Microsoft is listed on the NASDAQ under the ticker MSFT, and employs
76,539 people as of
2007.
The company had revenues of over US $51.1 billion, and net income of more than US $14 billion
as of
2007.
Historically, Microsoft has not always been popular with all sections of the
open source
community. This is partly for historical reasons, and partly because Microsoft is perceived by some
as being opposed to the
goals and values of the
open source
movement. Furthermore, some senior figures in the company have made some negative comments about
open source
generally, as well as the Linux operating system in particular
- for example, Steve Ballmer
once famously described the GPL
as "a cancer", and the company has also made various made allegations about possible
patent infringements in
Linux.
Despite this, Microsoft has in fact engaged in some
open source,
activities. Microsoft has even shipped some software under the
GPL
(Microsoft Services for UNIX), and other software under the
CPL
(Windows Installer XML - "Wix"), which is an
OSI
approved
open source license.
Microsoft's
open source
activities have largely been carried out as part of the company's
"Shared Source"
initiative. This initiative is an umbrella term encompassing a range of projects, including open sourcing some programs, making
other programs' source code available for viewing-only under fairly restrictive licenses,
and developing new copyright license agreements
(some of which might eventually be
certified
as meeting the
OSI's
Open Source Definition,
whereas others allow source code viewing but not editing, and only on restrictive terms).
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