Posted by
ryuzaki0
on from the isn't-it-ironic-dontcha-think dept.
rm-r writes: "The BBC is running a story here about Microsoft hiring Ralph Reed, one of George W. Bush's senior consultants and a big figure in the Christian Coalition, to lobby against their anti-trust case." Think MS knows that many people consider them the Great Satan??
But Ralph Reed IS.
by
Anonymous Coward
·
· Score: 5
Ralph Reed and his ilk are, in the words of John McCain, evil. They preach a peculiarly nasty strain of evangelical fundamentalism, one that would have Americans sniping Slepians and crucifying Shepards. While Bill Gates may have gotten a bad rap, cozying up to nutcases like Ralph Reed doesn't help.
Umm... can you give me an example of a software company that doesn't play hardball like MS?
Software companies, just like any other type, are free to play hardball if they want, unless they are a monopoly, at which point they play by a different set of rules. There is good reason for this. The US, more than any other nation I can think of, demands that its companies compete. Many other nations are much more protective of their "champion" corporations. They do what they can to shield them from competition. That's one reason why our economy is so strong and we are a major center of innovation. We don't let our corporations get so fat and happy that they lose their edge, or at least if they do get that way, we don't try to protect them from the consequences (usually, although there have been some significant exceptions where corps have been bailed out by the government).
Microsoft has a monopoly on desktop operating systems. While that is not illegal, it is not considered to be beneficial to competition or our economy in general. That is why we have anti-trust laws. Under those laws, Microsoft is not allowed to use its monopoly power to prevent competitors from entering and competing in that market. They are not allowed to create artificial barriers to entry. They are not allowed to leverage their monopoly in one market to try to dominate another market. They are not allowed to "play hardball" like non-monopoly companies. This is for the good of competition. We assume that competition is good for innovation and for consumers because it helps produce the best products at the best prices.
I'd suggest that a new set of rules was in order, but govt. restraint of the software industry will only slow the economy and the progress of technology.
I don't see how people can go throwing these kinds of assumptions around when history shows us exactly the opposite. Go read this article and get back to me. It's not specifically about Microsoft, or even anti-trust in general. It's about open access to infrastructure, namely phone and cable networks, but it does help to illustrate why regulation is often the best way to keep innovation alive rather than leaving it up to a single corp or handful of corps. We make the rules based on what serves the country best, not what serves the big corporations best. These corporations have no deity-given rights to protection from our government. We decided to give them certain protections and privileges, but it is done on our terms. The terms that serve the country. Now, it hasn't always worked, but we've gotten this far and we're doing better than most. I don't think that anti-trust laws or regulation in general should be chucked out the window just because people don't want to offend the country's biggest... err second biggest corporation. Yes they've been wildly successful. They also broke many laws to keep themselves on top and to get rid of the competition. That doesn't fly here, or at least it shouldn't. It remains to be seen whether Microsoft can buy a political fix for its legal problems.
Yet here we all are reading Slashdot, using an OS(Linux) we got for free that is eating at Microsofts share.
Saying that we shouldn't use Linux because its getting in the way of profits that should rightfully belong to Microsoft is like saying we should all stop breathing because nobody is getting rich even though we are consuming oxygen. Ok, so it's not exactly the same. The point is that if it can be made or had for free, or very cheaply, then it will be hard to make money on it. In this case, distributed effort has helped to produce a very good operating system that can be had for very little cost. Operating systems aren't the only products affected by this. Try selling ice to an eskimo sometime.
The best thing we could do to solve the MS problem is to ignore them.
Ignoring them would be foolish in the extreme. Doing so would simply allow them to build more and more artificial dependency into their products and raise the cost more and more for a company to switch to something else. If we stand idly by while Microsoft works even harder to achieve a stronger customer lock-in, we will end up losing a lot of ground. If Microsoft is allowed to own the standards, how can anyone else compete?
By going to the government and asking them to solve this, we are inviting the government in to regulate everything, including Linux and Open Source.
