Mandriva - no deal with Microsoft

[icechen1]

http://corp.mandriva.com/webteam/2007/06/19/we-will-not-go-to-canossa/

Novell, Xandros and Linspire have signed well publicized agreements with Microsoft.

Rumors on the Web have hinted that we might be next on the list. So we would like to clarify our position.

At Mandriva, we believe working in heterogeneous environments is essential to our customers. So, interoperability between the Windows and Linux world is important and must be dealt with, and anything that helps this interoperability is a good thing.

We also believe the best way to deal with interoperability is open standards, such as ODF which we support strongly and we are ready to cooperate with everyone on these topics.

As far as IP is concerned, we are, to say the least, not great fans of software patents and of the current patent system, which we consider as counter productive for the industry as a whole.

We also believe what we see, and up to now, there has been absolutely no hard evidence from any of the FUD propagators that Linux and open source applications are in breach of any patents. So we think that, as in any democracy, people are innocent unless proven guilty and we can continue working in good faith.

So we don’t believe it is necessary for us to get protection from Microsoft to do our job or to pay protection money to anyone.

We plan to keep developing and distributing innovative and exciting products and making them available to the largest number in the true spirit of open source.

François Bancilhon
Yay,Mandriva is not going to deal with Microsoft. :KS

[juxtaposed]

Good to hear :)

[justin whitaker]

Fantastic news!

I'm really liking the direction that Mandriva is going.

[23meg]

Good news, and well phrased.

[Extreme Coder]

They would be stupid to do so;
I also noticed this comment in osnews.com:

We now we see the line up:

For freedom, against intimidation and monopolization

Red Hat, Ubuntu, Mandriva and of course Debian.

For capitulation to corrupt monopoly power. Those who try to get an immoral edge for their own product together with lots of money being thrown at them to persaude them to compromise their principles.

Novell, Xandros and Freeepire

Well at last we now know where the major distributions stand, only Turbolinux has still to show its hand.

[SoulinEther]

Allow me to bust out my old Turbolinux and determine their standpoint.

[smoker]

So we don’t believe it is necessary for us to get protection from Microsoft to do our job or to pay protection money to anyone.

We plan to keep developing and distributing innovative and exciting products and making them available to the largest number in the true spirit of open source.

François Bancilhon

good news, excellent, and well put!:-)

[zapjb]

Great news!

[Tundro Walker]

I just really wish MS would go away on this topic. They remind me of my parents' annoying neighbour, who passive-aggressively bullies people on the block (like cat-calling them, leaving trash in their yards, tipping over their trash, calling the city on stupid things like throwing cut branches out in the trash instead of calling the dump to pick them up, etc). She's trying to tick folks off, so they'll stand-up to her, then she plays the victim, calls the cops like she's being threatened and harrassed (when actually she's the one doing it), and tries to sue whomever she's trapped in this little scenario of hers. Meanwhile, she keeps her personal life so shut-in, that you can't tell what kind of skeletons she has in her closet, so all you can do is ignore her and hope she'll get bored and go away.

It's funny how no matter how big an issue is, or how big the players are, it's just like that guy who wrote that book "Everything I needed to know, I learned in Kindergarten". It all boils down to some bully who's trying to aggressively push people around, or some weasly type that's trying to make it seem like they're getting pushed around so the teacher will feel sorry for them and get others in trouble.

You know what would be interesting. If an impartial web-site polled Microsoft Windows users (be it personal users, corporate users, etc), and asked what THEY thought about Microsoft pushing around little guys like Linux distro producers. On the same site, spell out what's going on clearly, then ask for MS users to vote whether they think MS is acting fairly or not. It'd be interesting to see, if given the full details, how many MS users think MS is in the "right" on this one.

[BarfBag]

I've never been a fan of Mandriva, but this is definitely good news.

[steven8]

Waahoooooooo!!!

[jrusso2]

Good for them. Now if they can just fix their buggy distro