Michael Robertson (businessman)
- This page is on the businessman. For the tennis player see Michael Robertson (tennis).
Michael Robertson (born 1967) is the founder and former CEO of MP3.com. He started Lindows.com, Inc., producer of Linspire (originally Lindows), in October 2001 in San Diego, California, U.S.. He went on to found SIPphone, MP3tunes, and Ajax 13.
Career
MP3.com
Robertson was the founder of the original MP3.com. Despite the amazing financial success of MP3.com (the day of the stock IPO (ticker:MPPP), the stock rose from $28 to peak at $103[1]), Robertson quickly led his company into a firestorm of lawsuits generated by the major record labels and music publishing concerns. The litigation sprang from Robertson's "Beam-it" program, a functionality that allowed people to quickly load their existing CD collection into online lockers at my.mp3.com and access their private music collections online from anywhere in the world. And also "Instant Listening" which allowed instant access of CDs purchased online from participating retailers. However, to launch the service Robertson essentially had to duplicate every music CD ever created. Although MP3.com purchased the CDs for their index and users had to supply their own copy as well, MP3.com failed to seek licenses for the music that was digitally stored on their servers.
Massive lawsuits erupted, with MP3.com claiming fair use and record labels claiming copyright infringement. Virtually every major record label sued MP3.com with MP3 settling the majority of the law suits. Universal Music, however, held out and took the issue to court. After the trial started, in the landmark case of UMG v. MP3.com, MP3.com was found to have violated copyright laws[2]. MP3.com paid $53.4 million to settle Universal Music's claim [3].
Some believed that MP3.com received unfair treatment by being lumped in with the Napster copyright case which took place during the same period. Others noted that the ruling came from the 2nd Circuit in New York, which is media company, not technology, friendly. It is speculated that a different outcome was likely if the case had been tried in the 9th Circuit instead of the 2nd Circuit. Still others saw the case as simple copyright infringement on a grand scale.
MP3.com was acquired for $385 million by Vivendi Universal during a buying spree by Vivendi's CEO Jean-Marie Messier. After the purchase by Vivendi, Michael Robertson cashed in with an estimated $103 million[4]. In hindsight, after Messier departed Vivendi, the new Vivendi management determined the corporate acquisitions spree to be reckless[citation needed] and later sold MP3.com to CNET which now manages the site. Vivendi also sold off many other companies to scale down its debt.
Linspire
After leaving MP3.com, Robertson started an OS technology company, Lindows. Since Lindows created a Linux based operating system designed to compete with Microsoft's Windows operating system, Microsoft filed trademark related lawsuits in the United States and abroad. Given that the trademarked "Windows" name was in some jeopardy, Microsoft paid to settle the lawsuit they initiated with a $20 million payment to Lindows and certain licenses with Lindows agreeing to change their name worldwide to Linspire.
Linspire has championed an easy to use system for desktops and laptop computers and has signed on popular retailers both offline and online including Walmart.com, TigerDirect, Frys and MicroCenter. Linspire is based on Debian with a KDE interface. Linspire is most distinguished by CNR, a one click software download and installation system which also provides updates. In 2005, Robertson stepped down as CEO in favor of Kevin Carmony, who would later leave the company and accuse Robertson of various acts of malfeasance (see related entry below.) Robertson remains Chairman of Linspire's board.
SIPphone
In 2003 Robertson founded SIPphone, which itself has seen legal action, filing suit against Vonage for false and misleading advertising including 'not disclosing the lock the company places on certain pieces of hardware'. Many view this latest suit as a publicity stunt, although Vonage later settled by altering their packaging and advertising to address the issues in the lawsuit. In addition to selling phone adapters and routers, SIPphone develops free VOIP software to compete with Skype based on the SIP standard called Gizmo, which is available on a variety of platforms.
MP3tunes
In February 2005, Robertson launched MP3tunes.com, which sells downloadable music. Robertson boasts that, unlike Apple Computer's iTunes Music Store and most other competitors, MP3tunes does not use digital rights management technology to limit the use of songs its customers purchase. MP3tunes also provides Oboe, a digital music back-up service.
Ajax 13
Founded in early 2006 by Michael Robertson (CEO) and Hisham El-Emam (CTO), Ajax 13 Inc. is a software development company that provides web-based applications written using XUL. It was started to pursue the software-as-a-service vision that is gaining momentum in both the enterprise and small business / home office marketplaces. Among the Ajax 13 products is ajaxWrite, a web-based word processor.
Education and personal life
He earned a bachelor's degree in Cognitive Science from the University of California, San Diego, where he studied under Donald Norman and interned at the nearby San Diego Supercomputer Center.
Michael lives in San Diego, California. His reported wealth has varied widely, but he has been on the Forbes 400 list once and twice on the Fortune 40 under 40, most recently in 2004.
Robertson self-identifies as a libertarian.[5]
The Kevin Carmony "Whistle Blower" Controversy
On April 11, 2008, former Linspire CEO Kevin Carmony issued a collection of serious accusations against Michael Robertson via Carmony's personal blog.<ref>[1]
Carmony's public accusations specify allegations that Michael Robertson/Linspire "has attempted to defraud a federally-insured bank, filed false documents with the IRS, knowingly filed a false report with the San Diego Police Department, and perpetrated deceit upon other federal and state government agencies." In the course of the blog, Carmony hints that he will be releasing a "Fact Sheet" containing further allegations and additional details in a manner similar to a previous fact sheet issued by Michael Robertson as an attack on Bill Gates. Carmony's position regarding a copyright infringement action filed by major record label EMI against Robertson and his MP3 Tunes company, which operates mp3tunes.com and sideload.com, remains unannounced.<ref>http://blog.wired.com/music/2007/11/michael-roberts.html]
Cited References
References
- MP3.com Goes Major Labels League by Brad King of Wired News (July 20, 2001)