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MS Hires The Salesman Who Won Munich For SUSE
ron_ivi writes "In a move reminiscent of the 1997 MSFT/Borland Lawsuits, Microsoft has hired the SUSE sales guy who won Munich for SUSE.
So if you want a job in this tough job market, just be wildly successful at your current job and Microsoft will come recruit you. (Another interesting Microsoft hire is the chair of the ISO C++ standards body as their VisualC++.NET architect.) Personally I think it's great that they recognize talented individuals and reward them well."
Yes, it's war, and microsoft is not above recruiting the enemy's best lieutenants.
MP3 Search Engine
Don't be successful.
Of $0, but he opted to go with Microsoft anyway.
Anyone know if they're happy with Linux in Munich?
-- jaf
they hire Linus as head Longhorn coder?
Microsoft is well known for their great hiring practices. I know quite a few of thier employees and they all are some of the best in the fields they specialise in. MS is pretty good at weeding out the chaff.
In God we trust, all others require data.
In sales it's all about making the money. I bet M$ will pay him better then anyone else has the ability to. Not a bad deal for him.
Evolution or ID?
I wonder how many good job offers MS has floated by Linus?
Schrodinger's cat is either dead or really pissed off...
Get Munich back on Windows!
His boss: OK, you're on probation until you get this first sale. There's this council in Munich...
Personally I think it's great that they recognize talented individuals and reward them well.
Or did they hire him to make him less of a threat?
The heat from below can burn your eyes out
Bill Gates: "Buy him out, boys."
My other processor is big-endian.
So if you want a job in this tough job market, just be wildly successful at your current job...
Thanks for turning the obvious into yet another anti-MS rant. Perhaps you should go into the inspirational poster business.
Why not hire those you think are best if you can afford them? And I'm not seeing these people being conscripted.
Dogma - "let's just say we'd like to avoid any empirical entanglements."
Can I expect an appointment letter ?
for the last time people, I am "frodo from middle eaRTH", not "middle eaST".
If its Herb Sutter you are talking about, he's been with microsoft for awhile now. He's posted a few articles on msdn about C++ on things like conformance and feature improvements to VS.net
So people trusted this guy to switch 10k machines to linux. Now, how will people look at his face when he is promoting windows OVER linux? Seems there isn't such thing as integrity.
Open Source Java Web Forum with LDAP authentication
Microsoft actually does have a pretty good hiring process, if a little brutal. But a lot of people are saying things like "well, at least somebody recognizes that exceptional people are worth it" -- I don't think that these examples are exactly displaying that. Microsoft has been hiring relatively exceptional people for a long time now; the only difference is that these people already have multinational acclaim in their profession.
Just thought I'd point that out -- this is a good move and everything, but hiring people that are already well-known in their field is neither A) necessarily good news for those of you stumping for MS jobs, or B) particularly cost-effective for Microsoft.
On a side note, the REAL message that this is sending to professionals around the world is this: Hurt Microsoft And Get Hired. Whether a lawyer, programmer, politician or standards' body member -- I encourage all exceptional individuals to put all of their skill towards the destruction of Microsoft. They like it! Really!
That's not why they're doing it. They have hired him because he has proved he is good at what he does. Microsoft know that having him on their 'side' will bring in more revenue, which is the aim of most businesses, isn't it?
isn't that he won't eventually give it all away or do some good, I believe him when he says that he will. However, people like Gates and those that run Microsoft have very little faith in people. Their arrogance is hard to beat. Even for such wildly successful people as those new hires, I wouldn't doubt for a second that they are getting a mere fraction of what Microsoft makes off them. Why would a proposed philanthropist such as Gates withhold all that cash, even from their "wildly successful" new hires? I think the answer is simple, he doesn't have faith in people to do the right thing with that money. This is of course if we take Gates at his word when he says he wants to help people with that money. While Bill Gates may eventually give talented people a chance, the damage he has done to the system by hoarding all that cash and unfairly eliminating competition far outweighs the benefits that will happen when he does give it away.
