A free, open-source Windows "clone" - ReactOS - that has been in development for over a decade has caught the eye of Russian President Dmitry Medvedev.

A student at a Russian high school the president visited recently gave Mr Medvedev a brief overview of the project - and asked him for 1m euros.

Domestic IT community has asked the president to support the idea of the operating system. Future developers Russian «national operating system» can get support in the form of federal target programs. In any case, the authors expect this letter to President Dmitry Medvedev, who is now preparing for the State Duma.

Glyn Moody now points us to the news that (Russian President) Medvedev appears to be going even further than just condemning today's copyright laws. He's now looking to adjust Russia's copyright laws in the other direction.

There has been so much talk in the last two weeks that Microsoft has changed with regard to its patent policy toward Free Software. We fool ourselves if we trust any of the window-dressing that Microsoft has put forward to convince us that we can trust them in this regard.

The freedom of the software we all sometimes use is under attack, in part thanks to companies like ACCESS and Microsoft, which found a partner in Tim O’Reilly and others who take money to change the direction of Open Source (taking it further away from Free/libre software)

"Many computer users tend to equate Microsoft with evil, but that is a mistake.

Here is just a quick word of caution: Now comes the latest FUD from the Burton Group, Microsoft’s left-arm FUD buddy, which was only recently used against Google, VMWare and ODF. As usual, it all comes in the form of a report Microsoft can cite and distribute copies of. It’s now used against Free software, too.

OK, so why have Novell, Xandros, and Linspire all gotten into bed with Microsoft? Is it...

1. They were seduced by Steve Ballmer's charming smile?
2. They've gone over to the dark side of the force?
3. Terror of Microsoft's mighty patent portfolio had them groveling at Microsoft's feet?

The Russian IT-community has been surprised at Russia to approve of using Office OpenXML, developed by Microsoft in cooperation with other companies, as an international standard. However, the most striking was the fact that the Russian representatives proposed no remarks and supplements to the standard.