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U.S. Army Warns Microsoft To Back Off
declan writes "My CNET News colleague Ina Fried has written an interesting article today about how the U.S. Army has told Microsoft to stop sending free CD-ROMs of Office 2003 to government employees. In what's effectively a cease and desist order, the Army said: 'Your offer of free software places our employees and soldiers in jeopardy of unknowingly committing a violation of the ethics rules and regulations to which they have taken an oath to uphold.' Whoops! Perhaps this is Microsoft's latest way to fight free software at the Pentagon. Remember that just 8 months ago, the Army paid $471 million for Microsoft licenses."
Yep... I'm in the navy and this new item hit the streets last week (I considered submitting it as a story--oh well). We had guys and civilian contractors in our building getting free copies of office. My hate for ms reached a new high--talking about caught red-handed trying to plant seeds that will secure them--argh.
Separately, as a member of the military and despiser of the pitiful quality of ms products, I've always been strongly concerned about the military's use of ms products. The military, like many parts of the government, subcontract-out most tech work and implementation. The contractors, with sealed pay rates and support plans, have no problem deploying huge ms flagships at given branch or sub branch of the military (and then forwarding all the licensing bill to uncle sam). In other words, the root concern is that senior military folks that make the money decisions, need to get the job done but don't have a technical background (ie, to them, linux, microsoft, a server, source code, hacking, and TCP/IP are all one and the same). The contractors drum up offers, the military takes one, and--wham--the US gov't is now shelling out to ms in huge numbers and there's no one who looks at and says, 'is this the best way we could be doing it?'
If you've been around the government, you know what I mean about how scary the contractors are in terms of quality and knowledge when it comes to industrial back-end technologies. I'm on shore tour now, but when I was on my sub, you'd see these people doing a software install by blindly reading out of a SPAWAR procedure. I'd ask them stuff as they went along to gain knowledge and tips, but I usually got back a sheepish "I'm not sure". Grr...
Andy
G-Force music visualization
but can they stop AOL cds as well? stemming that tide is well-nigh impossible.
turn up the jukebox and tell me a lie
And you know what, there's a reason for it. Others where I work got copies as well, and they are already pushing for us to get an Exchange server. There are many features in the new "Office System" that require server support. When you try to use a feature that requires support on the server, a message pops up about how you need to contact your systems administrator to find out how to enable this great new feature.
Now we just need the Army to go after spammers, SCO, and the like.... and back it up with tanks! lots of tanks!
Office XP, Visual Studio
you sell? I would like a copy of all of them. You
know my address.
Thank you,
Anonymous Coward
...they had absolutely no interest in AOL's high-speed technology and were threatening unilateral action.
Army: Stop sending us your products. .
Microsoft: What if we don't?
Army: We'll make you
Microsoft: You and what army?
Army: . .
Microsoft: Oh.
I want the fire back.
If I were to mail unchecked binary files to senior officers and ask them to run them without verifying the contents for trojans, worms or viruses the Department of Homeland Insecurity would likley have me shot in their Happy Fun Camp at Guantanamo.
And unlike a certain company *I* don't have a criminal conviction, a record of giving things that could hurt national security to the Chinese (Windows source code) or a past history of underhand payments to subvert the political process!
Where is the justice in that?
Beep beep.
My dad used to work in the contracts office in the Air Force and you couldn't accept anything that could be considered a gift. (IIRC there may have been a monetary cap on what you could accept but it was really low; even legitimate things like Christmas baskets or company tchotskes were frowned upon, which kind of weirded out suppliers the first time they dealt with the military since it could come across as rude when an Airman tells you to take your fruit basket home with you). Violation of this was taken very seriously. As big and established as MS is -- not to mention the fact they've dealt with the gov't on a contractual level for over 20 years -- this is a pretty boneheaded move. They should have known better and whoever authorized this should get shit-canned.
Um. $500 retail is crap.