You talk like the DOJ is moving into new territory here or something. Anti-trust laws have been on the books for over 100 years. This is nothing new. It's not opening any new doors or creating any new type of regulation. They are simply enforcing the law. As I said before, the US bases its laws on the assumption that competition is good. Therefore, a lack of competition is bad, and attempting to use monopoly power to maintain that lack of competition is illegal.
-- It's not enough to bash in heads, you've got to bash in minds. - Captain Hammer
Re:MS is NOT Satan, nor is Mr Gates.
by
Danse
·
· Score: 5
You're partially right. Bill Gates is not Satan. He is merely a henchman of Satan. Satan wouldn't be caught dead with a haircut like that.
Seriously though, I don't know if there is really any point in separating attacks on his empire from attacks on him personally. It amounts to the same thing. He IS Microsoft. Sure, he has his minions to do the day-to-day stuff, but there is no doubt that he runs the show. I'll agree that it's overkill to call Microsoft evil in the traditional sense, but we are talking about a company that has been breaking the law, and is now trying to use its money and power to influence politicians to keep from being severely punished.
One could argue that any of us would likely try to fight back and change the law if we felt we were being unjustly prosecuted for something, but I certainly feel that if that were the case, I'd do it openly and try to make an argument that stands on its own merit rather than simply getting an exception made for me under the table. The problem is that Microsoft has tried several times to make a public argument, but they always twist the facts and leave out the parts that don't look so good in the light of day. That doesn't work in court though, so many of these facts were brought to light and, in the end, that's why they lost the case. The facts simply contradicted their arguments almost entirely.
-- It's not enough to bash in heads, you've got to bash in minds. - Captain Hammer
There is a very distinct line between criticising the Christian Coalition and criticising Christians in general. The Christian Coalition is an extremist, authoritarian group, hungry for power. It has an ends-justify-the-means mentality; its leaders are on record advocating anti-democratic measures when they think the press isn't watching. Their legislative agenda would turn the US into a fundamentalist theocracy, imposing their narrow, judgmental morality on everyone. If they had the power, there would be stonings of fornicators, sodomists and blasphemers in town squares.
Furthermore, they are not representative of all Christians, or even the majority. There are many Christians who are content to live out Christ's message of judge-not-lest-ye-should-be-judged and being generally decent to their fellow human beings without declaring holy war against those whose values don't match theirs. And if I remember correctly, Christ had something to say about the hypocrites who make a point of wearing their "righteousness" as a badge of pride.
I'm not a Christian myself, but I have the greatest respect for those who are and live a decent life, rather than using their Christianity as an excuse to hate or condemn those who don't share it. Unfortunately, that's what most of the Religious Right seem to do.
In addition to being a painstaking reporter, Tarbell was a moralist. She viewed anti-competitive practices as corrupting as well as unlawful. Here are a few of her comments on the intertwined oil and railroad industries -- as exciting, novel and wildly profitable in the early 1900s as computers and the Internet are now.
Success is sanctified. If all the country had suffered from these raids on competition had been the limiting of the business opportunity of a few hundred men and a constant higher price for refined oil, the case would be serious enough, but there is a more serious side to it. The ethical cost of all this is the deep concern. We are a commercial people. We cannot boast of our arts, our crafts, our cultivation; our boast is in the wealth we produce. As a consequence, business success is sanctified, and, practically, any methods which achieve it are justified by a larger and larger class. All sorts of subterfuges and sophistries and slurring over of facts are employed to explain aggregations of capital whose determining factor has been like that of the Standard Oil Company, special privileges obtained by persistent secret effort in opposition to the spirit of the law, the efforts of legislators, and the most outspoken public opinion.
Pretty applicable, eh? Especially considering it was written 100 years ago.
---
Interesting Details at NYtimes
by
Chris+Phillips
·
· Score: 5
It's traditional microsoft public relations tactics.
About hiring Reed, the nytimes writes- "Microsoft's aim, the company says, is to curry favor with the apparent Republican presidential nominee,"
To do this, Reeds's firm would do this- "A series of e-mail messages from John Pudner, senior project manager for Century Strategies, laid out a detailed plan by Mr. Reed's staff and his contractors to recruit senior Bush supporters from around the country in an effort to undermine the government's suit. The Bush supporters -- and the e-mail showed that Mr. Pudner isscreening them carefully to make sure they are influential within the campaign -- are being asked to write letters to Mr. Bush saying they believe the government's case is misguided, and that the American people oppose it."
