Florian Müller
Encyclopedia
- For the footballer, see Florian Müller (footballer)Florian Müller (footballer)Florian Müller is a German football player. As of January 2009, he plays for Alemannia Aachen.-External links:...
Florian Müller (born January 21, 1970 in Augsburg
Augsburg
Augsburg is a city in the south-west of Bavaria, Germany. It is a university town and home of the Regierungsbezirk Schwaben and the Bezirk Schwaben. Augsburg is an urban district and home to the institutions of the Landkreis Augsburg. It is, as of 2008, the third-largest city in Bavaria with a...
, Germany
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
) is a lobbyist, entrepreneur
Entrepreneur
An entrepreneur is an owner or manager of a business enterprise who makes money through risk and initiative.The term was originally a loanword from French and was first defined by the Irish-French economist Richard Cantillon. Entrepreneur in English is a term applied to a person who is willing to...
, consultant
Consultant
A consultant is a professional who provides professional or expert advice in a particular area such as management, accountancy, the environment, entertainment, technology, law , human resources, marketing, emergency management, food production, medicine, finance, life management, economics, public...
, and the founder of the NoSoftwarePatents campaign
Advertising campaign
An advertising campaign is a series of advertisement messages that share a single idea and theme which make up an integrated marketing communication...
. He blogs about patent issues but does not have formally recognised legal qualifications.
Software industry/computer books
In 1985, Müller started writing articles for German computer magazines. A year later, at age 16, he became Germany's youngest computer book author.From 1987 to 1998, he specialized on publishing and distribution cooperations between US and European software companies. He initiated and managed such alliances in various market segments, including productivity software, utility software, educational software, and computer games. As a consultant to and representative of Blizzard Entertainment
Blizzard Entertainment
Blizzard Entertainment, Inc. is an American video game developer and publisher founded on February 8, 1991 under the name Silicon & Synapse by three graduates of UCLA, Michael Morhaime, Allen Adham and Frank Pearce and currently owned by French company Activision Blizzard...
, Müller was involved in the marketing campaigns for WarCraft II
Warcraft II: Tides of Darkness
Warcraft II: Tides of Darkness is a fantasy-themed real-time strategy game published by Blizzard Entertainment and first released for DOS in 1995 and for Mac OS in 1996...
, Diablo I and StarCraft
StarCraft
StarCraft is a military science fiction real-time strategy video game developed by Blizzard Entertainment. The first game of the StarCraft series was released for Microsoft Windows on 31 March 1998. With more than 11 million copies sold worldwide as of February 2009, it is one of the best-selling...
I).
In 1996, he co-founded an online gaming service named Rival Network, which in early 2000 was acquired by the Telefónica
Telefónica
Telefónica, S.A. is a Spanish broadband and telecommunications provider in Europe and Latin America. Operating globally, it is the third largest provider in the world...
group. From 2001 to 2004, Müller advised the CEO of MySQL
MySQL
MySQL officially, but also commonly "My Sequel") is a relational database management system that runs as a server providing multi-user access to a number of databases. It is named after developer Michael Widenius' daughter, My...
AB, developer of the namesake open-source database management software product.
Campaign against EU software patents
In 2004, Müller received the support of corporate sponsors 1&1, Red HatRed Hat
Red Hat, Inc. is an S&P 500 company in the free and open source software sector, and a major Linux distribution vendor. Founded in 1993, Red Hat has its corporate headquarters in Raleigh, North Carolina with satellite offices worldwide....
and MySQL
MySQL
MySQL officially, but also commonly "My Sequel") is a relational database management system that runs as a server providing multi-user access to a number of databases. It is named after developer Michael Widenius' daughter, My...
for launching NoSoftwarePatents.com, which opposed the European Commission
European Commission
The European Commission is the executive body of the European Union. The body is responsible for proposing legislation, implementing decisions, upholding the Union's treaties and the general day-to-day running of the Union....
's proposed directive on the patentability of computer-implemented inventions. Following several years of intensive lobbying by many parties, this proposed directive was rejected by the European Parliament
European Parliament
The European Parliament is the directly elected parliamentary institution of the European Union . Together with the Council of the European Union and the Commission, it exercises the legislative function of the EU and it has been described as one of the most powerful legislatures in the world...
on July 6, 2005, with 648 out of 680 votes cast.
For his political activities, Müller received several awards in 2005. A leading publication for intellectual property
Intellectual property
Intellectual property is a term referring to a number of distinct types of creations of the mind for which a set of exclusive rights are recognized—and the corresponding fields of law...
lawyers, "Managing Intellectual Property", counted Müller - along with the Chinese vice premier Wu Yi
Wu Yi
Wu Yi was one of four Vice Premiers of the State Council of the People's Republic of China, overseeing the country's economy until March 2008. Known as the "iron lady", Wu is one of the toughest negotiators in China's government.-Biography:...