Fair is fair, use the same value they do when calculating their "$90000000000 billion lost to software piracy!" figure.
Beep beep.
I am a Network Admin Here in AK and I can tell you that one of the most poisonous aspects of .Mil networking is Civillians. The other is the decisions made by Command Sections who are only interested in one thing, Budgets.
It sucks being told that your decision base on good sound Tech principles is not what they want to hear because of the cost involved.
The free software giveaway came about because a lot of paperwork is created in time with no war. Therefor people have to take their work home to get finished to make deadlines. So leadership said take a copy home install it. The Mil makes you use it. you have to get the work done so you are entitled to a free copy.
Integrity is the hardest thing to keep.
Wonder what would happen if we all sent OpenOffice.org CD-ROMS to not only the Army, but to other government agencies? Seems like a fantastic marketing idea to me, and I dont think (?) that employees would be breaking ethics rules, since it is free software.
bash: rtfm: command not found
If it something is sent to me for free, it is um, well, free!
Here, take this gold bar, absolutely for free, it's a gift. You pay nothing, it costs nothing! And now, about that contract of ours...
Anagram("United States of America") == "Dine out, taste a Mac, fries"
A while back when I was an IT monkey, I seem to remember Office2000 would install Outlook even if you specified not to, in the custom install. And don't get me started on trying to uninstall internet explorer...
This is why I turned to *nux and never looked back.
For quite a while Microsoft (and probably plenty of other software companies) has been donating software to schools and taking a tax write-off for the full retail cost. Not only is the first one free but it's apparently a tax benefit for MS.
I just returned from days of meetings that involved folks from the NMCI group, NSA, NIST, DoD, NAVSECGRU , CyberCorps and lots of others. I can assure you that within this area of the Fed (cyber-warfare, crypto, security, intel, etc.) that MS is a laughing stock. In the past this hasn't mattered terribly, but you have to understand that now things are very different. NSA/NIST (partnering as NIAP) now set the standard that all other agencies from the CIA down to the Dept. of Ag MUST follow. They establish the common criteria, define new directives and standards, etc. etc. aud nausiem. While MS isn't being thrown out, they are being gelded. It is a matter of time until the attitude held by these folks permiates the Fed as a whole. Linux is being pushed not becuase it's free, but because it's more readily secured. Much talk was bantied about on lots of OSS packages. I personally gave an impromptu class after hours to some of the less technical folks on installing and using Thunderbird + Enigmail + WinPT (GPG). Perhaps Linux/OSS truly is viral. It certainly is spreading as if it were. Keep the faith my friends.
Quoting from the article:
"Government Entities: Microsoft intends that this product be used in accordance with applicable laws and regulations for the evaluation, use and benefit of your government agency only," Microsoft states in the note. "You may, at your discretion, return this product package to Microsoft at its expense."
Okay, sending back at Microsoft's expense is easy. Just send it via UPS SonicAir same-day service. Doing a quick quote, from Texas (for example) back to Redmond would cost at least $264.94. Also, be sure to send it in the evening so that nighttime charges apply, and from obscure locations so the extended mileage also figures into the cost. If you do it right, you could get it up into the thousands depending on location (overseas stations?) and time of day. If there aren't any commercial flights, you can have UPS charter a plane just for your CD. Oh, and send each CD back separately for maximum effect.
When you absolutely, positively, have to stick it to Microsoft.
Want to improve your Karma? Instead of "Post Anonymously", try the "Post Humously" option.
The $20 / $50 rule is one of the key rules on employees accepting gifts from sources outside the government. This information paper is designed for employees of the Department of Defense (DoD).