They get $300 a letter. Classy.
More info at- http://www.nytimes.com/library/tech/00/04/biztec h/articles/11soft.html
On the good side, the man in charge of the committee that approves justice dept officials is Orrin Hatch, a big microsoft foe. The state atty generals are also involved with the case- GW can't just fire them.
A match made in heaven (pun intended)
by
Stiletto
·
· Score: 5
Ralph Reed gives Christians as much a bad name as Bill Gates gives computer enthusiasts. ________________________________
Nine months ago, GW was riding high in the polls and had a war chest several times the size of all his foes' combined. But after spending all that loot, he now enjoys bare parity with Al Gore in the polls. (He probably hopes Bill Gates doesn't give him more money to spend!)
Nine months ago, Bill Gates was riding high in the IT world, raking in the cash and laughing off Consent Decrees. But after blowing a huge wad of cash on lawyers, he is now the pariah of the IT world, viewed as an arrogant ass as well as a crook by anyone who followed the DOJ suit, and the traditionally pro-MS trade rags are openly questioning the sense of migrating to W2K.
Imagine what these two guys will accomplish if they pool their talents and resources.
Many people reading Slashdot, maybe. How many people in the normal population have this view, though? I'll give you a clue, it's somewhere in the single digits.
I used to completely agree to this. The public are sheep, I would say, and of COURSE they have no idea what's really going on. They love Microsoft due to ignorance. While that still holds true in many cases, I no longer think it universal. I have two observations to support this change in mind.
First off, have you seen the recent fuzzy-feeling Microsoft commercial? Bill Gates looks like he's in a kids' school computer lab. He talks about when he and is friends decided to harness the power of the home computer and make lives better for everyone. And he expresses his hope to have the freedom to inovate in the future. Its a nice public opinion piece. No products... unless you count positive public opinion of Microsoft as one. I feel that there's a good reason for this add to show up on primetime TV.
The reason is simple. The public is beginning to sour towards Microsoft.
Last year I told this story here but I'll go ahead and tell it again as it still applies...
I was sitting at my desk when someone in the office space behind me began loudly bitching about Microsoft. Was it a fellow Unix admin browsing Slashdot and having a go at some trendy MS bashing? Was it one of my NT admin friends who make their living from supporting one of the nation's largest Microsoft installations... but still grumble at various failings of the products?
No.
The loud complaints were being issued by a decisively non-technical budget analyst who had just lost her work to Windows instability. She stared at a blue screen blaming Microsoft for her woes.
Think about this for a minute. The point is subtle, but a major one. A year or so earlier, she probably would have blamed computers. But now its no longer computers that are at fault - it was the products from Microsoft that caused her grief.
The cracks in Microsoft's public relations wall are beginning to show. There's no flood of public outcry yet; you're just as likely to run in to people on the street who either do not care or don't know anything but Windows. You're always going to find people who very deturminely support Windows and Microsoft. But more and more, I'm finding people who hold Microsoft in a less favorable light.
The unfortunate truth is that "normal" people consider MicroSoft to be
gods. They see Bill's incredible success and marvel at it. They see the newest version of Windows and stand bug-eyed when they see their start menu fade in.
Maybe that's true in the US. Here in the UK there is (in my experience) considerable dissatisfaction with MS products. Maybe it's because of things like that unremovable "Network Neighborhood" icon which is the wrong spelling in this country, or perhaps it's things like the Word grammar checker having a go at you for using perfectly legitimate British English constructs. I imagine it's true that the further you get (culturally) from Seattle, the greater the proportion of people who see MS as menaces and not as gods.
Can Microsoft and the Christian Coalition be any MORE similar? They both have moral superiority complexes. They both have monopolies on their users, and chastise deviants. They both have deep pockets, big mouths, and puppets on Capitol Hill.
