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Last session there was a bill, the Artists' Contribution to American Heritage Act, that would have allowed the picture painting scenario you describe, see Sen. Leahy's letter. It seems likely that it would have applied to software but its not clear how it would be applied to Open Source software because it is unclear how to appraise Open Source software. See the thread on the Union for the Public Domain's mailing list.

In the discussion, according to RMS companies (not individuals) can already claim a credit for donations of proprietary software to FSF (which would presumably "free" it) or other such organization, but that he was not aware of any such situation where that had occured. It would surprise me if no companies would take advantage of this as companies like IBM are donating copyrights on code to FSF. I believe that patches to GCC must have copyright assigned to FSF.

The bill didn't pass, it will probably be reintroduced this session.

Of course, any discussion of taxes and free software would be incomplete w/o mentioning the Hacker Tax Credit.

Bartko

Jamie Love and the U.S. Consumer Project on Technology have done an outstanding job at http://www.cptech.org/ecom/jurisdiction/hague.html in keeping us informed about the Hague Conference on Private International Law. This page includes a reference to one mailing list on the subject, but you can also follow the news on another more general mailing list at http://lists.essential.org/mailman/listinfo/upd-di scuss .

Although it is true that /. readers are unusually well-informed on related issues, this Economist leader does make the important point that the U.S. government has deliberately sought to keep this accord secret from public discussion. Its quiet adoption might well mean an end-run around some freedoms on the Internet that many of us, including libertarians as well as liberals, technology experts as well as common consumers, ought to treasure and debate more openly.

Let's be realistic about this. Probably less than 1% of computer buyers realize that they have the option of buying a box without paying for a preinstalled OS. Heck, lots of Linux users don't realize they can buy a box without paying for a copy of Windoze that they'll just erase.

Can you even do this? This guy tried to get a computer without an operating system 2 1/2 years ago with no luck. Has the situation changed?

Perhaps this is little late ... but I can't resist answering his comments.

>>Would you buy hamburgers from McDonalds if the
>>company also sold crack

>Could you stop them if they did? And would the
>other 90% of sheeple in America continue to buy
>McDonalds b/c they cant read/dont care? Would
>you let these same people set the co-ordinates
>on the Space Shuttle???? no - why should we just
>let the sheeple-mob steer us all into oblivion?

You touch upon a very interesting point. You are basically saying that you don't trust the people. If you can't trust your fellow citizens, whom are you going to trust? And at the same time you are saying that "90% of sheeple in America can't read/don't care?" you are asking for "business to come to town-hall style meetings and be accountable to the public". The same public that can't read and doesn't care?

>>Shell now has a human right commissioner and
>>most ads from that company state how nice the
>>company is to the environment and to it's worker

>Are you on drugs? So they put some asshole in a
>title and shove propaganda down your throat and
>you think all is well? You think they have
changed one fucking bit?

Well, Amnesty International does think Shell is trying to improve. From an Amnesty International report on Nigeria:
"In its approaches in recent years to Shell and other transnational companies [other oil companies] with significant investments in Nigeria, Amnesty International has appealed to them to acknowledge their responsibility to do all they can to uphold human rights under the UDHR. Only Shell has done so to date."
Shell was heavily attacked for their stance in Nigeria so it is understandable that they have responded to those concerns. When your stock price begins to fall because of your human rights record you have to do something.
And Amnesty International is not the only NGO that thinks Shell is trying to improve it's human rights record. Urmi Shah of Human Rights Watch believes Shell is moving in the right direction on the human rights front.

>Would you buy hamburgers from McDonalds
>if the company also sold crack
>>Could you stop them if they did?
Yes, I could stop them, with little help from the "sheeple-mob". The campaign against Shell was pretty effective. So was the campaign against Nike for employing children in it's factories. And so was the campaign against soccer ball producers in Pakistan.

>>A corporation is a body, formed by people, that
>> is authorized by law to act as a single person

>When thousands of people act on behalf of a
> corporation it is no one person who is acting
> 'evil or bad'. The problem lies in the motivations,
> what people are forced to do to feed themselves.
> They are compeled to act on the corporations
> behalf to further its interests. There is no debate
> what the 'interests' of the corporation are: profit.
> Always.

