Microsoft Battles Free Software at Pentagon

Spirit of Ishmael writes "The May 22 Washington Post is running a story under the headline Microsoft Fights Free Software at Pentagon. According to the story: 'Microsoft Corp. is aggressively lobbying the Pentagon to squelch its growing use of freely distributed computer software and switch to proprietary systems such as those sold by the software giant, according to officials familiar with the campaign.'"

Comments

National Insecurity?

[ThesQuid]

Good grief, was it not less than two days ago that Microsoft claimed they could never release the APIs for Windows out of fear for the damage it would do to National Security? I would like to think that the cryptanalysts at the Dept of Defense would be fully versed in the fallacy of Security through Obscurity, and would make their voices heard.

Re:What do you expect?

[Metrol]

Free software is their competition. Next thing you know people like Alan Cox might speak to them about the benifits of open source. My god, how evil!

If Lockheed and Boeing were in the midst of competing for a contract, one would not be suggesting the other be BANNED through legislation. Sure, the competition would be rough. Thing is, they would be competing on the merits of the product they were bidding on.

What is happening here is (to keep the metaphor a rolling) is Boeing is making the claim that Lockheed is making inferior products, and giving all the secrets to unfriendly nations. That to even consider doing business with Lockheed is equivalent to being an unAmerican communist. You're not for communism are you?

Despite what you make think, it is not a usual occurance to have one competitor try to get legislation passed to ban another. You require a special kind of arrogance to go that far.

Will the US follow Peru's lead?

[Nate Enderle]

Not too long ago, slashdot posted this article concerning the campaign in Peru to switch the government to free software. It had a point by point by point analysis of Microsofts FUD. I hope that somebody in the US government takes the time to think through the issue, rather then just giving in to corporate pressure. What would be even better would be to see one of our own senators or high appointed officials show that they understand the issue as well as Peruvian Congressman David Villanueva Nuñez. One can hope.

Howitzering themselves in the foot...

[gdyas]

If any of you follow the link provided and read the article, you'll find that the DoD is giving MS's advice exactly the (lack of) credence it's due. So before you piss yourself about supposed Bush Administration / MS collusion, just read it.

Huzzah, and thank God the good folks at the DoD are relying on solid data to make good decisions about the software used to protect the nation, and Damn MSFT for looking for growth opportunities in degrading national security by harrying them for needless proprietary expenditures & vague allusions to "legal problems".

Corporate competition is one thing, but I don't think I can say it any simpler than Keep the Fuck off our Gov't with your FUD. When it comes to the DoD, there's more at stake than your option portfolios.

Re:What are their selling points?

[wirefarm]

"But if this Linux thing is so good, then why is it FREE? Can you answer me that?? Thought not. Microsoft must be better because it costs more."

Of course I'm being sarcastic, but how far is that from some people's thinking?

Government managers pride themselves on how much they spend and how many people they command, not on how much they save. Keep in mind that they cannot turn a profit or even show a savings - that's suicide - much more so than having your project fail spectacularly.

Bureaucracies often need to be able to quantify their logic (to avoid actual thought?) - so perhaps Linux should just cost more up front? That would make it a lot easier to go over budget later...

Of course it doesn't help that there is no recognized equivalent to the MCSE program - how do you then justify who you hire? Slashdot karma? I know there is the Red Hat program, but does that really carry much weight in government hiring?

Cheers,
Jim in Tokyo

Steve Ballmer, unplugged.

[mrsam]

Little news tidbits like these ones actually explain why there's been a steady trickle of those bizarre, off the wall, statements and comments, from Ballmer, Gates, and other senior Microsoft officers. You know -- the comments like open source being some demonic spawn of Vladimir Il'ich Lenin; or Richard Stallman invading your corporate vaults and stealing your company secrets, etc... etc... etc...

I do believe that Open Source software, and Linux specifically, are taking a bigger, and bigger chunk out of Microsoft's revenues. Not much, in fact it's rather piddly; but it's still noticeable. And it's growing. Although few people on /. can actually put a monetary amount on how much it actually is, if there's anybody in the world who has a pretty good idea how much revenue Microsoft is losing because of Linux, it must be Gates, Ballmer, and the rest of Microsoft's upper echelon.

And I think they're getting scared.

That may be a bit self-serving or presumptious, and with 40 billion in the bank they clearly don't have much to worry about. Still, I think they have to have at least a mild case of indigestion.

There's nothing in this story that really should surprise anyway. So the feds, and the spooks, are using Linux, sometimes in a quite visible, and mission-critical way. So? That's nothing earth-shattering. And that's precisely what's giving Ballmer and Co the problem. Linux has traction. Not just the feds. Linux has traction in big corporate America. SIAC - the folks who run the networks for the stock exchanges, have cut over some mission-critical functionality over to Linux. Look at the classifieds ads in New York City, from big financial firms. There's a small trickle of open job reqs for hackers with Linux experience.

