IP: MS and Open Source

[Dave Farber <dave@farber.net>]

http://www.cnn.com/2002/TECH/industry/04/16/microsoft.open.source.ap/index.h
tml

Microsoft learns a lesson from competition

SEATTLE, Washington (AP) --For most of its corporate life, Microsoft Corp.
has built its software monopoly -- and earned billions -- around the idea
that software should be sold, not given away, and that the blueprints ought
to be shielded by a high-security fortress of technical safeguards.

The company's very public campaign against the idea of freely sharing its
software blueprints, called source code, came to a head early last summer.
Microsoft's notoriously outspoken chief executive, Steve Ballmer, told a
reporter that a competing "open-source" system called Linux was "a cancer
that attaches itself in an intellectual-property sense to everything it
touches."

These days, Microsoft is singing a slightly different tune.

The company says it still believes its software blueprints should be closely
held, but says it has come to see the value in sharing some source code with
some of its best customers and selected academic institutions.

"We're learning from open source," program manager Jason Matusow says.

Microsoft has started to allow access of Windows code to some of its bigger
corporate customers and some outside technical experts who put together and
manage large computer systems.

Many contend that Microsoft still has a long way to go, however.

<snip>

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