Correct, the objective of every corporation is profit, the more profit, the better. But do you have a better system? Do you want all the corporations to be owned by the government, or perhaps you have even better solution? Besides, every society has rules to control the behavior of both people and corporations. Perhaps you will just say that corporations will bend the rules and bribe the governments. If you really think so, then please tell that to all the corporations that have had their actions blocked for some reason by the European Union :)

>The worlds transnationals are all alike
> - what the hell are you thinking? There
>are none that I would consider moral and
> just. Literally zero. Besides, capatalism
> ends in collusive monopolistic mega-corps
> all acting to preserve there collective best
> interests. They will collectively oppose
> anything that may force them to become
> accountable and responsible.... I suppose
> youve never heard of RIAA/MPAA?

Yes, I have heard of RIAA/MPAA. In fact I've been following the copyright and fair rights issues for a quite a while.
Even though I don't agree with RIAA/MPAA I don't find them immoral and evil. I do in fact believe there are quite a few good multinational companies. What do you have against IBM, HP, Oracle, Volvo, Compaq, Lucent, Dell, Xerox, Fedex, Kodak, Cisco to name a few?
You may disagree with them on some issues and their products may be trash. But to say those companies are immoral is just not correct. Heck, even Microsoft has done a lot for humanity, even though Windows is crap and they are a monopoly.
Besides, most companies today are accountable to the public. They have to comply with laws in America and EU and they have to answer for their wrongdoings in the media and before shareholders meetings. And Ford has certainly suffered because of the Firestone incident. And so has Shell because of their Nigeria incident.

>>>The internet is being dismantled by people
>>> who want to stop paying anything to
>>> produce any content but make you pay
>>>everytime you access the same old content,
>>>over and over, because its gravy, all gravy.

> you didnt address his point: That big business
> will simply change/buy laws to extend copyright
> so they dont have to create new content...
>and force everyone who does out of business...

This comment is quite ridiculous. Media companies make the most money from new or recent content. Do you see Disney, WB, Paramount, etc. trying to sell their many excellent old movies. No, you don't; instead you see them marketing their new and terrible movies every single year. I don't even see book publishers heavily marketing their old books, and I don't expect to see this change in the coming years. This phenomena hasn't changed yet, even when at the same time copyrights has been extended from 25 to more than 90 years today. Do you really think media companies will suddenly begin to market their old warez just because the copyright will be extended even further?
Media companies don't even have that immense clout. They are being attacked heavily by Congress and many NGOs for violence in their movies and TV shows (perhaps you agree with those attacks?). And do you really think the media companies, with perhaps 100 billions in total revenues, have more influence on the government and congress than the much bigger computer industry [or any big industry for that matter]? The computer industry isn't that successful in it's campaigns for more visas for foreign workers and for less export regulations for encryption.

>Big American Corporations have WAY to much
>power and WAY too little public accountability.
>I dont want to 'vote with my dollars' - this simply
>allows them to predicate their 'money is the only
>thing that matters' system - fuck that: I want
>business to come to town-hall style meetings
>and be accountable to the public, you dont
>satisfy the public - your out of business (or
>something similar, I may not have the right
>mechanism - but you get the idea...)

Perhaps you are right, maybe corporations do have too much power. If you want to fix that, the right place to start is with campaign financing reform, just like John McCain is asking for.
But your town hall solution is pretty weak as you have yourself pointed out (90% of Americans are "sheeple-mob").
And using your logic ("you dont >satisfy the public - your out of business") media companies that produce material that the public doesn't like (Hustler, Nazi books, communist books, etc.) would go out of business. I'm pretty sure no movie company would have dared to produce a movie like Natural Born Killers or Lolita because every town hall meeting would have found those movies to be immoral.

Try to come up with a better logic next time.

Now, let's address your concerns.

The major political systems here and abroad, are republican systems parliementary systems or monarchic. These are all more alike than not. (If you have to RUN for office or STAND for it or get knighted for it, its still the same. Its NOT democratic. Get that foolishness right out of your head.)

And I suppose you have a solution to this problem? You don't? - I then suggest you read this article.

