Moley's Musings

I came across this article whilst researching a different topic.

http://www.robweir.com/blog/2009/10/final-ooxml-update-part-iii.html

So it appears that Microshaft have continued to subvert the OOXML ISO processeses. What now transpires is that they have hijacked the committee and are not only stepping outside the established procedures but are also working towards amending the standard in order to make it compatible with Office 7, rather than building or amending their Office Suite to be compliant with the ISO standard. Apparently, it's only through leaks the we can find out what's happening.

This is the text of the Findings of Judge Thomas Penfield Jackson, Nov. 5, 1999; and it makes very interesting reading. It's still remarkably relevant today, even with the advances in Open Source.

http://www.albion.com/microsoft/findings.html

This exposes M$'s tactics extremely clearly, and the EU's assault on Media player and Internet Explorer seem to be rather inadequate as most of MS's (illegal) abuses of its monopoly really do go on unchecked. Reminds me somewhat of of the iceberg, most of it is under the water. It seems that the American Judicial System is not doing very well either - not surprising, really.

Conclusion - M$ always wins and we pay. It is clear that M$ continue to establish and maintain vendor lock-in unchecked, unaccountably and only in their own interests.

I have been reading about the case of Apple versus Psystar on the Groklaw site (www.groklaw.net), which is a serious site strongly leaning towards the defence of Open Source. For those of you who don't know, Psystar manufacture and sell knock-off OS X computers, contrary to the licence of OS X. This case also references the Verner versus Autodesk ruling which, I gather, is subject to appeal and likely to be overturned.

The crux of the matter is that if Psystar win, the guts will apparently be knocked out of the GPL licence and Apple software will become more expensive to cover it's losses, both as a result of the consequent ability to be freely copied and redistributed without any restrictions, if I understand correctly.

This raises the question of Psystars's motives, being a relatively small company and, indeed, how they are managing to finance all this litigation, and whether, like SCO, this is really an attack on the GPL licence masquerading as a contrived dispute with Apple who, conveniently, will also be damaged.

The case appears complex (what else would you expect) and I do not profess to understand it all, neither do I understand why all software licences, e.g. Microsoft, will not be affected.

Is anyone else following this case and do they have a better understanding of what is happening? Are Psystar really a stalking horse?

Meantime, I note that although SCO is bankrupt and dear Darl has been 'eliminated', the litigation is still ongoing.

or should one say Integrity in Government. My dander is up. (Did Frankie Howerd say this before?)

Today we read and hear the weasel words of Baroness Scotland (nothing personal) excusing herself for non compliance with a rather demanding, some say Draconian, law which she, apparently, pushed through and which, apparently, effectively states that there is no excuse.

The law requires a prospective employer to see, check and copy specified documents for a prospective employee to ensure that they are not illegal immigrants, and holds the prospective employer responsible.

On the same day we hear not only the lack of fair, or even decent, treatment of genuine rape victims by both the Police and CPS, but also the story of a restaurant proprietor who was fined £70,000 despite having both seen and copied at least the same documentation as Baroness Scotland, namely national insurance, tax records and former employment records and, in his case, possibly passports as well. It strikes me that Joe Public might not fully understand the purport of all visa stamps in passports. I imagine that this restauranteur is likely to go out of business.

So again we have double standards and, again, it is Joe Public - the little guy with little or no voice in this acclaimed model of democracy who suffer. It is symptomatic that we are constantly bombarded by a constant flow of legislation in which we consistently become the 'victim', we who have so little ability to defend ourselves against the system. It strikes me that society is actually being damaged by this constant flow of legislation creating instant potential criminals (or suspects) of us all.

Just now, on the news, I heard another item on Baroness Scotland which used words to suggest she had done nothing wrong, words which would not be used in reporting about us if we had committed the same offence.

I really do believe that the government should go back to the drawing board and create legislation and regulation which would lead to a responsible, healthy society based on sound value standards; and that Punch and Judy politics should be consigned to the bin. The country is in a state where it needs, and has needed, good governance and not subjugation to a plethora of futuristic IT systems knowing and micro managing every aspect of our lives (without our permission). We also need to have trust and faith in the integrity of our government and institutions, something seriously lacking at the moment.

It is clear that this rant is consequent all of this governments constant and unhealthy assault on our democratic rights *and* responsibilities fundamentally changing our society in a way that we have not sanctioned, whilst perpetuating the abuses by big business, banks, etc......

A symptom, a disease, a sign of the time, or just the way thing are or are going to be?

There is plenty of lively debate on other forums but ZDNet and it's readers remain relatively quiet and, dare I say it, relatively quiescent.

Our country fought a war, The Second World War, for values, standards and a way of life which we, or should I say our peers, are very busy throwing away. Similarly, we abhorred communism (East Germany, Albania and even Russia) for similar reasons, but it is now 20 years since the Berlin Wall and the rest of the Iron Curtain came down. Are we now living in a time when this has all been forgotten?

Now we live in a world where truth, honesty and integrity appear to have no value in our institutions of government and commerce, and hence by extension in our society. We cannot believe what we are told, and we cannot have faith in the culture of greed, as has been clearly demonstated over the last while.

The phorm type technologies are invidious and invasive. They do not have the approval of the majority of those that understand them, not only in the current form of a money making advertising vehicle which uses our privacy without any control over it on our part, but also represent the thin edge of the wedge (creep) whereby these technologies could be used more widely to control and record our every activity. It seems that this last point is why our government is so interested in getting the technology past the first hurdle and accepted, or at the very least acquiesced to reluctantly.

Taken together with all the current enthusiasm of our government for identity cards's and databases (and all that entails) for all aspects of our life, this creates a considerable cause for concern or anxiety. Unlike a prison sentence which considers rehabitation and is spent, these records will be for life, even if incorrect or unsubstantiated information is held in them, and have the capability to blight a person's whole life. And all this is before we consider any abuse or misuse of the systems, already amply demonstated.

So all of this comes back round to our lack of trust in our government and institutions and a genuine concern that they do not understand the inevitable consequences of their actions. Ironically, this also betrays a luck of trust by our government in the people themselves, something which I think is a consequence of the changes to the structure of our society brought about by, you guessed it, government.

I believe our politicians should, amongst other things, have an obligatory reading list of a selection of science fiction novels to gain an understanding of where the wrong use of technology could lead, and to see how much of the unacceptable side 1950's science fiction is already science fact.

These two articles are worth a read to keep informed as to how Microsoft has maintained it's position and undermined the position of others over the years, as their business model, rather than to just compete product to product.

http://www.ecis.eu/documents/Finalversion_Consumerchoicepaper.pdf

http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20090421111327711

In a nutshell, it is the playground bully taken to extremes that most ordinary people would just not begin to understand. Reminiscent of Jonas Cord in the novel 'The Carpet Baggers'.

Like most people, I cherish my freedom and the freedom to make my own choices. I strongly resent those being taken away from me, in whatever manner, having been brought up in the aftermath of the Second World War. I also mourn the loss of integrity that pervades our way of life now, as a norm.