Microsoft Promotions Turn Up in USPS Offices

Several readers, like this Anonymous Coward, have written with links to a letter from Cliff Crouch on macintouch.com. "I stumbled across this letter submitted to a web site I frequent. Apparently Microsoft has promotional displays with free WindowsXP promotional software in U.S. Post Offices."

Comments

not only that

[Syre]

usps.gov has a marketing deal with Microsoft apparently. Their Web-Based Solutions page, accessable from the main usps.gov page, is "Powered by Microsoft bCentral", and promotes subscriptions to Microsoft services.

Maybe we need to add "separation of corporation and state" to our "separation of church and state" in the constitution?

Re:Here's the reason

[NMerriam]

And what happend to "innocent until proven guilty"?

MS has been proven guilty -- the only thing under review is what the penalty will be.

First Anthrax now XP

[smartin]

The post office is crawling with viruses these days.

Take them all.

[Rothfuss]

The CDs are free. Take them all.

Once you have a few hundred of them, you can gather them together with the myriad AOL CDs in your drawer and enjoy a nice day of CD Craft Fun as suggested here, here and here.

Good luck.

-Rothfuss

OK, here's the question. . .

[cgleba]

I really don't care if MS advertises in post offices. What piques my curiosity, though, is what were / are government agencies' policies on advertising?

I know that the MA Registry now allows advertising at their sites (somthing for people to look at during the long waits). It wasn't that way too long ago. . .

I have never seen an advertisment in a post office that did not either promote USPS's services or was somthing about taxes.

Was this by design, or was it that no one thought of advertising in a post office before :)? Could an advertsising policy cause bias in a government agency like campaign contributions cause in politics?

It's not radical or life-changing, but it does have a large curiosity factor that I could not find much info on. . .

Creative Crime.

[BreakWindows]

Man, the "devious" flag just raised on this one. Maybe I can grab all the CD's, bring them home and burn new ones, chock full'of nice little additions...viruses, bugs, flaws; then put them back, shrinkwrapped and ready to go. "Hello, Microsoft? I just installed this XP promo and every time I boot up it invokes the name of Satan". Or, "sweet jesus, what's with all the penguins on my screen!?". Hey, maybe something as simple as a new office assistant that offers advice every 15 seconds.

And for the smartasses...yes, new bugs over the ones already on there. I guess this would work with those AOL promo's too...but since no one would ever install those (as they already have 500) it wouldn't be as fulfilling.

Windows Stamps?

[Rothfuss]

I'm looking forward to the "Great Operating Systems of the 20th Century" stamp series sponsored by Microsoft.

There will be stamps celebrating such great operating systems as

Windows 3
Windows 3.1
Windows 3.11
Windows NT 3.5
Windows NT 3.51
Windows NT 4.0
Windows 95
Windows 98
and
Windows 2000

Then of course there will be a variety of service packs for the 1 cent stamps.

-Rothfuss

New Merger, USPS bought out by MS

[Mac Nazgul]

PR release:

Microsoft announced today the acquisition of the United Postal Service. "It's a great innovation, that we know our customers will enjoy. Instead of being hassled by paper communication, our MSN and Hotmail service will provide all means of communication for the people of the US in a safe and secure way." said Microsoft's co-founder Bill Gates.
While many questions have risen regarding the ethical and legal considerations, Microsoft was confident of the acceptance of their new program. With a surprise backer in the federal government, Microsofts program received considerable support from a Mr. DCS1000. Security considerations also came into play with the recent anthrax scares.
The program launches tomorrow, with the initial transfer of all US citizens to the new MS PassportPlus for national identification (Win95/NT/98/2000/XP compatible). A new email activation program will also initiate, offering enhanced security against terrorist hackers sendign unauthorized digital signals.

It's really a "Wanted" poster

[Ukab the Great]

Usually when you see posters on post offices, they feature people who steal valuable resources from citizens or cause them irreperable harm. Usually these people are regarded as being extremely dangerous and should be avoided at all costs

I'd say that adequately pegs XP.

Re:Regardless

[elmegil]

it's just marketing, not monopolistic business tactics.

And exactly where did the article say it was monopolistic business practices?

Seems to me everyone is bitching because of the blatant conflict of interest on the part of the government. "One hand is suing you, the other hand is selling you advertising space that isn't apparently being sold to any other advertiser."

Re:so what?