Corporations will justify anything for the bottom line. Corporations have absolutely no morals, no conscience and neither heart nor head. They don't care, they really DON'T CARE about how many people get killed, maimed and ruined by their corporate lack of conscience.
Let's begin by checking what a corporation is. A corporation is a body, formed by people, that is authorized by law to act as a single person. So a corporation is basically a group of people. If those people are immoral then the corporation will be immoral and vice-versa. Many of our fellow residents of Earth are immoral and evil, but I don't believe the majority of shareholders of big companies is evil.
Let's, however, assume that the owners and executives of a given company are immoral (evil?) and don't care if people get killed etc. Who are going to stop this big bad company? The consumers, of course! You must remember that you, the consumer, also have responsibility. If you buy products made by company you find evil, then it is your duty to stop buying products from that company. This strategy has worked pretty well over the years. Nike, for example, has improved the working conditions in it's factories because of public outcry. Shell now has a human right commissioner and most ads from that company state how nice the company is to the environment and to it's worker, just because of a "little incident" in Nigeria.

Corporationism can readily weigh profits versus the volume of lawsuits resulting from injuries caused by the products of shoddy workmanship.
Some corporations do this. If you don't like it, don't buy products from that company again and get your friends and family to do the same. Show that you care.

Corporationism can readily sell crack to kids while forcing them to fuck for food and shove me and thee to wage-slave jobs in the "maquiadoras" by rationalizing that they are merely "filling a need."
I don't know where you heard this. Selling crack to kids is illegal, no matter if you are a corporation or an individual. And I don't see much difference in an individual selling crack and a corporation selling crack. At least, the same company would have a hard time breaking into other markets than the "crack market" because of public opposition. Would you buy hamburgers from Mc'Donalds if the company also sold crack?

The internet is being dismantled by people who want to stop paying anything to produce any content but make you pay everytime you access the same old content, over and over, because its gravy, all gravy.
Now, I don't think all the free content on the Net will just disappear just because some corporations will decide to charge for content.

One word: Why?

Some future stories on Slashdot:

• Identifying your Wall Warts
  Posted by Hemos on Sat 18 Nov 02:07PM
  from the that's-dymo-nite! dept.
  LeetSkeeter wrote, "This helpful article that shows us one solution to the age-old question: how to deobfuscate those wall-wart[?] power adapters." I use those new gel pens in flourescent colors, too.

• Better Case Air Circulation
  Posted by michael on Sat 18 Nov 01:07PM
  from the vacuum-kewled dept.
  ThinkGeek is working with a leading vendor of high-powered turbine systems to get co-branding. Can you imagine the little BSD mascot on one of these? Overclockers, read on.

• Ask Slashdot: Too Many Fluff Postings?
  Posted by timothy on Sat 18 Nov 01:07PM
  from the running-gnu-lint-on-it dept.
  DustBunny writes, "What's the right balance between meaningless stories and trivia? Everyone says that Slashdot's been going downhill, but I don't think so. I think it's just that more people notice how low it's always been. Come on, when's the next Tenchi Muyo DVD that we're supposed to boycott?" [update by timothy]: We got a cease and desist from ZD News... apparently they have the inside on puff journalism.

Face it, despite the ravings of Browne and Nader, our children will grow up in an America that's largely controlled by corporations.

Check out some of Nader's "ravings" here, including the damning truth about ZapMe (Commercial Alert is a group founded by Nader).

This is one way in which Nader differs from the two major presidential candidates. All of them see a decline in the childhood experience, but the Bush/Gore response is to censor or rate film, television and the internet. In contrast, Nader's solutions prevent the over-commercialization of schools. Whereas Bush and Gore propose mandatory internet filters in schools and libraries, Nader wants to eliminate Channel One, ZapMe, exclusive soft drink contracts with schools, etc.

America was founded by corporations (Hudson BAy Company, anyone), and corporations have caused America to become the great place it is, do you remember "What's good for General Motors is good for America."

ZapMe will not contribute to anyone's future greatness. The junk products peddled by ZapMe and their destructive advertising strategies do not add overall value to America or anywhere else.

I know of no way to resolve this dilemma

I know how you can resolve it. Vote for Nader.

Like yourself, I also hated politics. I also poo-pooed "Go Vote" campaigns since people who aren't motivated by the issues shouldn't dilute the power of people who are. Even the more literate people must cope with tabloid media and conveniently homogenized analysis, boring debates, the electoral college system, useless television ads, and lack of good choices on the ballot.

Nader was the first politician that ever inspired me to vote. He is the most promising choice to reform the campaign process. If president, expect him to lower the cost of campigns (partly by closing the soft money loophole), thereby eliminating many of those "persausive" TV ads that you see. He also has a few proposals for putting more government-related information online (so you can check out your congressman's record instead of relying on his own commercials).

