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Oracle Says It Investigated Microsoft Allies
Schnedt McWapt writes: "Oracle Says It Investigated Microsoft Allies.
From the article: 'Oracle Corporation acknowledged today that it had hired a prominent Washington detective firm to investigate groups sympathetic to its archrival, the Microsoft Corporation, an effort that yielded documents embarrassing to Microsoft in the midst of its antitrust battle with the government.'"
Myriad adds: "This apparently ties in with an earlier [CNN] report involving IGI and the failed purchase of Association for Competitive Technology office trash -- a group with ties to Microsoft. You can find the article on CNNfn here. I hate to say it, but would reactions be different if it was Microsoft who hired IGI against another company?"
One of the first things they tell you when you are learning about business ethics is don't do anything that you wouldn't be ashamed to read about in the newspaper the next day.
The business arena is not a private one. People can and do betray each other; secrets leak, enemies sneak.
Naturally, you want to keep your business secrets secret. If you are afraid of how people will act when they find out -- fair enough. But if you are afraid of what people will think of you, well that's a damn good sign you have an ethical problem.
I've been witness to numerous ethical quibbles in business where people come up with complicated rationalizations about why its OK to do something which any sensible person would know is wrong. You know what? I've yet to see a case where in the end it really was worth the energy to (A) justify it to yourself and (B) hide it from other people. And that's assuming you don't care to think of yourself as a decent, reasonable person.
Now, you can argue that Microsoft has made a pile of money while doing all kinds of unethical things. But it's the same old shit on a huger scale -- they made lots of money but they're pissing away that much more time and money, and it ain't over yet -- it's hardly even begun. I think they'd still have made almost as much money acting in a way that would preserve the respect (if not the admiration) of information technology professionals, and they would be free and clear now to enjoy their monopolies which in all liklihood they'd have won fair and square.
What is stunning, to me, is how unnecessary all of Microsoft's legal and ethical problems are. Competitiveness, even with a modicum of ruthlessness, is a virtue; but Microsoft is like a character in a play who takes what would in moderation be a virtue and turn it into a self destructive obsession. Shame exists, among other reasons, to keep you from doing really stupid things. A person who feels too much shame is to be pitied; a person who feels no shame at all is to be loathed and ultimately will have to be destoyed.
"We'll have thee, as our rarer monsters are,
Painted on a pole, and underwrit,
'Here may you see the tyrant.'"
-- MacDuff, MacBeth Act 5, Scene 8
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
Knowledge is power
Power corrupts
Corruption is evil
Therefore teachers breed evil. QED.
Oversimplification can lead to a lot of wrong conclusions.
Larry was an egomaniac long before he was a billionaire. Ditto for Bill, Steve, and all the other tech CEO's that we know by first name. Their "alpha dog" personalities is a big part of why they are where they are today.
Information wants to be anthropomorphized.
Companies are always checking out the competition. As long as Oracle is not using government force (say through draconian patent and copyright law) or fraud, I don't really see the problem. If the PI firm is breaking the law, then there may be some culpability, but absent that, hiring a PI to check out how Microsoft is attempting to use government force is not only ethical, they would be fools not to do it. Microsoft was attempting to manipulate the government to further its own ends (be those ends morally right or wrong). It is in its competitors' interests to find out how, and to expose the attempts if that is appropriate.
Logic ... merely enables one to be wrong with authority. -- Doctor Who
Seriously, if this comes as a suprise to anybody then they obviously don't know much about the business world at all. Corporate espionage and intelligence gathering has been one of the fastest growing market sectors, along with "head-hunting", for the last decade or so, and the trend looks set to continue.
Any corporation that wants to get ahead of its rivals in of course extremely interested in what is going on with their rivals. And there are plenty of agencies which specialise in finding out facts that aren't published in the annual company review.
As a professional consultant I've worked with very large Fortune 500 corporations, and after working on introducing an ERP solution for one of them, I was approached thorugh my agency by a "client". At lunch I was asked several innocent sounding questions about the company who I'd just been working with, and the client was never heard from again.
But, if it helps ensure more vigorous competition in the business world then I don't see how anyone can really argue that this is a bad thing - after all it's not like they're after personal secrets is it? Most corporations have too much to hide anyway.
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Jon E. Erikson
Jon Erikson, IT guru
would reactions be different if it was Microsoft who hired IGI against another company?
-If it was Microsoft who did the hiring we'd all be crying bloody murder.
-If Microsoft had nothing to do with it it woudn't show up on slashdot. Can you picture the headline: Nortel hires IGI against Acatel? Neither could I, mostly because we wouldn't care. Why? Because a lot of us are all hellbent on beating MSFT into the ground and thus will focus in on all the bad points.