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April 30, 2006
One Aussie Boy Scout vs Microsoft
It turns out that the testimony of Andrew Tridgell, the brilliant young Australian who gave us Samba, which allows Linux users to share Windows files and printers, may be the key to whether Microsoft will have to pay the European Commission that 497 million euro fine for abusing anti-trust laws. He might sound like a Boy Scout, but Tridge made some telling points. Describing how once a year, programmers from rival companies gather for a "plugfest," where they connect computers together to see how their programs interoperate - an invaluable service to the users of their software - he revealed a notable absentee from these events:
"We work around the clock for a week," he told a rapt courtroom. "We torture our machines in the pursuit of interoperability."Tridgell illustrated the way Microsoft's reticence stalls innovation by showing the court a paperback-sized storage server, which he said can be turned into a work-group server with the aid of the information that Microsoft doesn't want to share. Once it gives over the protocols, he explained, "Microsoft no longer has a stranglehold over the world's networks." That, essentially, is what this case will decide, what with the US judicial system proving to be completely inadequate against Microsoft's tactics: whether one company's profits should take precedence over the rights and interests of everybody else."'Can you do this test with Microsoft?" Judge Cooke asked.
"Yes, but they don't turn up," Mr. Tridgell said.
Later, Mr. Tridgell explained that for the last six years Microsoft has boycotted the event: "They used to come. It used to be held in Seattle, close to Microsoft's headquarters."
Posted by cw at April 30, 2006 11:04 AM