Even if Nader isn't elected, voting for him can only help. It tells the major parties to get a candidate who will discuss solutions to tough problems rather than blabber conveniently ambiguous propoganda to the most impressionable audience that he can find on television.

1 quick google search later, it appears that the ruling wasn't quite as broad as I had thought it was; it relates mostly to first amendment (free speech) and the 14th amendment.

The link I found is from May 1998 and is here./p&g t;

What's Nader out ranting about -- he's out there complaining that Hollywood is marketing violent video games and movies to kids, and should be punished. Oh yeah, that's something we've never heard from the Republicans and Democrats.

Actually, Nader emphasizes the over-commercialization of the childhood experience. While the Republocrats are distracted by smut in movies, Nader realizes the potential harm of the ad barrage directed at children, intended to hook them on Pepsi and Snickers for a lifetime. Saturday morning ads mock grown-ups and undermine parantel authority, encouraging children to whine and beg for the new toy which they just can't do without (at the expense of being cool). Advertising in schools (e.g. Channel One) is another nasty beast. Look at Commercial Alert to see why this ad barrage is a bad thing that causes real harm. Of course, the Republocrats won't criticize advertising, because it is the real source of their power (the cost of ads drives up campaign costs, ensuring that only Republocrats have enough money to gain the presidency). Entertainment is one of the major money contributors to the Duopoly, so it's not suprising that Republocrats are conveniently distracted by some trivial legislation while avoiding the real issue.

Why don't you pick on the computer industry and start doing some muckraking on the extremely low quality of commercial software?

Actually, Nader is doing just that--one of his latest projects is Appraising Microsoft; their appraisal has been mostly negative, and that includes the quality of MS software, or rather the lack thereof. Nader's web site, Essential Information, covers a lot of areas, but rear-engined cars aren't among them. As for the Corvair, Nader happened to be right--I almost died in a Corvair spin-out. But that's ancient history; do you also still bemoan the South's failure to win an immediate victory in the US Civil War?

Unless you are mentally retarded and didn't understand what you were doing, $murder == $death

But Texas also executes the mentally retarded. See Penry v Lynaugh. And not just Texas, mind you. Between 1976 and February of 1998, 34 mentally retarded people were executed, five being in Texas.

• Electronic Content and Civilization's Discontent (1994)
• Fighting some of Slashdot's battles in 1996 by opposing some WIPO treaties
  

• 
  Some AT&T corporate PR outlining a few of the Library's Digital initiatives
• Remember when the GAO told him he wasn't authorised to disburse or use funds given by foreign libraries in cooperative projects?

• Withdrawing a travelling show of slavery-era photographs
  

__________

Take taxes from you?

Like the Microsoft Tax?

Start wars?

You mean like Hearst, and the Spanish-American War?

Engage in gross acts of waste?

You mean like logging the Amazon rainforests?

And these aren't the only examples, by any means. You sound awfully naive about corporate power.

-Isaac

I hate to burst everybody's bubble, but there has been at least one study done positively linking cell phones to brain cancer and malfunctioning pacemakers. Read this article, which comes from a really good listserv on corporate misdeeds.

I hate to burst everybody's bubble, but there has been at least one study done positively linking cell phones to brain cancer and malfunctioning pacemakers. Read this article, which comes from a really good listserv on corporate misdeeds.

Erm, they probably still do -- in numbers, and in ruthlessness. They normally don't allow one to, say, appeal for 10+ years if they decide to shoot you; and celebrity fan appeals don't mean squat -- as they shouldn't. For instance, according to the "Death Penalty Information Center", an anti-DP site, the total number of executions in the US from 1976 to 1998 reached 500. That's 22 *years*. See their report for details... that's a vastly lower per-capita rate.

Remember that this is a country which essentially celebrated the UN Anti-Drug Day by executing narcotics traffickers. Life has a significantly lower value there.

Sorry, that wasn't "Less than a year ago". That was 4 years ago.

You are incorrect. This survey is dated June 3, 1998. It wasn't until a few months after that that there was any breaking of ranks in the OEMs.

Any OEM was perfectly free to sell any OS they wanted to, they just couldn't sell it on the same model computer that a windows OS was on.