I wonder if Ralph will certify Microsoft products "Holiness Approved" and convince members to use only Microsoft products. With any luck Microsoft has just shot itself in the foot by alienating those will any sense left in them.
I swear when I read that I genuinely felt something cold and clammy run down my back....
Mind you it does seem that the minions of satan and those of heaven are teaming up.... might really signal the end of the world:-)
Microsoft hedges their political bets.
by
MattXVI
·
· Score: 5
Before anybody reads too much into the hiring of a GOP lobbyist, keep in mind that MS has hired Democrat lobbyists as well. Why doesn't that merit a story on Slashdot? The GOP controls both side of Capitol Hill, so it certainly makes sense to employ a big name GOP lobbysist if you are one of the biggest corporations in America.
It's interesting to note that Microsoft gives about the same amount of money to each party. Like most companies, they hedge their bets. This article has more details.
-- When I'm singing a ballad and a pair of underwear lands on my head, I hate that. It really kills the mood. -Tom Jones
So MS hires some big gun to clean its PR. How is this any different from what they are doing?
And what about this reference to Satan? MS is not satan! They may have stifled competition, thumbed their noses at Judges, bully OEMs, forced Go out of business, dumped Internet Explorer, write sneaky code to make compatible products incompatible, misrepresented their committment to OS/2... but they are not evil.
Think MS knows that many people consider them the Great Satan??
Many people reading Slashdot, maybe. How many people in the normal population have this view, though? I'll give you a clue, it's somewhere in the single digits.
The unfortunate truth is that "normal" people consider MicroSoft to be gods. They see Bill's incredible success and marvel at it. They see the newest version of Windows and stand bug-eyed when they see their start menu fade in.
My father was even saying how unfortunate it is that MS is even involved in the anti-trust case at all. Lets face it, the general population really doesn't know what's going on... not that they have to, though. Windows is good enough for their means, and it's relatively easy to use. As long as this holds true, their opinion of MS is not going to change, no matter what happens.
Oh boy this may very well turn out to be the battle of the century. *DING DING DING* In the this corner wereing the very very black trunks Microsoft and the Christian Colition... and in this corner in the red trucks the United States Government. That part that I'm confused about is, who is the one that is most evil? Microsoft, Christian Colition nutball, or our less then perfect Gov. ?
the 5 minutes you wait for windows to boot is supposed to be mandatory prayer time?
tcd004
Microsoft Just Bought G.W. Bush's Ear
by
Anomalous+Canard
·
· Score: 4
If they're smart, they won't bend it much until after the election. If GWB tries to make the Microsoft prosecution into an election issue, that is nothing but a loser for him. Anomalous: inconsistent with or deviating from what is usual, normal, or expected
-- Anomalous: deviating from what is usual, normal, or expected Canard: a false or unfounded repor
Slashdot Mirror
Ralph Reed and his ilk are, in the words of John
McCain, evil. They preach a peculiarly nasty
strain of evangelical fundamentalism, one that
would have Americans sniping Slepians and
crucifying Shepards. While Bill Gates may have
gotten a bad rap, cozying up to nutcases like
Ralph Reed doesn't help.
Umm... can you give me an example of a software company that doesn't play hardball like MS?
Software companies, just like any other type, are free to play hardball if they want, unless they are a monopoly, at which point they play by a different set of rules. There is good reason for this. The US, more than any other nation I can think of, demands that its companies compete. Many other nations are much more protective of their "champion" corporations. They do what they can to shield them from competition. That's one reason why our economy is so strong and we are a major center of innovation. We don't let our corporations get so fat and happy that they lose their edge, or at least if they do get that way, we don't try to protect them from the consequences (usually, although there have been some significant exceptions where corps have been bailed out by the government).
Microsoft has a monopoly on desktop operating systems. While that is not illegal, it is not considered to be beneficial to competition or our economy in general. That is why we have anti-trust laws. Under those laws, Microsoft is not allowed to use its monopoly power to prevent competitors from entering and competing in that market. They are not allowed to create artificial barriers to entry. They are not allowed to leverage their monopoly in one market to try to dominate another market. They are not allowed to "play hardball" like non-monopoly companies. This is for the good of competition. We assume that competition is good for innovation and for consumers because it helps produce the best products at the best prices.
