B&N: Microsoft Forcing "Oppressive" Agreements on Android?

[kjk]

http://www.networkworld.com/communit...ts-android-pat

It is not just licensing fee's either, though they claim is Microsoft is recieving anywere from $5 dollars to $15 dollars or more per copy of Android sold (which is equal to or more thanwhat they charge for Windows Mobile licenses). Barnes & Nobles claims that along with paying the blood money Microsoft demands, Microsoft also makes license holders sign an "oppressive" agreement which gives Microsoft say over future hardware and software configurations and innovations. This according to B&N is to ensure that they keep Android from advancing too far, too fast for Microsoft to keep up. That is in many ways worse than the licensing fees. Microsoft wants to control future Android development and innovation. Positively evil.

Curious how this actually works in practice, not just for companies like
Samsung, HTC, Viewsonic, Acer, etc. but also ODMs like Wistron, Quanta and Compal, who make Android devices for others.

[teh603]

Just more proof that Microsoft's only real innovation is better strongarm tactics.

[Barty]

Android is pure profit for Microsoft. Meanwhile, is it making any money for Google?

Talk about ironies!

[wodin]

Originally Posted by Barty

Android is pure profit for Microsoft. Meanwhile, is it making any money for Google?

Talk about ironies!

Yes, tons. But with their business model it's not as apparent.

[SeaKing]

Originally Posted by teh603

Just more proof that Microsoft's only real innovation is better strongarm tactics.

I see more "anti-trust" suits in Microsoft's future.

[kjk]

Originally Posted by wodin

Yes, tons. But with their business model it's not as apparent.

Well, we do know how much they make in mobile, since Android's revenues/profits come through mobile search/display ads; they don't see any direct revenue from the Market or for licensing (unlike MS).

Google is on track to make $2.5 billion in revenue annually in mobile-which would be about 7% of their total revenue.

But that is their mobile revenues in total; in Congressional testimony earlier this year Google claimed two-thirds of Google's mobile search traffic came not thru Android, but thru iOS , so obviously not all of that 7% is attributable to Android.

[Dopedangel]

Today they are making nothing but in 5 years 70-80% of the search business will be from mobile devices. Android is for protecting Google's future rather than present.
If Google had not come out with Android, Microsoft would be selling its mobile OS and making billions at the moment so who is loosing money and making money on Android is a matter of opinion.
Microsoft has been trying to claw back into the search market where as google is trying to get into Microsoft's main earner corporate software etc. Its an interesting battle to see so far I think Google is winning as it has got millions to use its OS and has been slowly weaning people off Microsoft.

[teh603]

Originally Posted by SeaKing

I see more "anti-trust" suits in Microsoft's future.

Anti- trust is dead in the US. MS received an order about ten years ago requiring an AT&T- style divestiture, and it hasn't happened yet. I've got a hunch they threatened to revoke all the government's windows licenses.

If I was Obama, my response would be, "Fine, we're going to put everything on Linux as soon as we can. Kthxbai"

[tubemonkey]

Originally Posted by Dopedangel

Microsoft has been trying to claw back into the search market where as google is trying to get into Microsoft's main earner corporate software etc. Its an interesting battle to see so far I think Google is winning as it has got millions to use its OS and has been slowly weaning people off Microsoft.

Microsoft is also weaning people off Microsoft. Just look how they squandered their dominance in the mobile market.

[kartu]

Heck, the main news here is, that B&N actually revealed misterious Microsoft's patents "infringed" by Android, why instead choose such a strange title?

TLDR version of the patents:


So to summarize, three reasons you should like B&N:

Unlike amazon, B&N chooses ePub, an open format, for the Nook.
Second, they make the Nook easily rootable.
Third, they tell Microsoft to go f**k themselves.

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by teh603

Anti- trust is dead in the US. MS received an order about ten years ago requiring an AT&T- style divestiture, and it hasn't happened yet.

Uh, no.
There was *no* divestiture order and other than being found guilty of *trying* (and failing) to harm Netscape (which opened them to money-grabbing lawsuits left and right) nothing came out of the trial other than a ten-year monitoring of MS by the court.
A lot of urban myth surrounds that trial, starting with the idea that it was about anything but politics and political contributions.
Long story that isn't relevant here, but do note that at the time MS was the biggest tech company that was not involved in politics and did not contribute to either party.
Now they are the biggest donor to both parties.
Nothing tech-related passes Congress without MS being informed way in advance. *That* is what antitrust achieved.