That's an incredibly naive statement. Microsoft switched to using per model licensing rather than per-processor licensing to get around the consent decree. It didn't have any effect on OEMs. They were still faced with the same prospects they'd had all along. The DOJ failed to help their situation. Sure, technically they could ship another OS just by slapping a new nameplate on a box. In reality, that wouldn't please Microsoft and therefore was not done for fear of having Windows prices jacked up or having their Windows license revoked. That's why the consent decree is considered to be a complete failure.

Some good stuff on that site, well worth looking at.

A quick introduction to Soft Tempest (in HTML, Anderson seems to like PDF) can be found here. It's particularly interesting how the project was started:

Microsoft's recent $20 million donation to Cambridge University was accompanied by a request for research into technologies that would prevent users from illegally copying Microsoft's software products. ... this involved the development of a technology that would permit Microsoft or other software vendors to identify unauthorized uses of software simply by driving surveillance vehicles near places where software was used, which could monitor faint radio signals from computers.

mochaone wrote:

So let me get this straight. I'm supposed to gather evidence to support my suppositions, yet you are allowed to postulate as to what Judge Jackson is going to do?

No, you were postulating about what the appeals court would do, and I asked for some evidence for your postulations. I too was postulating, and in spite of your sarcastic tone, I will take your statements as a request for evidence on my part.

You seem to be questioning two points of mine: I expect the findings of fact will probably declare Microsoft to be a monopoly, and not suggest anything as to remidies, which is really two points: I expect the findings will declare monopoly, and I expect they won't suggest remedies at this point. The other point is A slap on the wrist would hasten the death of the proprietary software industry, because Microsoft would continue to kill it.

First, I expect the findings of fact to declare Microsoft a monopoly because that is far from controvertial. The rule of thumb is a company is a monopoly if it has more than a 70% market share, Microsoft has a 90% market share. The controversy is over whether or not Microsoft used its Monopoly powers illegally, and I did not speculate on what Jackson would find there.

I expect the findings of fact to suggest no remedies because there is no other reason for Judge Jackson to split the findings of fact from the Judgement. Microsoft asserted that they will appeal any negative judgement very early in the trial. The purpose of separating the judgement from the findings of fact is to shield the facts of the case (which are harder to appeal) from being dragged through the mud during the appeal of the judgement. Suggesting remedies during the findings of fact would defeat the purpose.

Lastly, as for Microsoft killing the proprietary software industry, here is some good material to support my opinion:
Caldera v Microsoft Complaint
Reiser v Microsoft on allegedly illegal product tying
A Rutgers University analysis of Microsoft's use of predatory pricing to destroy competitors
A Reuters Article describing Microsoft's pressure on Acer to not sell competitors applications

In all, Microsoft is clearly trying to encompass as much of the industry as they can get away with, and kill any competitors that stand in their way. If they're the only provider of proprietary software, it's no longer an industry, hence they would have killed the industry. Personally, I don't think it's a great loss, since Microsoft is a big fish, eating all the little fishes (other proprietary vendors), while the rest of us are learning to farm kelp (Free software).

Hmm...I guess since you're saying it, "evidence" isn't needed to prove your point?
No, I was saying evidence was needed to prove your point. As you can see above, there's lots of evidence to support my point.

PS: I was completely baffled by your talk of movies and heads. What were you trying to say there?

----

Here's Jamie Love, who seems to be the main person from Ralph Nader's organisation driving discussion of Microsoft, announcing that he's created The Unofficial and unauthorized: Brett Glass is unhappy with the GNU General Public License (GPL) page. The discussion that follows is enlightening. To my knowledge, Brett never *did* create his own page representing his arguments.
--

Be warned when reading this that Brett Glass is obsessively, fanatically opposed to the GPL. He used to be on the am-info ("Appraising Microsoft") mailing list, but he would turn every thread into a thread about the evils of the GPL and it became impossible to discuss anything else because everyone was talking about the absurd claims he was making.

Eventually I publically aired the suggestion that we ask the administrator to remove him from the list; he was removed a couple of weeks later, and the list returned to usefulness.

It's a pity, because he's clearly an intelligent and insightful thinker, but his crusade against the GPL is simply beyond all reason.
--

Another two D.C. 'government related' sites, (i.e. somewhat political), are that of the Consumer Project On Technology, (http://www.cmptech.org), and Essential Information, (http://www.essential.org). These are the people that brought us the Appraising Microsoft conferences, which in part helped spawn the current DOJ antitrust suit against MS.

Nice to know both sites run Linux with Apache.

executions are more expensive due to the legal process and the number of appeals.