I'd suggest that a new set of rules was in order, but govt. restraint of the software industry will only slow the economy and the progress of technology.
I don't see how people can go throwing these kinds of assumptions around when history shows us exactly the opposite. Go read this article and get back to me. It's not specifically about Microsoft, or even anti-trust in general. It's about open access to infrastructure, namely phone and cable networks, but it does help to illustrate why regulation is often the best way to keep innovation alive rather than leaving it up to a single corp or handful of corps. We make the rules based on what serves the country best, not what serves the big corporations best. These corporations have no deity-given rights to protection from our government. We decided to give them certain protections and privileges, but it is done on our terms. The terms that serve the country. Now, it hasn't always worked, but we've gotten this far and we're doing better than most. I don't think that anti-trust laws or regulation in general should be chucked out the window just because people don't want to offend the country's biggest... err second biggest corporation. Yes they've been wildly successful. They also broke many laws to keep themselves on top and to get rid of the competition. That doesn't fly here, or at least it shouldn't. It remains to be seen whether Microsoft can buy a political fix for its legal problems.
Yet here we all are reading Slashdot, using an OS(Linux) we got for free that is eating at Microsofts share.
Saying that we shouldn't use Linux because its getting in the way of profits that should rightfully belong to Microsoft is like saying we should all stop breathing because nobody is getting rich even though we are consuming oxygen. Ok, so it's not exactly the same. The point is that if it can be made or had for free, or very cheaply, then it will be hard to make money on it. In this case, distributed effort has helped to produce a very good operating system that can be had for very little cost. Operating systems aren't the only products affected by this. Try selling ice to an eskimo sometime.
The best thing we could do to solve the MS problem is to ignore them.
Ignoring them would be foolish in the extreme. Doing so would simply allow them to build more and more artificial dependency into their products and raise the cost more and more for a company to switch to something else. If we stand idly by while Microsoft works even harder to achieve a stronger customer lock-in, we will end up losing a lot of ground. If Microsoft is allowed to own the standards, how can anyone else compete?
By going to the government and asking them to solve this, we are inviting the government in to regulate everything, including Linux and Open Source.
You talk like the DOJ is moving into new territory here or something. Anti-trust laws have been on the books for over 100 years. This is nothing new. It's not opening any new doors or creating any new type of regulation. They are simply enforcing the law. As I said before, the US bases its laws on the assumption that competition is good. Therefore, a lack of competition is bad, and attempting to use monopoly power to maintain that lack of competition is illegal.
It's not enough to bash in heads, you've got to bash in minds. - Captain Hammer
You're partially right. Bill Gates is not Satan. He is merely a henchman of Satan. Satan wouldn't be caught dead with a haircut like that.
Seriously though, I don't know if there is really any point in separating attacks on his empire from attacks on him personally. It amounts to the same thing. He IS Microsoft. Sure, he has his minions to do the day-to-day stuff, but there is no doubt that he runs the show. I'll agree that it's overkill to call Microsoft evil in the traditional sense, but we are talking about a company that has been breaking the law, and is now trying to use its money and power to influence politicians to keep from being severely punished.
One could argue that any of us would likely try to fight back and change the law if we felt we were being unjustly prosecuted for something, but I certainly feel that if that were the case, I'd do it openly and try to make an argument that stands on its own merit rather than simply getting an exception made for me under the table. The problem is that Microsoft has tried several times to make a public argument, but they always twist the facts and leave out the parts that don't look so good in the light of day. That doesn't work in court though, so many of these facts were brought to light and, in the end, that's why they lost the case. The facts simply contradicted their arguments almost entirely.
It's not enough to bash in heads, you've got to bash in minds. - Captain Hammer
The Christian right even nauseates me, and I'm a Christian! Or maybe it nauseates me especially because I'm a Christian.
*sigh*
--
-- Slashdot sucks.
