81 lines
3.4 KiB
HTML
81 lines
3.4 KiB
HTML
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<title>FSF Europe - FSFE to challenge Microsoft in its appeal against European Commission</title>
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<h3>July 27th, 2004</h3>
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<h1>FSFE to challenge Microsoft in its appeal against European Commission</h1>
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<p>The European Commission sought to help the IT market grow in
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the best possible way for consumers and citizens of the European
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Union with its antitrust ruling against Microsoft.</p>
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<p>EU Commissioner Mario Monti imposed a penalty of nearly 500 millions
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Euro and additional conditions. One of these is the publication of the
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software interfaces. This information is important for example to
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the Free Software project SAMBA. SAMBA connects the UNIX and GNU/Linux
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World with Microsofts operating systems. Via this gateway SAMBA
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reduces customers addiction of the monoculture which is fostered by
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the Redmond based software giant. Without the information on the
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interfaces SAMBA cannot work best.</p>
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<p>Although it seems questionable whether that ruling would truly stop
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the monopoly, Microsoft seems to be worried and has entered appeal
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against it in front of the European Court.</p>
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<p>After having participated as third party in the antitrust case before,
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the Free Software Foundation Europe has participated to the
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preliminary hearing on Tuesday 27th of July 2004 to enter court in
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order to defend the decision of the European Commission and the
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freedom to use Free Software SAMBA.</p>
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<p>Among general interests of Free Software, the FSFE will specifically
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be representing the interests of the SAMBA team, a Free Software
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cooperation developing the only remaining competing implementation of
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the SMB/CIFS protocols that permit interoperability between various
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operating systems and the MS Windows family.</p>
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<p>The Italian lawyer Carlo Piana, of the milanese firm Tamos Piana &
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Partners, will represent the interests of FSF Europe and of SAMBA
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team, the developers of the remaining competing implementation of the
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SMB/CIFS protocols that permits interoperability between various
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operating systems and the MS Windows family. He commented: "FSFE
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simply could not remain outside this litigation. The decision of the
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Commission represents an important precedent which is of utmost
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importance in the sofware market and for the whole society. Freedom,
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not just money, is at stake. I am therefore very proud of this
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appointment".</p>
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<p>"This case is about preserving the last remaining obstacle to total
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Microsoft dominance of the Microsoft-compatible server market. It is
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not only about defending freedom for users, but mainly freedom of
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businesses." says Georg Greve, president of the FSFE, adding "We call
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on all businesses to support us in this struggle. Those who ignore
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that call today have to expect to have only one choice to buy storage
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and directory services from tomorrow.</p>
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<p>Information about the FSFE fundraising campaign can be found at</p>
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<a href="http://fsfeurope.org/news/2004/news-20040701.en.html">
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http://fsfeurope.org/news/2004/news-20040701.en.html</a>
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<a href="http://fsfeurope.org/help/donate.en.html">
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http://fsfeurope.org/help/donate.en.html</a>
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<p>More background information on the Microsoft investigation is available
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on <a href="http://fsfeurope.org/activities/ms-vs-eu/">http://fsfeurope.org/activities/ms-vs-eu/</a></p>
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</body>
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<timestamp>$Date$ $Author$ </timestamp>
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