Or else Msoft will get their sh!# together and there will be no reason to ever switch.
why is this news? He quit SuSE in 2003 and he got a new job.
slightly OT, but there's so much grumbling on slashdot about not enough jobs for IT people...
I remember reading somewhere that there was a high demand for IT guys in the automotive industry... lemme google...
ah, there it is
New Cars getting too expensive to fix
The interesting paragraphs are near the bottom:
"There's no shortage of general technicians, but there is a big shortage of qualified people to work on drivability and emissions issues," says Robert Rodriguez of Automotive Service Excellence. The Leesburg, Va., organization certifies repair shops and technicians.
These specialist technicians need advanced reading, problem-solving, and basic electronics skills, he says. "The best people to find are those who have worked in the IT [information technology] industry," he says.
--
I think it would be amusing if this same salesmen, KarlAigner, can go back to the City of Munich and win them back to Microsoft products. That would be salesmanship!! :P
Harpo Tunnel Syndrome--my wrist feels funny.
He began his new role April 1, Microsoft said Tuesday.
Say no to software patents.
From the C|Net article, dateline May 7, 1997:
Yocam maintains that Microsoft is luring personnel away with huge signing bonuses, some in excess of $1 million. "They have the audacity to send limos to Borland's headquarters to take Borland employees out to lunch. I mean, this has got to stop."
Ah, the good old days. Million-dollar signing bonuses. Limos for job prospects. Corvettes for hot programmers fresh out of college. Penthouse suites with the company logo in genuine Italian marble.
Why did it ever have to end?
Oh, wait, don't answer that...
Stressed? Me? Of course not. Stress is what a rubber band feels before it breaks, silly.
You have no idea how business works do you? You don't buy a competitor who is/has beating/beaten you to destroy them, you buy them in order to use their assets/skills/tech/etc for your own purposes. Only a fool destroys their betters! If you knew anything about business you would know it is in your best interest to hire the best people you can, yes, they might be a threat, they could destroy you from the inside and leave you hanging... but that is far better then the alternative of hiring your inferiors and being safe and secure, firm in the knowledge that they can never harm you and take your job/company/business/etc.
Help Brendan pay off his student loans
...next time that guy shows up in Munich on a sales call.
"Okay, you know all that stuff I told you? Nevermind. I've got something better, now... hey! Put down the pitchforks! Aiiiiieeee!"
OtakuBooty.com: Smart, funny, sexy nerds.
Sales is about selling... it has precious little to do with making the world a better place.
Yeah, It's just like when Darth Vader tried to get Luke to join him. After Luke had destroyed the first Death Star, Vader and Palpatine realized what a great asset he could be. They offered him the chance of a lifetime, just wanted to reward him for his good work, and what did the whiny brat do? Goes and kills them both and destroys the empire's last change of survival. He ruined the livelyhoods of millions of innocent emperial employees, not to mention the thousands he murdered, just for some hippy idealism. If only he had been more grateful like these two guys, maybe the world could have been a better place.
Herb Sutter mentions planned C++/.Net CLR extensions being discussed for later inclusion in the C++ standard in last months C/C++ Journal. (Sorry, there is no link on their site yet.) I thought it odd that the chairman of such a standards board would mention M$ proprietary software so favorably. Then I saw that he works for M$ and understood perfectly. No conflicts of interest here. Enough to make you sick. I wonder what Stroustoup thinks of this. What next? A Microsoftie on Sun's Java steering committee perhaps?
an ill wind that blows no good
Did you ever see the movie "The Devil's Advocate"? Same principle in operation here.
Cantankerous old coot since 1957.
First off, Herb Sutter joined MS over 2 years ago. He freely admitted that people would think weird of him to join such a company, but Visual Studio .NET's C++ conformance has greatly increased to the point of almost leading the industry. The current C++ compiler is missing a few esoteric language features and the 'export' keyword, but otherwise it compiles complex C++ just fine. This is a massive improvment over their previous offerings and is no doubt attributable to Mr. Sutter's involvement.