There is a very distinct line between criticising the Christian Coalition and criticising Christians in general. The Christian Coalition is an extremist, authoritarian group, hungry for power. It has an ends-justify-the-means mentality; its leaders are on record advocating anti-democratic measures when they think the press isn't watching. Their legislative agenda would turn the US into a fundamentalist theocracy, imposing their narrow, judgmental morality on everyone. If they had the power, there would be stonings of fornicators, sodomists and blasphemers in town squares.
Furthermore, they are not representative of all Christians, or even the majority. There are many Christians who are content to live out Christ's message of judge-not-lest-ye-should-be-judged and being generally decent to their fellow human beings without declaring holy war against those whose values don't match theirs. And if I remember correctly, Christ had something to say about the hypocrites who make a point of wearing their "righteousness" as a badge of pride.
I'm not a Christian myself, but I have the greatest respect for those who are and live a decent life, rather than using their Christianity as an excuse to hate or condemn those who don't share it. Unfortunately, that's what most of the Religious Right seem to do.
I found this in an editorial in my local paper
In addition to being a painstaking reporter, Tarbell was a moralist. She viewed anti-competitive practices as corrupting as well as unlawful. Here are a few of her comments on the intertwined oil and railroad industries -- as exciting, novel and wildly profitable in the early 1900s as computers and the Internet are now.
Pretty applicable, eh? Especially considering it was written 100 years ago.
---
It's traditional microsoft public relations tactics.
c h/articles/11soft.html
About hiring Reed, the nytimes writes-
"Microsoft's aim, the company says, is to curry favor with the apparent Republican presidential nominee,"
To do this, Reeds's firm would do this-
"A series of e-mail messages from John Pudner, senior project manager for Century Strategies, laid out a detailed plan by Mr. Reed's staff and his contractors to recruit senior Bush supporters
from around the country in an effort to undermine the government's suit.
The Bush supporters -- and the e-mail showed that Mr. Pudner isscreening them carefully to make sure they are influential within the campaign -- are being asked to write letters to Mr. Bush saying they believe the government's case is misguided, and that the American people oppose it."
They get $300 a letter. Classy.
More info at-
http://www.nytimes.com/library/tech/00/04/bizte
On the good side, the man in charge of the committee that approves justice dept officials is Orrin Hatch, a big microsoft foe. The state atty generals are also involved with the case- GW can't just fire them.
Ralph Reed gives Christians as much a bad name as Bill Gates gives computer enthusiasts.
________________________________
AP story: "Reed Apologizes for Bush Work"
Let's see...
Nine months ago, GW was riding high in the polls and had a war chest several times the size of all his foes' combined. But after spending all that loot, he now enjoys bare parity with Al Gore in the polls. (He probably hopes Bill Gates doesn't give him more money to spend!)
Nine months ago, Bill Gates was riding high in the IT world, raking in the cash and laughing off Consent Decrees. But after blowing a huge wad of cash on lawyers, he is now the pariah of the IT world, viewed as an arrogant ass as well as a crook by anyone who followed the DOJ suit, and the traditionally pro-MS trade rags are openly questioning the sense of migrating to W2K.
Imagine what these two guys will accomplish if they pool their talents and resources.
--
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
"Oh please boot please boot please stay up for over an hour oh please oh please oh please..."
--The basis of all love is respect
First off, have you seen the recent fuzzy-feeling Microsoft commercial? Bill Gates looks like he's in a kids' school computer lab. He talks about when he and is friends decided to harness the power of the home computer and make lives better for everyone. And he expresses his hope to have the freedom to inovate in the future. Its a nice public opinion piece. No products... unless you count positive public opinion of Microsoft as one. I feel that there's a good reason for this add to show up on primetime TV.
The reason is simple. The public is beginning to sour towards Microsoft.
Last year I told this story here but I'll go ahead and tell it again as it still applies...
I was sitting at my desk when someone in the office space behind me began loudly bitching about Microsoft. Was it a fellow Unix admin browsing Slashdot and having a go at some trendy MS bashing? Was it one of my NT admin friends who make their living from supporting one of the nation's largest Microsoft installations... but still grumble at various failings of the products?
No.
