Posted on 01/31/2006 10:34:35 AM PST by ShadowAce
Microsoft has begun e-mailing its corporate customers worldwide, letting them know that they may need to start using a different version of Office as a result of a recent legal setback.
The software maker said Monday that it has been forced to issue new versions of Office 2003 and Office XP, which change the way Microsoft's Access database interacts with its Excel spreadsheet.
The move follows a verdict last year by a jury in Orange County, Calif., which found in favor of a patent claim by Guatemalan inventor Carlos Armando Amado. Microsoft was ordered to pay $8.9 million in damages for infringing Amado's 1994 patent. That award covered sales of Office between March 1997 and July 2003.
"It was recently decided in a court of law that certain portions of code found in Microsoft Office Professional Edition 2003, Microsoft Office Access 2003, Microsoft Office XP Professional and Microsoft Access 2002 infringe a third-party patent," Microsoft said in an e-mail to customers. "As a result, Microsoft must make available a revised version of these products with the allegedly infringing code replaced."
Although existing customers can keep using older versions on current machines, any new installations of Office 2003 will require Service Pack 2, released by Microsoft in September. Office XP will need to be put into use with a special patch applied.
Microsoft is also recommending that customers update their existing software with the new code.
"We understand that this will create an inconvenience for a small percentage of our customers and are committed to working with them through the process and easing the inconvenience as best as possible," Sunny Jensen Charlebois, a Microsoft senior product manager, said in a statement to CNET News.com. The company is readying an all-new version of Office, code-named Office 12, that is due out later this year.
Microsoft would not say how many customers are affected, but said it is likely only a "small fraction" of Office users. However, the company appears to be requiring all companies to use the new version from now on, so most large organizations could be affected by the move.
The software maker started notifying customers this month, in an e-mail sent via its sales channel. All those affected will have been informed by next month, Microsoft said.
The company said the necessary downloads are available from its Web site.
Gartner analyst Michael Silver said it is hard to estimate the cost to customers, but said it is a significant impact for companies to move to a new service pack of a major program such as Office.
"It's probably a multimonth effort" for companies that want to double-check that key databases and critical Excel macros all work, Silver said. The other option is to "roll the dice" and just switch to the new software, but "most companies don’t want to do that with critical resources," he added.
The question for companies, though, is if they are exposing themselves to potential legal liability if they don't quickly move to the new software. Microsoft promises to indemnify customers from third-party patent claims, but Silver said the license terms also require customers to "immediately" move to any new noninfringing version that Microsoft releases.
"Immediate is pretty quick," Silver said. "It would be nice if there was some sort of time line that says you have to do it within six months or a year."
www.openoffice.org
You're certainly not claiming you as an end user get the same legal protections from Open Office, are you? How do they indemnify, or do they not, at all?
Re-try:
http://www.openoffice.org/
Not a lot :)
I used to run Office 97. Great product.
But then I bought a notebook computer and Office 2000 Pro was bundled in for "free." And this was back in the good old days (2001!) when the vendors actually give you distro CDs.
Is indemnification even necessary, or is it hype? I can't find any precedent of end-users being sued and losing. This wasn't even an issue until the now-failing SCO campaign.
I'm still using my old copy of Office 2000. I like it, and I have copies of Office XP. I can see no reason to switch, and one major reason to stick with 2000. It doesn't have the draconian registration system. I can re-install it as many times as I like without asking Microsoft's permission.
Look around on eBay. Copies of Office 2000 are readily available. There are few things it doesn't do that any normal user will ever need.
"Now, if this was open source code, which typically includes no warranty and passes legal liability on to the end users, then yes, you would be required to upgrade to avoid any personal legal liability for using the product."
Can you cite one example of an OSS user being successfully sued?
Hint: The Autozone case is on hold pending the IBM/SCO lawsuit which isn't looking too hot for SCO.
Not really, because open source is still a relatively obscure product line that doesn't have a large stash of cash for anyone to persue. Why hasn't eolas sued Firefox yet, when it's apparently guilty of the same crime MS Internet Explorer is? Because they can't get $500 million from Firefox. In fact, they probably can't get much of anything.
As much as I hate MS, have you looked at the bloat of OpenOffice, particularly the file size? It's often 10 to 1 compared to "evil" MS. They know it and are promising improvements, but we are 'hitting the wall' with open software as it tries to remain nominally compatible with the MS versions. That's why we need to concentrate on file formats, not programs.
This was the heart of and the genius of OpenDoc. The microsofties may have defeated the commerical initiative of OpenDoc, but they haven't refuted the underlying logic. It is file formats and interoperability, not programs, that will make the difference.
It will be interesting to see if Carlos Armando proceeds to sue the Microsoft customers who don't want to install the new software. Microsoft may decide not to indemnify them.
Open source software includes the same warranties and legal liabilities as Microsoft-ware. None. Read the EULA you agreed to.
It's reaffirming to see that some things never change. Your ongoing additions to your extremely large number of inaccurate and idiotic posts, for example.
bookmark
That's because Microsoft stores your Office files as binary code. OO.org stores your data as XML-delimited text.
One is open. One is secret and proprietary and stores YOUR data in a way that you must pay someone to get at it.
Given the two options, I'll live with the "bloat."
You're wrong, just like always. Thanks for the link to my history so people can search for your username and count how many times you've been blown out of the water and resort to name calling since you have nothing else.
Microsoft always indemnifies their customers, when have they not?
AFAIK they never indemnified the end user until SCO created their "sue the end user" boogeyman. Did you ever hear of Microsoft's end-user indemnification program before SCO? Can you find a mention of it?
Had I heard of it? No. Was I still safe from lawsuits against their products during that time? Yes.
How do you know? Microsoft didn't announce the policy until SCO, and there were no suits to test your theory. Microsoft had indemnification in their contracts with OEMs long before SCO, meaning they thought it was needed. They did not put end-user indemnification in their EULA or announce end-user indemnification by any other method, meaning they didn't think it was needed.
"Now, if this was open source code,"
Ha ha! Can you say, "red herring?"
It's NOT open source code. But, no one here expects you to stay on topic, Chickenhead.
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