The empire strikes back

I meant in a good way. As expected, Microsoft realise that existing licensing is too expensive for emerging cheap laptops. [I wouldn't call it ultra-low-cost PC. To me, it is a PC. It is on the cheaper than the [current] cheapest end, but a PC nonetheless] Its effort is to reduce the licensing price for computers it segmented out as the cheapest end.

If you look at it from a software business viewpoint, it is a correct move, i.e., identified a new market (cheaper than cheapest), segment the market correctly by making sure that it does not cannabolise existing market, and target the market with the “correct” product. For someone who play with software, that sounds like unnecessary work. A better way is to give your OEM people the full software and let them pick-and-mix, then, since we are talking about non-free software, charge them according to what they want.

Here are a few interesting points: First, confirmation that Windows XP will not die. That is because Microsoft need it to compete for platforms that Vista is simply too big. Second, Bill Gates’ last major project, Windows Vista, did not deliver on certain segments of the software market. He should had foresee it. Therefore, Vista is a partial flop. Third, don’t go out and buy for EeePC yet, or you will pay a premium of GBP50 over for the  operating system (Windows). Wait a while longer you will might find a flourishing market for similar laptops, driving price down for you. Microsoft just confirmed that a market for these type of products is possible.

Now, to anyone who claim FOSS software does not innovate, how about creating an extension of  the cheap end of the market? The fact that Asus did not need to ask anyone permission to use Linux (and OpenOffice.org), and that the software can run on cheapest (and most expensive) hardware, and the ability to customize Linux certainly help Asus to pionerr the market.

For that amount of money, I WILL appeal

Heise Online is running a story (in German) saying that Microsoft will appeal the European Commission fine imposed on it.

I know the amount is small for a company like Microsoft, but in absolute term it is huge, I will be appealing if I were Microsoft.

Should the appeal be allowed and the fine reduced? Let’s not forget there are two fines: One for the offense and another for not following the remedy the EC told Microsoft to do. For both counts, morally speaking, since Microsoft fought tooth and nail and lost, it should not.

However, there is another dimension to it. This is a referendum of whether EC oversteps its authority by imposing a bigger than reasonable fine on Microsoft. When the judgement come through, we might have the answer. However, while it is possible, it is unlikely to be a clear cut case. We are extremely likely to look at the history of how appeals affects fine imposed by EC in the past and make our own informed decision.

EeePC list price

A reader Orlando said in a comment to my musing about the difference between Eee PC Windows and Linux might be an artificial one that Asus Australian site actually have EeePC with the same specs for both Windows and Linux and that the windows one was AUS150 more. A very big thank you to Orlando for pointing this out.

I always harbour some suspicion that the APC Magazine article might be mistaken or a hoax. Hence, after seeing Orlando’s comment I went back and read the article again. My opinion now is that it is possible that the author Kidman was talking about some promotion which lump both Microsoft Windows XP and MicrosoftWorks into the EeePC (The Asus site only have WIndows XP. Either that, or I got hoodwinked.

Orlando’s find on Asus website was great for me since it allows us to compare the real cost of Win
dows XP license, at least in Australia. The amount appears to be AUS150, which is about the same as that in UK (guestimate at GBP70+ for OEM the size of Asus and exchange rate of AUS2.05 to GBP1.00). Right now, you expect to pay this license fee in full as the EeePC is hot. Let it cool down and you should be able to get a discount from your mass market retailer. Again, if I was not hoodwinked by Kidman, the fact that only the Windows XP version is available at mass retailer set it up nicely for price competition. This will  be good for consumers. It will also be a good experiment on how much competition can bring down the cost for consumer.

It’s a shame that Skype chicken out

I was hoping for a court upholding GPL in Germany with the Skype lawsuit. Unfortunately, Skype took the hints and withdraw the lawsuit. In any case, since the court already said upfront that Skype had not met its burden of proof, we might not get such a decision anyway.

Yes, there is a difference, but my worry is the difference might be artificially created

Lyman of 451 CAOS Theory was worry that we did not read beyond the headline of the recent revelation from APCMag that Windows-based Eee PC 900 is cheaper than their Linux-based cousin, i.e., we forgotten that the Windows version is slower and that the Linux version pack a bigger hard disk.

I did noted the two factors first time. And immediately realize that this can be a sinister marketing ploy to protray Linux in a bad light. Get a joe-consumer, put him in a store, show him the two EeePC, which one is he going to take? He don’t know (and probably don’t care) about the difference in hard disk. Not being technologically inclined he will not know Windows is actually running slower. He look at the price and say why should I pay extra for something I don’t know (Linux) compared to something I do know (Windows). Well, that is still OK. However, he would be left with the impression that Linux is more expensive and, if he care to read the hard disk size, Linux requires beefier hardware. In other words, this can be a careful marketing ploy to damage Linux.