The loud complaints were being issued by a decisively non-technical budget analyst who had just lost her work to Windows instability. She stared at a blue screen blaming Microsoft for her woes.
Think about this for a minute. The point is subtle, but a major one. A year or so earlier, she probably would have blamed computers. But now its no longer computers that are at fault - it was the products from Microsoft that caused her grief.
The cracks in Microsoft's public relations wall are beginning to show. There's no flood of public outcry yet; you're just as likely to run in to people on the street who either do not care or don't know anything but Windows. You're always going to find people who very deturminely support Windows and Microsoft. But more and more, I'm finding people who hold Microsoft in a less favorable light.
Maybe that's true in the US. Here in the UK there is (in my experience) considerable dissatisfaction with MS products. Maybe it's because of things like that unremovable "Network Neighborhood" icon which is the wrong spelling in this country, or perhaps it's things like the Word grammar checker having a go at you for using perfectly legitimate British English constructs. I imagine it's true that the further you get (culturally) from Seattle, the greater the proportion of people who see MS as menaces and not as gods.
perl -e 'fork||print for split//,"hahahaha"'
Can Microsoft and the Christian Coalition be any MORE similar? They both have moral superiority complexes. They both have monopolies on their users, and chastise deviants. They both have deep pockets, big mouths, and puppets on Capitol Hill.
I wonder if Ralph will certify Microsoft products "Holiness Approved" and convince members to use only Microsoft products. With any luck Microsoft has just shot itself in the foot by alienating those will any sense left in them.
It's 10 PM. Do you know if you're un-American?
BG: With the help of Microsoft, has tried to keep us in a "computing dark-ages" by pushing bad operating systems
RR: Wants to take away your social freedoms
BG: Wants to take away your computing freedoms
RR: Thinks God is on his side
BG: Doesn't give a shit whose side God is on, as long as he has money and power
RR: Makes me want to swear whenver I hear his name
BG: Makes me swear whenever I use his products
RR: One of the perfectly corrupt by-products of 80s Reagan-era greed
BG: Ditto
And to see all of them tied together with Governor Bush just makes me ache inside. Ugh
Mind you it does seem that the minions of satan and those of heaven are teaming up .... might really signal the end of the world :-)
It's interesting to note that Microsoft gives about the same amount of money to each party. Like most companies, they hedge their bets. This article has more details.
When I'm singing a ballad and a pair of underwear lands on my head, I hate that. It really kills the mood.
-Tom Jones
And what about this reference to Satan? MS is not satan! They may have stifled competition, thumbed their noses at Judges, bully OEMs, forced Go out of business, dumped Internet Explorer, write sneaky code to make compatible products incompatible, misrepresented their committment to OS/2 ... but they are not evil.
Think MS knows that many people consider them the Great Satan??
Many people reading Slashdot, maybe. How many people in the normal population have this view, though? I'll give you a clue, it's somewhere in the single digits.
The unfortunate truth is that "normal" people consider MicroSoft to be gods. They see Bill's incredible success and marvel at it. They see the newest version of Windows and stand bug-eyed when they see their start menu fade in.
My father was even saying how unfortunate it is that MS is even involved in the anti-trust case at all. Lets face it, the general population really doesn't know what's going on... not that they have to, though. Windows is good enough for their means, and it's relatively easy to use. As long as this holds true, their opinion of MS is not going to change, no matter what happens.
-- Dr. Eldarion --
Oh boy this may very well turn out to be the battle of the century. *DING DING DING* In the this corner wereing the very very black trunks Microsoft and the Christian Colition... and in this corner in the red trucks the United States Government. That part that I'm confused about is, who is the one that is most evil? Microsoft, Christian Colition nutball, or our less then perfect Gov. ?
Check out the MSNBC article.
kwsNI
tcd004
If they're smart, they won't bend it much until after the election. If GWB tries to make the Microsoft prosecution into an election issue, that is nothing but a loser for him.
Anomalous: inconsistent with or deviating from what is usual, normal, or expected
Anomalous: deviating from what is usual, normal, or expected
Canard: a false or unfounded repor