They sound defensive. That's probably a good thing.
Can someone explain how Microsoft's S+M proposal differs and how well it would work in the real world with proxies, firewalls, NAT etc? (I'm being lazy and haven't read the paper)
The biggest difference between SPDY and Microsoft's proposal is that Microsoft's proposal is only theory at this point. The SPDY proposal has dozens of independent implementations behind it and 3 years of operational experience.
I'm not trying to dis the proposal; just point out that it is in its infancy. To jump start it, Microsoft started with SPDY at its core, but changed the syntax.
Can someone explain how Microsoft's S+M proposal differs and how well it would work in the real world with proxies, firewalls, NAT etc? (I'm being lazy and haven't read the paper)