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Comment by taylodl | Hacker News Reader

Karma is finally biting Microsoft in the ass. Who else remembers the refrain "it ain't done 'til Lotus won't run!" from Microsoft's earlier years?

Having said that, I would expect the "do no evil" company - directly referring to not being like Microsoft - to do the right thing, if, in fact Microsoft is being fully forthcoming in stating they have complied with all of Google's objections.

In the end, both companies have blemishes and so far I can't determine who's really at fault here. The soap opera will continue, I'm sure.

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The article says that they decided to release the app over Google's objections:

  There was one sticking point in the collaboration. Google
  asked us to transition our app to a new coding
  language – HTML5.
  [...]
  For this reason, we made a decision this week to publish
  our non-HTML5 app while committing to work with Google
  long-term on an app based on HTML5. [...] Google, however,
  has decided to block our mutual customers from accessing
  our new app.

Needing Google's permission to release an app on their own platform doesn't sound very open.

Not needing Google's permission to consume Google's content sounds very .... umm ... you decide.

Well if Google are claiming their platforms are open, then as long as Microsoft can comply with content providers (showing ads, etc), Google should not have a problem with them hooking into their platform?

Google is not interested in "openness" except where it benefits them. They are just as controlling as Apple when it comes to their viable properties (and rightly so, but they should stop using "open" to describe their platforms).

Where is the claim that YouTube is some big open ecosystem? Google provides APIs for working with YouTube, which to me seems the only sane way to protect its content providers. MS refuses to use those APIs. What is hard to digest about this situation?

My understanding of the article is that Microsoft IS using the APIs to their fullest extent. Google does not provide a public API that can allow Microsoft to serve the "correct" ads before a video.

Google often talks about the broader web and services in ways that encourage openness and standards. Yet here they are making it difficult for someone who wants to hook into their data while respecting the content owners' rights.

I had no idea what you meant by "it ain't done 'til Lotus won't run!", so I googled it. This is the first link that showed up:

http://slashdot.org/story/05/08/02/2219208/the-dos-aint-done...

Whatever about this particular instance, there are documented incidents where Microsoft deliberately made things not work; in particular, the Java thing, and the DR-DOS Windows thing (where Windows would run on DR-DOS if it pretended to be MS DOS, but not otherwise).

> and the DR-DOS Windows thing (where Windows would run on DR-DOS if it pretended to be MS DOS, but not otherwise).

Only in a beta, not in a released version:

http://blogs.msdn.com/b/larryosterman/archive/2004/08/12/213...

Since it did not make it into a released version of Windows, it did not actually affect DR-DOS. Still, Novell eventually got an 8-digit settlement out of Microsoft.

I mentioned that lawsuit (particularly the Win95 parts) in my blog article on the MS OS/2 2.0 fiasco:

http://yuhongbao.blogspot.ca/2012/12/about-ms-os2-20-fiasco-...

Sure it's in vogue to say Microsoft is "finally" getting their comeuppance whenever something like this comes along, but I wonder how long they can be held responsible for past sins.

Are we really going harp on Lotus Notes, or, heaven forbid, IE6, five or ten years from now?

Note that I think that the post from Microsoft is 90% self-serving. It's just a general thing I notice with Microsoft bashing.

> I wonder how long they can be held responsible for past sins.

They are still threatening Android handset makers with patent lawsuits, and in fact making more money from Android patent extortion than they are from Windows phone.

The whole UEFI Secure Boot requirement is designed to thwart Linux adoption under the guise of safety.

It is NOT sins of the past. The only reason they're not pulling another IE6 or Lotus Notes is because they aren't as dominant now, not because they aren't as evil. (The UEFI thing is on the same league of evil, if you ask me, just not as successful)

I don't necessarily agree with the premise of your patent argument, but I think it's a valid concern, and definitely fair game.

But, again, my quarrel is with people who choose to continue pouring salt on old wounds when there are many more relevant grips to bring up.

designed?

Sure. What's your question about the threat UEFI Secure Boot poses to an open PC platform and its ability to run GPLv3 software?

My point is I see no evidence it was deliberately designed to do so, other than on WinRT that they stupidly decided to lock down like iOS.

I'm deliberately saying "GPLv3" here.

If your laptop comes preloaded with Microsoft's signing key and is also set to fast boot [1] so that you can't even get into the BIOS, your system does not have the ability to run a GPLv3 OS. You can't get into the BIOS so you can't change the fact that it refuses to run anything not signed by the Microsoft key!

Yes, I know Linux is not GPLv3, but it is GPLv2 "or any later version." Also, I already know that Windows 8 has a way to get to the BIOS (hold down shift, click the restart button). Neither of those is a valid counter-argument.

[1] http://mjg59.dreamwidth.org/24869.html

After you go into the BIOS using Win8, you should be able to disable fast boot, secure boot, change between BIOS and UEFI boot modes etc.

That's what I said above.

As a Windows Phone user I am just going to have to accept I will never get YouTube, G+ or Google Drive while Android and iOS users can get onenote, lync, skydrive and the Xbox companion shit.

Being without Google Drive is an advantage. Dropbox and even SkyDrive are better....

Personally, I wrote a blog post on the decades old MS OS/2 2.0 fiasco, just to make it clear that it was pretty seriously bad (I don't see PX00307 mentioned anywhere before I mentioned it for example), even though I know it is too late (fortunately the x64 transition went much better).

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