OK, I will concede that a lot of other factors can lead to the difference between the Windows EeePC and Linux EeePC. The first is the expected sales volume of both. I will say Windows EeePC will probably outsell the Linux version. Now one will normally argue economy of scale kick in that will make Windows EeePC cheaper to make and hence cheaper to consumer. However, lets not forget that both versions of EeePC will share the same production line and the decision on Windows or Linux is simply done at the very last minute, probably when the hard disk were slotted in. Both share the same distribution channels etc. Hence, if we have both EeePCs with the *same* specs, the cost of licensing Windows is unlikely to be small enough to cover the additional cost of swapping out Windows for Linux.

The second is EeePC 900 market positioning. You need a marketing boffin to explain the details to you but essentially, they might be worried that EeePC 900 Linux edition’s market will overlap with existing EeePC offering, cannibalizing their existing market rather than expending it. This is a more likely reason. However, this argument is marred by the fact that EeePC 900 Linux is not on the same mass market retail shelf as existing EeePC offering. This is of course assuming that existing EeePC do appears on mass market retail shelf.

What I am worried, is EeePC striking a marketing deal with Microsoft to make EeePC Linux look bad in general, Linux in particular. The signs are more than sufficient to satisfy conspiracy theorists of course. Microsoft’s abuse of market power history, proven by antitrust authorities world wide, means trust in the company for not using illegal means to stifle competition is simply not there.

Does GPL violate anti-trust in Germany?

I suppose we will find out, since Harald Welte reports that Skype is appealing against a GPLv2 conviction in Munich on this ground. I hope somewhere there will be a translation from German on what the anti-trust claim is actually based on. It would be interesting to find out how Skype based this claim on.

Potential anti-competitive pricing?

There is a news item at APC that says Windows-based Eee PC 900 in Australia is more expensive than their Linux counterpart. Ordinarily I will say that is not very surprising, since Dell had demonstrated that it can lower prices by loading your PC with crapware. However, there is something fishy which I think Australian antitrust authority should look into.

Perhaps to pull the wools over consumer’s eye to justify the difference in price, the Linux version has a beefier hard disk. Even then, I cannot see how this can bridge the price difference of cheap (Xandros) + free (openoffice.org) with non-free (Windows) + non-free(MS Works). Moreover, this implies Linux need bigger hard disk, which is surprising because all other accounts that I see says Windows need more hard disk space than Linux. Second, the linux version is only available at computer stores, i.e., not all retailers. Surely they can supply all retailers with both versions and let the consumer decides.

All these is assuming that Microsoft has a hand to play with the configuration dance. If Microsoft did, then it is an potential anti-trust issue, i.e., Microsoft manipulating the market to make it looks better. However, I have to stress that this is just a speculation, only the authorities are able to dig more to prove/disprove this.

ODF validation

I blogged before about Alex Brown’s original test that Microsoft Office cannot write OOXML correctly. I said the test was problematic because we are validating against a completely new standard which developers had no time to implement. I actually expected Rob Weir to jump on the bandwagon and make a “song and dance” about it, the same way PJ did. However, to his credit, he saw through that the test was not a good one. The only time he commented was in the blog post I am discussing below where he had no choice but to touch on the issue as it is relevant to the discussion. True to someone that had development experience, he agreed that the failure to conform to ISO OOXML standard can be reasonably explained.
True to his word, Alex Brown made good his promise to perform the conformance analysis he did with ODF. The conclusion of the analysis is that the ODF document he created with OpenOffice.org does not satisfy the ODF standard. Unfortunately, several decisions he made along the way in some way can potentially distracted him from the original goal. Some were touched on in Rob Weir’s comment on Brown’s work. This leads to more discussion about ID and IDREFs (Brown’s rebuttal of Weirs [Weir’s answer at the end of original comment) and the internal working of the validator they use. It is interesting to note experts at work here. Who is right? The answer is not as straight forward as it seems.
Weir casted Brown analysis as validating the ODF/OOXML standard document, download from OASIS and OOXML in their respective format, with the appropriate ISO Standard. Was this the aim of Brown analysis? I had always read Brown’s OOXML analysis as an article, processed by Microsoft Office 2007 does not satisfy the ISO OOXML standard. It appeared that I had mistaken. Brown had by-passed Microsoft Office completely. He took a OOXML Standard Document and validate it against the new OOXML specs.

In the ODF analysis, Brown’s decision to use the same OOXML document, raises a lot of questions. First and foremost, he should had used ODF standard document to validate against ODF specs. I will be the first to admit that this itself is not perfect. For one thing, if need be, it is easier to edit a shorter document by hand. However, since we are testing a standard document, its your fault if you supplied a longer document. While I understand why he chose to use the same document (OOXML Standard Document), he introduced a a lot of complication simply by the need to convert that document from OOXML to doc via Microsoft Office, then to ODF via OpenOffice.org. As evidence I will present Weir’s comment about double hash (##) sign in URL. The second problem is the test is also a test of OOXML to doc format by Microsoft, and doc to ODF conversion by OpenOffice.org. Moreover, the first is a backward-conversion, and even Microsoft does _not_ guarantee a backward compatibility from OOXML to doc format. All these makes the results with ODF less predictable.

