This man seem to have begun a flamewar.
Microsoft has OS patents; Linux has none
,----[ Quote ]
| The days of kumbaya, where vendors are locked arm in arm singing
| open-source love songs to "grow the market" through co-opetition
| are over.
`----
http://news.com.com/2010-7344_3-6140341.html?part=rss&tag=2547-1_3-0-20&subj=news
Related:
Big businesses boast of patent benefits, for small businesses
,----[ Quote ]
| A report published by an EU task force on intellectual property claims
| that small businesses benefit from a patent system, despite lacking
| almost any participation by the small business community.
|
| Instead, the report, titled IPR (intellectual property rights) for
| competitiveness and innovation, was written up almost entirely by
| large corporations and the patent industry.
|
| [...]
|
| The report does note objections from the likes of patentfrei.de and
| Sun Microsystems, which were recorded at some length in the report.
| But this does not appear to have impacted the conclusion of the
| report in any way
|
| [...]
|
| Jean-Pierre Laisne, of ObjectWeb, an open source software community,
| said that he found the report useless: participants were told that
| all their contributions would be recorded but at the end only
| those of Business Software Alliance and Microsoft were used.
`----
http://www.pcpro.co.uk/news/99155/big-businesses-boast-of-patent-benefits-for-small-businesses.html
Other cases where Microsoft /et al/ take over key 'reports' and government
decisions.
MA Governor-Elect Names MS Anti-ODF Lobbyist to Technology Advisory Group
,----[ Quote ]
| That person is Brian Burke, the Microsoft Regional Director for Public
| Affairs, and if that surprises you, it surprises me as well, given the
| degree of acrimonious debate and disinformation witnessed in Massachusetts
| over the last 15 months involving the Information Technology Division's
| transition to ODF.... it is my understanding that it was Burke who led
| the lobbying effort on Beacon Hill against ODF, and also urged legislators
| to introduce the amendment intended to take away much of the ITD's
| planning power generally, and as regards standards specifically, and hand
| it to a task force made up of political appointees.... Although I'm told
| that Burke announced yesterday at the first meeting of the new working
| group that he will be participating as a private citizen rather than a
| Microsoft employee, I believe that Burke should recuse himself from
| participating in any discussions or recommendations relating to
| document format standards.
`----
http://www.consortiuminfo.org/standardsblog/article.php?story=20061128161343183
Changing the Report, After the Vote
,----[ Quote ]
| That agreement was nearly imperiled last weekend, though. Gerri
| Elliott, corporate vice president at Microsoft's Worldwide Public
| Sector division, sent an e-mail message to fellow commissioners
| Friday evening saying that she "vigorously" objected to a paragraph
| in which the panel embraced and encouraged the development of open
| source software and open content projects in higher education.
`----
http://insidehighered.com/news/2006/09/01/commission
A new Microsoft-commissioned anti-Linux study debuts
,----[ Quote ]
| Microsoft seemingly has backed off from trumpeting its "Get the
| Facts" studies, as of late. But that doesn't mean the company has
| ceased commissioning research outfits to perform its anti-Linux dirty
| work.
|
| On September 25, Mercer Management Consulting released a new
| Microsoft-backed study. The study is entitled "Driving Lower TCO and
| Rapid ROI through UNIX Migrations." The synopsis: "Microsoft Windows
| the preferred choice for UNIX migration when IT organizations migrate
| servers as part of a focused effort to improve business processes,
| deploy critical applications or restructure their IT architecture."
`----
http://blogs.zdnet.com/microsoft/index.php?p=12
,----[ Quote ]
| This is something Microsoft must know is coming, which is why it is
| trying to discredit any existing efforts to deploy Linux in schools,
| like ACCESS. Fortunately in this case, we don't have to buy what
| they are trying to sell.
`----
http://www.linuxtoday.com/it_management/2006120102126OPMRPB
Study: open source needs official support; Lobbyist
disagrees with "flawed" conclusions
,----[ Quote ]
| The study, commissioned by the European Commission, Directorate
| General Enterprise and Industry, is but a small part of the larger
| FLOSSPOLS project that aims to keep the EU a leader in global
| development of open source software.
|
| [...]
|
| Now, the ISC is widely regarded as a shill for Microsoft, although
| the member list also includes companies like Intel, Autodesk, and
| RSA Security (now an EMC subsidiary). The 300-strong member list is
| mostly padded with lesser lights such as Yapi ve Kredi Bankasi(
| Turkey), ThreeSixtyDegreez (Pakistan), and Datoprogrammu Apgads
| (Latvia). The institute pushes hard for the right to patent
| software, alongside regular bashings of open source businesses.
`----
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20061017-8011.html
Report Says Nonprofits Sold Influence to Abramoff
,----[ Quote ]
| E-mails released by the committee show that Abramoff, often
| with the knowledge of the groups' leaders, exploited the tax-exempt
| status and leveraged the stature of the organizations to build
| support among conservatives for legislation or government action
| sought by clients including Microsoft Corp., mutual fund company
| DH2 Inc., Primedia Inc.'s Channel One Network, and Brown-Forman,
| maker of Jack Daniel's whiskey.
`----
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/10/12/AR2006101200889.html
http://tinyurl.com/y2rbpu
Open Source Foes In Bed With Abramoff
http://politics.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/10/12/2036223&from=rss
,----[ Quote ]
| Long before it employed bloggers to do the job for it, Microsoft hired
| sympathetic members of the public to make its case in online forums,
| posing as disinterested citizens. Things got much more professional as
| the antitrust trial unfurled. After hiring DCI in the late 1990s,
| Microsoft created two new trade groups, the Association for Competitive
| Technology (ACT), and the Americans for Technology Leadership (ALT),
| and marshaled campaigns such as "Freedom to Innovate" - encouraging
| Windows users the chance to make spontaneous gestures of support for
| Chairman Bill.
|
| These weren't always too successful. A campaign in 2001 to petition 17
| state's Attorney Generals - who had pooled resources to bring their
| own antitrust action against Microsoft - resulted in supportive letters
| being written by dead people.
|
| And the astroturf taint continues today.
|
| Most recently, a spoof video portraying Al Gore as a Penguin was reported
| to have originated from a computer registered to the DCI Group, although
| the lobby group said it did not fund or approve the video.
`----
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2006/09/14/google_lobby/
|
|
