Free Software, Free Society: selected essays of Richard M. Stallman. 2nd edition.

This article was written in July 2005. Microsoft adopted a different policy in 2006, so the specific policies described below and the specific criticisms of them are only of historical significance. The overall problem remains, however: Microsoft’s cunningly worded new policy (see http://grokdoc.net/index.php/EOOXML_objections#Patent_rights_to_implement_the_ Ecma_376_specification_have_not_been_granted) does not give anyone clear permission to implement OOXML.

European legislators who endorse software patents frequently claim that those wouldn’t affect free software (or “open source”). Microsoft’s lawyers are determined to prove they are mistaken.

Leaked internal documents in 1998 said that Microsoft considered the free software GNU/Linux operating system (referred to therein as “Linux”) as the principal competitor to Windows, and spoke of using patents and secret file formats to hold us back.

Because Microsoft has so much market power, it can often impose new standards at will. It need only patent some minor idea, design a file format, programming language, or communication protocol based on it, and then pressure users to adopt it. Then we in the free software community will be forbidden to provide software that does what these users want; they will be locked in to Microsoft, and we will be locked out from serving them.

Previously Microsoft tried to get its patented scheme for spam blocking adopted as an Internet standard, so as to exclude free software from handling email. The standards committee in charge rejected the proposal, but Microsoft said it would try to convince large ISPs to use the scheme anyway.

Now Microsoft is planning to try something similar for Word files.

Several years ago, Microsoft abandoned its documented format for saving documents, and switched to a new format which was secret. However, the developers of free software word processors such as AbiWord and OpenOffice.org experimented assiduously for years to figure out the format, and now those programs can read most Word files. But Microsoft isn’t licked yet.

The next version of Microsoft Word will use formats that involve a technique that Microsoft claims to hold a patent on. Microsoft offers a royalty-free patent license for certain limited purposes, but it is so limited that it does not allow free software. You can see the license here: http://microsoft.com/whdc/xps/xpspatentlic.mspx.

Free software is defined as software that respects four fundamental freedoms: (0) freedom to run the software as you wish, (1) freedom to study the source code and modify it to do what you wish, (2) freedom to make and redistribute copies, and (3) freedom to publish modified versions. Only programmers can directly exercise freedoms 1 and 3, but all users can exercise freedoms 0 and 2, and all users benefit from the modifications that programmers write and publish.

Distributing an application under Microsoft’s patent license imposes license terms that prohibit most possible modifications of the software. Lacking freedom 3, the freedom to publish modified versions, it would not be free software. (I think it could not be “open source” software either, since that definition is similar; but it is not identical, and I cannot speak for the advocates of open source.)

The Microsoft license also requires inclusion of a specific statement. That requirement would not in itself prevent the program from being free: it is normal for free software to carry license notices that cannot be changed, and this statement could be included in one of them. The statement is biased and confusing, since it uses the term “intellectual property”; fortunately, one is not required to endorse the statement as true or even meaningful, only to include it. The software developer could cancel its misleading effect with a disclaimer like this: “The following misleading statement has been imposed on us by Microsoft; please be advised that it is propaganda. See http://gnu.org/philosophy/not-ipr.html for more explanation.”

However, the requirement to include a fixed piece of text is actually quite cunning, because anyone who does so has explicitly accepted and applied the restrictions of the Microsoft patent license. The resulting program is clearly not free software.