, which solution will be measured, just, and effective.
The executive branch of the USA has brought and won the right case, albeit
a bit late, and the judiciary ruled correctly, to the extent that it has
ruled so far, but the judiciary is having difficulty finishing the job.
Of course, it is quite correct for a government to move very deliberately
in such matters, but a plague on creativity requires a very creative cure,
which is not the usual milieu of the courts.

The protections a civilized world provides for owners of intellectual
property are among the most fundamental to civilization itself, and are
therefor almost universally agreed upon via the Berne Treaty, but are
based on several assumptions that do not pertain in the case of Microsoft.
The fundamental tacit assumption of copyright protection is that the
protected party is not incessantly criminal or utterly devoid of ethics.
Given that crime can cause the duly convicted to lose any and all rights,
it does not at all follow that the authors of the USA itself expected
copyright to be absolute or inviolate, nor is it reasonable to assume that
"for limited times" in the Constitution is restricted to "always the same
time limits, above some minimum". In particular, "Below some maximum, in
specific particularly obnoxious or highly economically interdependant
cases" is equally admissible under the Constitution if it promotes the
general welfare. So it will in this case.

Consider legislation declaring Microsoft operating system products to be
"specifically compromised intellectual property". The "compromise" is to
allow anyone to "reverse-engineer" and resell Microsoft operating system
products no less than five years after thier release dates, on a
permanent, continuing, version-by-version basis. If such a law were
enacted today that would mean that e.g. Windows 95 and earlier are fair
game for modification and/or reselling by others as of today, as are early
versions of NT, I believe. Windows 98 and later would still be exclusively
Microsoft's protected property for a couple years. This is the measured
approach to take, measured against, and in the units of, the industry in
question. Five years is a long time for a great engine of innovation. I
believe a five year product lag of this nature will destroy Microsoft,
unless they rapidly become the great engine of innovation they so ardently
pose as. However, this scenario has clear advantages for Microsoft even as
they exist now versus other proposals. Meanwhile, viable alternatives to
Microsoft as a source of operating systems for PCs can reasonably be
expected to arise rapidly. This approach puts Microsoft in level
competition with thier own past, thier only possible source of substantive
competition in the short term.

The advantages to Microsoft are that this approach leaves them as the
pilot of thier own compromised ship, the sole architects of all thier own
products, the sole judge of what should be in a Microsoft OS and what
shouldn't, and otherwise spares them from government micromanagement.
Government involvement would be very limited, stating what is and is not
bundled. For example, MSN-related client software is bundled and
compromisable, the MSN network itself isn't. Et cetera. This leaves them
free to be thier rusticly charming proprietary selves vis-a-vis the
products they have not yet bundled into Windows, such as (last I heard,)
Office, which reflects the idea that the operating system has
public-interest aspects that ancillary products may not. Thus Internet
Explorer and so on would be subject to compromise in due time.

As a programmer and musician I am revolted when Microsoft and similar pose
as defenders of intellectual property rights. I feel that the Constitution
meant something other than exactly what we have now when speaking of
"...to Authors and Inventors...". Note the use of "Authors", not "Owners".
Certainly, authors need to be able to sell thier works if copyrights are
to have material value, which is essential, but a fair price to an
individual idea-peddler assumes a free market, and free of bullying
especially. There's something very wrong when the loudest proponents of
"intellectual property rights" have never produced any important
intellectual property. Ideas have the very least need for monopoly. Ideas
are not municipal utilities. Ideas need to be planted in numerous
environments to continue to evolve. Civilization requires this.

As an American, I sincerely hope the USA does the right thing here, and
continues to be a leader in such matters, rather than leaving the
initiative to someone like, for example, The People's Republic of China,
even though I personally have no desire to use Windows or variants thereof
from any source, in any flavor, at any price. To potential vendors or
political patrons of "compromised Windows", I note that this proposal and
Microsoft itself are scabs on a flawed market paradigm. A better overall
approach to charging for, and compensating authors of, software for
personal computing use is the cLIeNUX membership model.

Rick Hohensee
John Marshall Park, D.C.
ftp://linux01.gwdg.de/pub/cLIeNUX/descriptive