To Evil: tech's most evil villains
Danny O'Brien's continuing his brilliant series, "To Evil," a monthly column in which he picks out a few genuinely evil people in the tech industry and describes their sins for our edification and amusement (and Danny is very, very amusing: "Ziff-Davidians" indeed!).We start, as any trawl through the inferno should, up to our thighs in spam.Link (Thanks, Steve!)This month, Redmond's lawyers sprayed a unique license from its hind-most intellectual property glands - all over the IETF's proposal for an anti-spam mail authentication standard, Sender ID.
As ever, open source kill-joys had a few problems with Microsoft's license. First, the patent license they offered wasn't transferable. So everyone who got the source had to sign a deal with Microsoft to use their super-special patented technology.
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Cory Doctorow
Upcoming appearances
* Feb 9, 2012, DeKalb, IL: Day of Doctorow, NIU
* Feb 10-12, 2012, Chicago, IL: Capricon 32
* Feb 13, 2012, Arlington, TX: UT Arlington College of Engineering Distinguished Speaker Series
* Feb 16, 2012, Victoria, BC: 13th Annual Privacy and Security Conference
Recent books:
* Context (essays)
* With a Little Help (short stories)
* For the Win (YA novel)
* Makers (adult novel)
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