So, is Brown’s analysis worthless? No. From the beginning his purpose is to simulate discussion and work on standard conformance for ODF and OOXML and judging by the responses he got from both postings, he succeeded. Discussion on his finding, including Weir’s critic are precisely efforts that we should encourage to encourage both camp to work harder in achieving conformance. While it is unfortunately that his ODF work is not performed in the same “laboratory” settings as his work on OOXML, lets not forget that he always stress that his results is a “smoke” test. Therefore, he is permitted a lot of leeways.

Did he managed to prove that OpenOffice.org did not write valid ODF? Yes, he did, even Rob Weir acknowledge it. I acknowledge the standard we used in validation is very very high, i.e., not a single failure is tolerated. That is the standard _and_ everyone agrees with it. However, since this standard is so high that I do not really expect any applications to conform to either standard, ever. What is more interesting is the answers to these two questions: How many flaws that we find and how many _types_ of flaws there are. I believe this is what we should measure application with. Unfortuantely, this discussion is more difficult as there is no agreement on what the acceptable measure is.

As I had expected, Doug McHugh picked up on the topic. As usual, he took it on face value without performing any analysis of his own. But he did point us to Stocholm’s article about Stocholm testing conformance of ODF back in Fall 2007. While it is alarming to see that OpenOffice.org did not produce valid ODF, we need to note that the methodology is seriously flawed since there is NO way for an independent third party to cross-validate the results. For a start, we don’t have the original documents. The second part is that he did not say which version of ODF it validate against. There is always the possibility that it validate against the wrong one. The claim that all OOXML docs in the test passed ECMA OOXML is a smoke screen: It is easy to do so when you write the standard yourself and get it rubber-stamped. However, his conclusion in his last line is valid: we want better ODF conformance iwth OpenOffice.org!

Oh dear….

Steve Ballmer’s presentation computer is … (See picture on Andy Patrizio’s blog)

There are several questions raised by the picture. Is the Apple laptop supplied by the organizer or is it Steve’s? I am going to give Steve the benefit of doubt by saying it is the organizer’s _and_ the organizer is NOT Microsoft. Second, is it a coincidence that the board with the word “Microsoft” is there or some savvy PR people use it specifically to cover up the Apple Laptop? Your guess is as good as mine. However, if it is the latter, give that PR person a bonus, Microsoft.

As the Gizmodo editor said in this post,  may be he is running BootCamp!  My first thought, before reading the post is that it must be running MacOffice, so it is not surprising that I agree with the editor. Moreover, Microsoft personnels prepared the presentation, hence it is likely to be MacOffice or Microsoft Office. However, if they wrote it with KeyNote…OH MY GOD!

I have some concern that this is a hoax. The event is no longer on Microsoft’s website, but I did found it in Google Cache.

Intentional/unintentional loop hole. Also buyer beware

A story that is making its way through the net last weekend is that Dell is still going to install XP on new machines well past Microsoft’s deadline for killing the majority of XP’s versions.

The news that XP is still being shipped is not surprising considering the fact that Vista take up is below what I had expected a year after launching. However, I still have difficulty seeing it as proof that Vista is a failure, since I know from experience, no technical manager will touch Windows family of operating system until it is at least it is at least one year in a wild. (In practice, it is two years, with some skipping one version if Microsoft can make good of its promise to deliver new OS every three years or so.)

What was not clear to me was how Dell can do it legally, until BBC outlined how this is done. It appears that it is using a standard practice in the industry that allow purchaser to buy a license then “downgrade” it to earlier version. This is mainly a practical workaround the fact that you cannot buy license for earlier versions. It is usually practice in places where the shopfloor need to buy a new computer and with it, a new license for the software, but would not use the latest versions because they had standardize the software on the older version.

Two things that is unusual here. First and foremost, Dell will give you a copy of Windows XP CD and second, it install it for you. Normally, it is you who have to do the two yourself. Both are “innovations” in its own right. It also says that XP is still have strong demand as Dell deem it not only worthwhile to do so, but to go the extra mile and push the envelope of “downgrading” practice.

What I find disturbing is the fact that nobody explain to the consumers what buying XP actually means post Microsoft deadline means. It means you cannot expect the normal level of support you normally expect with Windows, i.e. 3 years active support with at least 5 years of security patches. Your mileage on the first part is dropping from the deadline day by day. It is only a theoritical problem since most people’s computer would had died in 3 years. No active support for last two years of life? Who cares! Still, you should know the bargain you had striked by downgrading.

BBC touch on the fact that this practice will allow Microsoft to chalk up XP sales as Vista sales. Initially, I thought this means Microsoft can bask in artificially inflated Vista sales figure. However, the more I think about it, I don’t think this is what Microsoft is aiming for. First, chalking up version N-1 sales as version N sales this way is standard practice in industry. Second, it is a problem particular to Microsoft where its sales figures will be heavily scrutinized and punters remineded of this fact. The later is particularly an irritant for Microsoft. As much as the PR department like to “confuse” the sales figure for the two, the business department will be well aware of this. They, like commentators, will be busy tracking the demise of XP.  The only difference is they will do it silently. If anything, Microsoft has demonstrated time and time again that its business department is probably the one of the most astute one. Therefore, they will not let XP “demise” statistics slip their finger.