"It is true that lengthier sentences can add to the costs of imprisonment. But as a replacement for the death penalty, even a sentence of life without parole would not add significantly to the prison population, and would, in fact, be cheaper than the prolonged litigation associated with a death sentence." http://www.essential.org/dpic/dpic.r07. html

Killing mentally ill people is a classic in the USA. But there are even more compelling cases, see for instance the careful www.essential.org/dpic/index.html ("Other Cases of Possible Innocence"), or http://members.tripod.com/~Boycott/Execution.html, or follow links starting from http://www.uaa.alaska.edu/just/deat h/index.html.

Two possible cases of innocents in the death row, from these sites, are Jimmy Dennis and Charles Raby. There are others (an average of 4 people are freed from death row every year, for they are innoncent).

I'm sorry. I find your argument somewhat shallow and obtuse. Saying that Bill Gates is a businessman hardly excuses him for violating federal anti-trust laws, no matter how vague you might think they are. I'll leave it to those more knowledgable of the law to argue the issue. Here's a couple of links which put Microsoft's actions in perspective of the law.

• ProCompetition
• Daily Wrap and Flow
• Consumer Project on Technology

May I give you one rhetorical question to ponder?

If Windows were really the most technically advanced and innovative operating system on the planet, would Microsoft be in court against the DOJ at this time? Somehow, I doubt it.

It's the fact that monopolies stifle innovation as well as competition which has brought these issues to the forefront. This is why Microsoft has to resort to proprietorization of protocols--what Bill Gates calls innovation--to assure that their monopoly survives. See the oft-quoted Halloween Document for clear evidence of Microsoft intentions. See any account of the Sun/Java Case for an example where Microsoft exercised these proprietorization techniques.

I find the DOJ evidence against Microsoft compelling. Even Microsoft's own defense was a great embarassment. Don't take my word for it. Look for yourself. There are sufficient sites on the Web covering the trial. Check out CNN, ZDNet, Business Week, InfoWorld, etc.

Bork 'em, Danno.

Arne W. Flones Long Ship Software

Pay no mind to the chaos you are seeing. It is merely the shifting of paradigms.

In responding to a FOIA request submitted by Corsearch in 1996 requesting a copy of the domain name database (NSF FOIA No. 96-090 Request), the NSF claimed (NSF FOIA No. 96-090 Response):

"NSF does not possess or control the domain name database ..."

An administrative appeal of this decision was made (NSF FOIA No. 96-090 Appeal). This appeal was rejected. The words "possess" and "control" are being used here in the context of the Freedom of Information Act to determine if the database is an "agency record", and not in respect of claims to ownership of intellectual property. These are the same terms used in the FLITE case (Baizer v. Department of the Air Force, 887 F. Supp. 225 (N.D. Cal. 1995). The FLITE decision has been criticized for its "broad assertion of an exemption from FOIA for 'library' materials, and its questionable use of legal precedent" ( Supreme Court Decisions in FLITE database, Information Policy Notes, Taxpayers Assets Project). The Flite decision draws upon the Supreme Court decision in Department of Justice v. Tax Analysts, 492 US 136 (1989).

So, the NSF has the right to obtain a copy of the database from Network Solutions, but because the NSF has not chosen to obtain the database, it is not possible to obtain the database from the NSF under the FOIA. And even if the NSF did have a copy of the database, it is not clear, in the light of the FLITE decision, whether the NSF would be required to make the database available under the FOIA.

Although the death star reference may make it seem like Microsoft, I have yet to receive any trouble from them over kmfms.com. I've been unable to get into Segfault to try and figure out exactly what they could have said to miff MS off, but I doubt they would target parodies before going after places like yamoo or the excellent CPT's Microsoft Antitrust Page which are far more direct in their criticism.

[Microsoft] corporate spokesman Adam Sohn [said] "OEMs are completely free today to ship any OS they choose. There is no provision in any of our contracts telling OEMs they can't ship something else"

Another couple of knee-slappers:

Sohn added that Microsoft has no plans to orchestrate a counter-demonstration emphasizing customers' "high satisfaction" with Windows.

Also got a chuckle out of:

He also said Microsoft has no plans to discuss formally with OEMs potential ramifications from a Windows Refund protest.

Sheesh. And to think that at one point in the distant past I actually liked Microsoft!

--
ChipR without a cookie at the moment