1. General rule against gifts. DoD employees are generally prohibited from accepting gifts that are from a "prohibited source" or that are offered "because of the employee's official position." [5 CFR 2635.202(a)]
2. Definitions. The definition of "prohibited source" includes companies and organizations that do business or seek to do business with DoD. [5 CFR 2635.203(d)] A gift is offered "because of the employee's official position" if it is offered because of the status, authority or duties associated with the employee's Federal position. [5 CFR 2635.203(e)] "Market value means the retail cost the employee would incur to purchase the gift. An employee who cannot ascertain the market value of a gift may estimate its market value by reference to the retail cost of similar items of like quality." [5 CFR 2635.203(c)]
3. Exceptions. There are about 30 exceptions to the general rule against gifts. One exception, which is called the $20 / $50 rule, provides that an employee may accept gifts of up to $20 in market value per source per occasion, so long as the total market value of the gifts received (under this rule) from one source does not exceed $50 in a calendar year. [5 CFR 2635.204(a)] One may not accept cash under the $20 / $50 rule. [5 CFR 2635.204(a)]
4. Examples. Here are two examples of gifts that may be accepted under the $20 / $50 rule. First, an employee who gives a speech as part of her official duties may accept a thank you gift having a value of $20. Second, an employee may accept three $16 lunches from a DoD contractor in a calendar year.
5. Buying down to $20. If you are offered a gift that has a value over $20, you may not "buy the gift down" to $20. [5 CFR 2635.204(a)] For example, if you are offered a $21 ticket to a baseball game, you may not pay $1.00 to whomever is offering the ticket, and then accept the ticket under the $20 / $50 rule.
6. Combining items. If you are offered two separate items on the same occasion, and each item has a value under $20, and the items together have a value over $20, you may accept one of the items and decline the other. For example, if you give a speech as part of your official duties, and you are offered a $6 coffee mug and a $15 pen as thank you mementos, you may keep one or the other, but not both. [5 CFR 2635.204(a)(Example 2)]
7. Different sources on the same occasion. Under the $20 / $50 rule, you may accept gifts of up to $20 in value "per source per occasion." This means that the $20 limit applies separately to each company or organization that is offering you a gift on a particular occasion. Here is an example from the ethics regulation.
During off-duty time, an employee of the Department of Defense (DoD) attends a trade show involving companies that are DoD contractors. He is offered a $15 computer program disk at X Company's booth, a $12 appointments calendar at Y Company's booth, and a deli lunch worth $8 from Z Company. The employee may accept all three of these items because they do not exceed $20 per source, even though they total more than $20 at this single occasion. [5 CFR 2635.204(a)(Example 5)]
8. Impermissible gifts. If an employee receives a gift that cannot be accepted under the $20 / $50 rule (or any of the other gift rules), the employee must do one of the following (unless the item is accepted by the agency under specific statutory authority). If the gift is a non-perishable tangible item, the employee must either return the item to the donor or pay the market value of the item to the donor. If the gift is a perishable item and it is not practical to return the item (such as flowers or a fruit basket), the item (at the discretion of the employee's supervisor or ethics official) may be given to an appropriate charity, may be sha
I bet a school could really save some money by getting those "free as in beer" copies of Office.
But hey, why should schools save money?
Unfortunately, due to the current conflicts our choice of couriers is limited, so we will have to return the CDs by loading them in pamphet-dispersion canisters and dropping them on your Redmond, WA offices.
Love,
The Army
That doesn't square at all with my experience... former Air Force talking here.
Most pilots are bright folks, they just stumble when confronted with an area where they have no background or training (like anyone). If you're starting from scratch, Linux is just as intuitive as anything manufactured by microsoft.
Incidently, the Air Force has plenty of tech-saavy people, often in the form of reservists. I've had systems guys in deployed locations who were company-grade officers... but senior software engineers at major corporations, often using linux on-the-job. Many of them hated our reliance on MS products, and looked for ways to use more-functional things every chance they got. Good grief... our NT servers in Saudi Arabia had to be rebooted monthly or they'd simply cease to function (don't even get me started on service packs).
MS is not the way... it is a way, and that's all you can say. Pilots are more than swift enough to use linux if you gave them a little training.
Even if a man chops off your hand with a sword, you still have two nice, sharp bones to stick in his eyes.