- among the "top 50 most influential people in intellectual property" (renominated in 2006). IT-focused website Silicon.com listed him among the Silicon Agenda Setters. A jury of EU-focused weekly newspaper "European Voice" elected Müller as one of the "EV50 Europeans of the Year 2005", and handed him the "EU Campaigner of the Year 2005" award. Jointly with the FFII
Foundation for a Free Information Infrastructure
The Foundation for a Free Information Infrastructure or FFII is a non-profit organisation based in Munich, Germany, dedicated to establishing a free market in information technology, by the removal of barriers to competition...
, Müller received the "CNET
CNET
CNET is a tech media website that publishes news articles, blogs, and podcasts on technology and consumer electronics. Originally founded in 1994 by Halsey Minor and Shelby Bonnie, it was the flagship brand of CNET Networks and became a brand of CBS Interactive through CNET Networks' acquisition...
Networks UK Technology Award" in the "Outstanding Contribution to Software Development" category.
Soccer policy
After more than 20 years in the IT industry, Müller became involved with football (soccer)Football (soccer)
Association football, more commonly known as football or soccer, is a sport played between two teams of eleven players with a spherical ball...
politics
Politics
Politics is a process by which groups of people make collective decisions. The term is generally applied to the art or science of running governmental or state affairs, including behavior within civil governments, but also applies to institutions, fields, and special interest groups such as the...
in 2007. He advised the Spanish
Spain
Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...
soccer club Real Madrid
Real Madrid
Real Madrid Club de Fútbol , commonly known as Real Madrid, is a professional football club based in Madrid, Spain. The club have won a record 31 La Liga titles, the Primera División of the Liga de Fútbol Profesional , 18 Copas del Rey, 8 Spanish Super Cups, 1 Copa Eva Duarte and 1 Copa de la...
with respect to a European Union
European Union
The European Union is an economic and political union of 27 independent member states which are located primarily in Europe. The EU traces its origins from the European Coal and Steel Community and the European Economic Community , formed by six countries in 1958...
policy
Policy
A policy is typically described as a principle or rule to guide decisions and achieve rational outcome. The term is not normally used to denote what is actually done, this is normally referred to as either procedure or protocol...
-making initiative concerning professional sports
Professional sports
Professional sports, as opposed to amateur sports, are sports in which athletes receive payment for their performance. Professional athleticism has come to the fore through a combination of developments. Mass media and increased leisure have brought larger audiences, so that sports organizations...
.
from Oracle
Müller published an article suggesting the possibility that Oracle's claims that GoogleGoogle
Google Inc. is an American multinational public corporation invested in Internet search, cloud computing, and advertising technologies. Google hosts and develops a number of Internet-based services and products, and generates profit primarily from advertising through its AdWords program...
violated their copyrights may have merit, an article which was heavily criticized by two technical bloggers. According to Ed Burnette, a ZDNet blogger, Google published those files on its web site to help developers debug and test their own code. ArsTechnica's Ryan Paul also said that these findings in the online codebase are also not evidence that stolen code is distributed on Android handsets. Two days after his original assertions Mueller claimed to have found the files in the official source availability packages of device makers Motorola, LG and Samsung.
from the Linux Kernel
Müller amplified a HuffingtonPost article by an intellectual property lawyer who suggested that GoogleGoogle
Google Inc. is an American multinational public corporation invested in Internet search, cloud computing, and advertising technologies. Google hosts and develops a number of Internet-based services and products, and generates profit primarily from advertising through its AdWords program...
likely violated the GPL by copying Linux
Linux kernel
The Linux kernel is an operating system kernel used by the Linux family of Unix-like operating systems. It is one of the most prominent examples of free and open source software....
header files. The accusation was dismissed by Linus Torvalds
Linus Torvalds
Linus Benedict Torvalds is a Finnish software engineer and hacker, best known for having initiated the development of the open source Linux kernel. He later became the chief architect of the Linux kernel, and now acts as the project's coordinator...
, the original author and chief architect of the Linux Kernel
Linux kernel
The Linux kernel is an operating system kernel used by the Linux family of Unix-like operating systems. It is one of the most prominent examples of free and open source software....
.
Study on the worldwide use of FRAND-committed patents
In october 2011 Müller announced on his blog that MicrosoftMicrosoft
Microsoft Corporation is an American public multinational corporation headquartered in Redmond, Washington, USA that develops, manufactures, licenses, and supports a wide range of products and services predominantly related to computing through its various product divisions...
had commisioned him to conduct a study on patents.
External links
- Florian Müller, No Lobbyists As Such (2006). 377-page play-by-play memoir of the story of Florian's part in the campaign over the EU software patent directive.
- — Review by Matthew Broersma, Techworld
- NoSoftwarePatents campaign
- Florian Müller's FOSS Patents blog
- Florian Müller's FOSS Patents Twitter page