COMMENTARY--In what is without question an important piece of reporting, my colleague David Berlind says IBM and Microsoft "have been quietly busy behind the scenes for the last two years building a tollbooth that could position the two companies to collect royalties on most if not all Internet traffic."
That may or may not be true. What he says is theoretically possible. But I think it's highly unlikely this scenario will actually play out. Why? Because the marketplace won't let it happen.
What I think David's reporting proves, beyond the fact that he's squarely on the side of customers, is that there are some things customers probably don't need to watch being made: The one we know about is sausage. The other is standards.
THE INTERNET is built on royalty-free standards. Back when it was being created, the work was done to government spec (and at government expense), and sought to unite educational institutions, government agencies, and others who had to work collectively to make the Internet happen.
Today the Internet is more commercial than cooperative. Standards-making has become a highly competitive and sometimes nasty game where corporate and individual vision and ambition are pitted against one another. There are winners and losers, but--so far at least--I think things have generally worked out for the best.
Standards are hashed out in semi-public forums and customers don't pay too much attention. Sometimes, a particular issue busts into the open, which is what's happened here. In this case, it's a conflict between standards that are entirely royalty-free (like the current Internet protocols) versus standards for which patents exist and ownership is claimed (the Java programming language, for example).
The concern here is that Microsoft and IBM own patents on certain Web-services technologies they are trying to turn into standards. Yes, it's possible Microsoft (I can't speak for IBM) will use its patent rights to muscle people out of the Web-services business. Or even to somehow set up, with IBM, a "tollbooth" on the Internet.
But will it?
MICROSOFT WOULDN'T respond to repeated calls from David Berlind. But after David's story appeared, Charles Fitzgerald, general manager of Microsoft's Platform Strategy Group, agreed to answer some of my questions. He finds the issue frustrating, because of legal restrictions on what the company can and cannot make as a public statement. Nevertheless, he agreed to try.
"While this may be disappointing to some conspiracy theorists, Microsoft has absolutely no ambition, plan, or desire to collect a royalty on Internet traffic," Fitzgerald told me.
"XML-based Web services are fundamental to our strategy. Microsoft has led the industry in the formulation, development, and standardization of Web services, and will continue to do so with the overarching goal of broad industry adoption. The fundamental premise of Web services is interoperability between applications, regardless of platform, language, or object model.
"WE WILL NOT do anything to put roadblocks in the way of making integration faster, cheaper, and easier. Burdening the underlying standards with additional costs would both undermine this strategy and fly in the face of our business strategy of delivering high-volume, low-cost software."
OK, maybe the part in the middle about leading the industry lays it on a little thick. But the general thrust--that making it expensive for other companies to implement Web-services protocols isn't in Microsoft's best interests--makes sense to me.
This was my opinion even before I talked to Fitzgerald: Microsoft would be stupid to do this. And over the long haul, I don't think it's a stupid company. Microsoft pays attention to public feedback, and modifies its behavior accordingly, more often than many people think.
AFTER THE CONTROVERSY surrounding Microsoft's introduction of its .Net My Services (previously code-named "Hailstorm"), the company went back to the drawing board to find something that didn't scare off potential customers. Big changes have been made.
Just last week, pressure from this column and other quarters caused Microsoft to reconsider its previous unwillingness to enter into a new development agreement with Apple. It's unclear what will happen, but complaining had an effect.
Microsoft has also significantly modified a new enterprise software-licensing program based on feedback from angry customers.
While I understand people's concerns about Microsoft and agree that many of them are well-founded, I also think Microsoft takes customer interest and feedback seriously and modifies its behavior accordingly.
Appearances do count, especially where IBM and Microsoft are concerned. In the case of Web-services protocols, I think we'll find Microsoft willing to respond positively when legitimate concerns are brought to its attention. But in this case, I don't think they've done anything wrong.
What do you think? Should we trust Microsoft on this one? TalkBack to me below.
