[WSIS CS-Plenary] The next Vienna Conclusion: So it WAS Microsoft that asked to delete Free Software

[Georg C. F. Greve]

[ http://www.fsfe.org/fellows/greve/freedom_bits/the_next_vienna_conclusion_so_it_was_microsoft_that_asked_to_delete_free_software ]

The next Vienna Conclusion: So it WAS Microsoft that asked to delete
Free Software

   Tuesday 22 November 2005

   The [24]ORF (Austrian Broadcasting Corporation) features a[25]report
   in its futurezone.orf.at section about the Free Software censorship
   described in my blog entry "[26]The Vienna Conclusion:
   Sponsorship+Politics=Influence".

   They describe the situation, quote the rapporteur of the panel, Ralf
   Bendrath, that he was somewhat surprised to see the conclusions of the
   expert panel modified, and concluded that since this was the only
   substantial change it was very questionable.

   In the comments you also find a statement by the chairman of the
   conference, [27]Prof Peter Bruck who attacks the ORF for their
   "misleading and manipulating" report. According to him, everything is
   fine, because there was a [28]blog on which this had been discussed.

   When checking out the blog, you find five (!) entries, two of which
   are procedural. Of the remaining three, one is a statement that does
   not refer to the "Digital Righs & Creative Commons" panel in any way,
   one is a argument-free pro-DRM statement by the "[29]Cox Orange" PR
   company (whose site is entirely unusable because of Flash) in the name
   of [30]creativ wirtschaft austria. If anyone can tell me who they
   really represent, [31]please let me know.

   The last statement is by Thomas Lutz in the name of Microsoft, in
   which they spread the typical anti-Free Software propaganda:


      p5/2. Digital Rights/Creative Commons

      While we largely agree on the point that more choices should be
      given to creators and users (and the subsequent conclusions on
      Creative Commons or Wikipedia) we explicitly disagree on the
      notion that "increasingly, revenue is generated not by selling
      content and digital works, as they can be freely distributed at
      almost no cost, but by offering services on top of them. The
      success of the Free Software Model is one example" and propose
      to delete this text part completely, as it contains only an
      one-sided perspective on the ICT industry. The rationale for
      this is, that the aim of free software is not to enable a
      healthy business on software but rather to make it even
      impossible to make any income on software as a commercial
      product.

   This is so obviously stupid and nonsensical that it seems pointless to
   comment on it: Just another monopolist trying to uphold their monopoly
   by preventing freedom of markets -- which is what Free Software really
   aims at.

   More interesting: This is the proof, Free Software was removed on
   request of Microsoft.

   Given this was a conference with hundreds of high-level participants
   and discussing a rather hot topic, do you wonder why are there only
   five entries in this blog? Do you wonder why noone tore the Microsoft
   propaganda apart? There is an easy answer to this: Noone on the panel
   ever knew this blog existed. I just learned this now.

   In fact: in Vienna everyone wondered where the chapeau had come from,
   whether it was possible to work on it, what would be the outcome of
   the conference... it was all entirely intransparent to us. Any claims
   to a transparent and participatory process collapse when looking into
   them just a little bit.

   Furthermore, Microsoft was not willing to make these statements in the
   panel. They were at the conference, but gave the "Digital Rights &
   Creative Commons" panel a wide berth. They did not dare to say this in
   public, knowing full well it would not hold up to the daylight of
   reason.

   All the panelists were quoted in the publication with name and
   picture, and the text in question was presented as an outcome of our
   panel.

   So where exactly did the manipulation and misrepresentation take
   place?

   [32]Creative Commons License 
   This work is licensed under a [33]Creative Commons
   Attribution-ShareAlike 2.5 License.