As to the actual topic, Patent enforcement is not generally an area for anti-trust; it is an area for contract law. That is why they are negotiating. In negotiations either side can ask for whatever they want. Whether they get it or not depends on what the other side has.

B&N came to the negotiations empty handed because they have no technology patents they can assert. Their basic choice, other than whine and pout in public and scream for somebody, anybody, to rescue them, is to either pay up or force MS to take them to court and pay legal expenses up the wazoo and *then* pay up to MS.

Everybody cheers when the big guys like MS, Apple, and Amazon get sued over patents but boos when *they* assert their rights. Well, rights belong to everybody or they belong to nobody. Patent law doesn't differentiate between big and small, rich or poor.
And patents tend to be about very specific ideas, not implementation, so it is possible to infringe innocently, but that is still no excuse.

That even patent-rich companies like Samsung are meekly settling with MS is ample evidence they have a case. That Google keeps quiet and does nothing to immunize/assist the users of their product (as MS does with OEMs that rely on *their* products, as Apple is doing in their in-app buying spat) is further evidence there is fire under the smoke. That the nature of that case is kept confidential is also part of the game (witness Amazon's quiet settlement, yesterday, with Discovery over Kindle).

All that is business as usual in the technology world. B&N is not a technology company but they're trying to play in that world without understanding it and they went for expediency instead of due diligence; now they have to face the consequences.

And, for the record: MS and Amazon had their own little patent "chat" last year. Amazon quietly negotiated and since *they* have quality tech patents of their own both sides settled without drama like professionals.

It's the clueless amateurs that whine.

[tubemonkey]

The main problem is that most of these patents were granted in the first place.

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by tubemonkey

The main problem is that most of these patents were granted in the first place.

A problem to those that want a free ride, maybe.

Be careful: what today seems obvious was not necessarily obvious or trivial at the time of the filing. When it comes to OS tech, MS is old school so a lot of now-common work was done first there.

It might be inconvenient for newcomers but if they did the work first they were entitled to patent it.

As for B&N, they have placed themselves in a position where either they win or they are made an example of. Not smart. Smart companies don't go scorched earth in public.

It's not as if they even have the money to pay the legal fees for the all-out court warfare needed for a "win" so what they really are facing is a lose-lose scenario.

Somebody ought to tell B&N about NTP vs RIM.
NTP started out asking for a few million, RIM refused; they went to court, lost and the judge awarded NTP $56 million. RIM appealed and challenged the patents. They lost the appeal and the debt grew to $612 million.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NTP,_Inc.

[fjtorres]

BTW, over the years, there's been a fair amount of cases of creative competitive use of patents.
Off the top of my head one of the more amusing one was the Immersion rumble controller case where they sued MS for a few million and MS took a look at the case and settled out of court and then gave Immersion extra money for 10% of the company and a share of an extra licensing fees.
Sony, chose to fight in court, lost, appealed, lost again and even removed rumble from their PS3 controllers, giving MS an extra selling point advantage in the console wars. Eventually, Sony gave up, paid up and MS made a nice little profit ought of Sony's hide.

All perfectly legal.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immersion_v._Sony

Patent law is all about negotiation; it is meant to protect and reward inventors, not competitors, not consumers.
It's a game for sharks not whiners.
(shrug)
Smart players negotiate, survive, and prosper; others go shoot craps in the courts and, more, often than not, lose.

[teh603]

Originally Posted by fjtorres

A problem to those that want a free ride, maybe.

Be careful: what today seems obvious was not necessarily obvious or trivial at the time of the filing. When it comes to OS tech, MS is old school so a lot of now-common work was done first there.

It might be inconvenient for newcomers but if they did the work first they were entitled to patent it.

As for B&N, they have placed themselves in a position where either they win or they are made an example of. Not smart. Smart companies don't go scorched earth in public.

It's not as if they even have the money to pay the legal fees for the all-out court warfare needed for a "win" so what they really are facing is a lose-lose scenario.

Somebody ought to tell B&N about NTP vs RIM.
NTP started out asking for a few million, RIM refused; they went to court, lost and the judge awarded NTP $56 million. RIM appealed and challenged the patents. They lost the appeal and the debt grew to $612 million.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NTP,_Inc.

So let me get this straight, if I go and secure a patent on fire, then I'll have the world over a barrel, right? Or maybe a patent on light, and require everyone who can't pay to wear a blindfold or have their eyes surgically removed at their own expense?

These patents were overly broad and some of them appear to have been made in very bad faith. Bad faith and overly broad patents are not a healthy form of capitalism, no matter what your economics professor might tell you. Neither is strongarming your way into a de facto monopoly over a sector the way MS has.