[FattMattP]

The Post Office isn't some holy place, it's barely connected with the government, and hasn't received any tax dollars since Nixon. It's basically a private organization.

Whether it has received any tax dollars or not is irrelevant. It's part of the government. Did you notice their domain was usps.gov? Did you know that it is illegal to attempt to compete against the USPS with mail delivery under the Code of Federal Regulations, Title 39, Chapter 1, Sec. 310.2, paragraph (a)? Those regulations are only suspended for mail that is considered "urgent" and "critial" but only if it's being delivered more than 50 miles away from where it's sent. In those cases, companies can compete but they are required by law to charge more than the USPS would, even if the USPS can do it cheaper. Read about it in the Code of Federal Regulations, Title 39, Chapter 1, Sec. 320.6, paragraph (c). Did you know that the Postal Service is exempt from property taxes? They are exempt from parking tickets as well. They even have their own law enforcement branch with badges and guns.

Sounds like government to me, warts and all.

"Postal Ad Network"

[Animats]

The U.S. Postal Service now sells advertising space. They call it the "Postal Ad Network". The USPS writes:

• Success Sells.

  For over 200 years, the United States Postal Service is the brand that has been built on trust and service.

  Now we're selling our unique space. Think of us as your Multi-channel Communications Service. Marketers can get the visibility and reach through the Postal Ad Network.

  Place your big message on our trucks, collection boxes and even in our postal facilities. Or small space ads on our stamp packages and banner ads on our website.

So it may get worse; there may be Microsoft ads on USPS trucks next.

There's opposition to the USPS selling out like this.

What are you smoking?

[Erris]

The post office is not really part of the government but rather a business run to support an important country function.

What part of "United States Post Office" don't you understand? That the civil servants are employed by the Federal Government?

There are many makers of software in this great country and I'm sure none of them apprecite their tax dollars being used to support Microsoft. Don't you remember half of them testifying against M$ over the last few years? Well, gee there it is being promoted in a maner that some people will take as offial US sponsorship. It stinks. Were any of them offered the same oppertunity? Would it even be possible to fit all the material there? 30 Linux distros, 45 BSDs, AOL, Sun, HP, Compaq. There would not be room to stand.

Let's look at another thing "powering" the US post office by way of compairison. Jeeps. You see them all over, as they won bids on an open market. The Post Office Jeeps were stripped of all insignia and were only recognizable by their form. No cardboard cut outs recomending the purchase of Jeeps ever kept the sun from shining through a USPO window. No "test drives" were ever offered. Instead, Jeep was happy to be making the sale and the use was recomendation enough. The USPO had no intentions of recomending one automobile maker over another.

Go to Netcraft, you will see that most US government sites do NOT run M$ trash.

So my wife asks me, "why would they bother to promote M$, a company that needs no promotion." Might the settlement be nationalization? Oh shit.

This is still a valid Public Policy decision

[i1984]

The advertisement of Microsoft software in the United States Post Office should be subject to public policy review, irrespective of the Postals Service's technical corporate status.

Microsoft is a convicted monopolist that has shown no remorse for its actions, and scarcely acknowledges that it has done any wrong. Ideally, the government would not be helping to pormote this malignancy.

It has been repeated many times throughout this discussion, first that the Post Office is part of the US government, only to have that assertion contradicted to the effect that the Postal Service is actually an independant corporation established and run by the government -- posters have also pointed out that the Federal Government is the sole shareholder, appoints the directors, and as needed bails the service out to the tune of a billion dollars.

All this is missing the point: the government shouldn't be helping spread the monopoly even if the post office is technically independent. The service still answers to Congress, and does arguably more so than most other businesses. This sort of issue is well within the domain of public policy -- even if no policies currently exist that are relevant to this situation.

In a broader sense, corporations in general also answer to Congress (even in cases like Enron where they'd rather not!), and by extension we regulate all of them in numerous ways as well. In comparison to wholly indepenent and totally private corporations it should be easy to shape a public policy in regards to a pseudo-governmental organization like the post office -- even if it means appointing a board of directors who agree that convicted monopolists shouldn't have the privilege of advertising in Postal Service buildings.

This is also why this is a relevant Slashdot story. It involves what amounts to a public policy decision (or lack thereof) that affects technology that the Slashdot community cares about: Microsoft, monopolies, the blurred line between the public and private sector, and public policy regarding these topics.