Gates, Ballmer, and Co, are seeing this as well as the next guy, and they just don't know what to do about it. That's what's scaring them. It's one thing when you have a well-defined opponent to do battle with. But how do you define the opponent here? Microsoft can't clearly define who their opponent here is. There's no single company to purchase, spread FUD about, or drag into court over some frivolous intellectual issue, in order to bleed them with legal fees.

So, all you can do is to try to FUD your way against Linux in general. But each time you'll try to go with a generic FUD campaign, your arguments can be easily shut down with a single, specific, counterexample of Linux's success in a mission-critical role. There's enough case history out there now to be able to point to, as a counterargument to FUD.

Microsoft is clearly struggling, trying to figure out a focused, targeted, anti-Linux campaign, and failing each time. Notice how they no longer claim that Linux isn't ready for mission-critical roles. That didn't work. Now they're claiming that using Linux puts your intellectual property in jeopardy. That can't last much longer. They still can't come up with a specific example, and only talk about in generalities; furthermore with Sun and HP putting Linux APIs into their respectives *nixes, the notion that Sun and HP have intentionally put their intellectual property in jeopardy is a bit difficult to swallow.

So, I don't think the intellectual property FUD has much more left in it, and it will slowly disappear over time. So, what's the next FUD attack? I don't know. Neither does Ballmer, or Gates. And that's what's scaring them.

Re:Steve Ballmer, unplugged.

[Permission Denied]

if there's anybody in the world who has a pretty good idea how much revenue Microsoft is losing because of Linux, it must be Gates, Ballmer, and the rest of Microsoft's upper echelon.

And I think they're getting scared.

Microsoft is scared. But they're not scared that they're losing money to Linux.

In the section where I work, it's become common practice not to buy any software that does come with source. That includes database apps written specifically for what we do and marketted to a small niche, utility programs and development tools. The software doesn't have to be "Free" or Open Source - it can come with an NDA, but it must come with source code. Why, you ask? My management now understands the power of having source code. If there's a bug, we fix it. If we need a feature, we add it. We're less dependent on third parties to complete our jobs.

NB the ridicule against MS when they claimed that keeping their source code secret was a matter of security. The mainstream press (and perhaps mainstream America) is starting to understand what we techies mean by "security through obscurity." A few years ago, MS could get away with a move like this and most people wouldn't have given it much notice.

Look at the moves toward open standards, which MS is grudgingly accepting. Things like XML, documented networking protocols, standardized programming languages. People have always demanded interoperability, but they now understand that interoperability comes through open standards.

MS has $40 in the bank, and yet they're still making dumb moves against Linux - moves like that "national security" announcement a few days ago. These moves show that they're scared - they're making dumb moves which may hurt their image and their bottom line in the end, and in the business world, those dumb moves which hurt your bottom line are the dumbest dumb moves. But what are they scared of? Are they afraid that $40 billion will become $39 billion? Would you risk attacking Linux/Free software/Open Source so vehemently at the threat of losing one fortieth of your company's stockpile?

Microsoft is not afraid of losing money to Linux. They're afraid of an idea. When people demand source code in order to reduce vendor lock-in, fix bugs and add features, when the public recognizes the crap which MS is claiming as security, when business starts demanding open standards - when these things happen, that's a problem for MS. The MS executives are not foolish - they realize a few hundred million dollars is not such a huge problem for them at the moment. However, what could be a huge problem for them is the death of their business model. That's what they're afraid of.

Re:Actually..

[Danse]

Not even the source code. They said that they couldn't reveal certain APIs and protocols even. That's fucking sad.

Re:last paragraph

[Animats]

That was with the old process, where NSA did their own evaluations. The new evaluation scheme is under the thumb of software vendors, with testing performed by private testing services paid by the software vendor.

Microsoft is trying to get Windows 2000 approved under the new scheme, but hasn't succeeded yet.

Real people ridicule MCSEs

[Anarchofascist]

What I was saying is that the MCSE program has way better brand recognition than anything Linux has to offer. Everybody's heard of it and frankly, outside of slashdot, it's rarely something to be ridiculed for.

I've been writing software in PHP for an employment agency for the last year. I have had to work closely with our employment consultants to see how they work, what they think is important to know about candidates, vacancies and companies. None of them read /.

When our IT staff hear about someone with an MCSE their immediate reaction is "Get to the back of the queue with all the others."

MCSE may have incredible brand recognition, but that works against it being useful to employers. Everyone knows about it, it's marketed as the must-have qualification, so a candidate spends the money, spends some time, and as long as they have a certain IQ level, an MCSE comes out of the 'certification' slot on the Microsoft machine. Result - millions of MCSEs.

The first thing employers care about is work experience. They can call your last employer and ask how good you were. In 30 seconds they can make a decision. The second most important facto they consider is your real tertiary qualifications.

Last and least are the one-day courses, the part-time courses, and the MCSEs.