So your statement is completely misguided, and I assume that you aren't a C++ programmer that uses MS tools. Otherwise you would laud their efforts to bring the development community a solid (and partially free) tool for use under Windows.
"In a move reminiscent of the 1997 MSFT/Borland Lawsuits..."
This is *nothing* like the Borland lawsuit. Your own link says that's about hiring a large number of key staff thus draining the business.
This is about hiring one key person. Apart from hiring from a competitor (standard practice) there is no resemblance at all.
Read reviews of shopping cart software
Am I the only one that sees this as buying out the competition?
Which is a long held tradition in the business world. With the caveat that you cannot always do it -- there's that irritating little bit about freedom of choice. If someone doesn't want to sell their business to you (or, more particularly in this case) work for you, they don't have to.
And some guy is making the world better by furthering a standard. Let's hire him so that our C++ becomes the only stardard the world must follow.
Of course, the reality here is that VC++ was close to rock bottom when it came to meeting the ISO C++ standards (particularly in regards to the STL). Since Herb Sutter was hired by MS they have drastically improved compatibility with the standard, both in the compiler and in their STL. I don't think they're the most compliant, but they're a damn sight better than a lot of other compilers, GNU g++ included.
As for changing the standard for MS's benefit -- by merely stating that it proves that you have absolutely no clue how the ISO committees work, particularly when it comes to languages.
Oh, and in case you're wondering -- no, I don't use MS VC++. I code in Unix with g++. But I'm not a clueless moron.
MS seems to assume that they lost the sale because the Linux side had superior marketing instead of a superior product.
Who says you can't do both? This way they get the best of both worlds: They have him, and can use his talents. Meanwhile, SuSE has to scramble to find someone of comparable ability, or lose ground. You *can* have your cake and eat it too!
*That's* how successful corporate raiding works.
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Munich decided that Linux was cheap, extendable, powerful and usable enough to suit their purpose...so Microsoft hired the guy who told them all this?
/
If I write a database engine that even an idiot can administer, will Microsoft then hire the idiot?
Ade_
Big Bubbles (no troubles) - what sucks, who sucks and you suck
There's a very simple term for this kind of hiring. It's called "smart business". If somone proves that they can do something great for your competitors, like pull off a massive sales coup, then that's the kind of guy you want on your staff. The same applies to engineering, politics, and a host of other enterprises.
For example, the guy who designed the S2000 for Honda designed the 300ZX turbo for Nissan. (Both are benchmark designs for the auto industry.) David Gergen worked for both the Nixon and the Clinton administrations. (He may have worked for Reagan, but I'll need to check to be sure.) Hilary Clinton was president of her college's chapter of the Young Republicans, and technology companies exchange employees regularly.
It's good to use your head, but not as a battering ram.
"...Personally I think it's great that they recognize talented individuals and reward them well."
Yeeeaaa... that's been the M$ employee experience. NOT!
Maybe this guy was successful because SUSE is an actual solution to business technology?
Sales guy:
"All that stuff I told you when I was working for SuSE was BULLSHIT. But now, you can believe everything I say. We ... ah going to pump ... YOU up!"
Research shows that 67% of those who use the term "research shows", are just making shit up.
Steve Jobs talked to Linus Torvalds about hiring him. He mentioned it in an interview. It's no big deal, and not a "PR nightmare"--well, on Slashdot everyone would suddenly claim it's a PR nightmare, but outside this little niche nobody else would care!
Personally I think it's great that they recognize talented individuals and reward them well."
Yes, that is great. There is also nothing wrong with taking such an offer.
But the effect is still anti-competitive. Microsoft has the money to buy up just about any talent around the world they like to. Where would the computer industry go if everybody who knows how to do anything gets hired by Microsoft? Because that's where this is going.
The people to do something about this are not Microsoft or the individuals involved, but government regulators.
It's called having a job. If you're a salesperson, guess what? You sell what you're HIRED TO SELL!
Only on Slashdot, made up mostly of college students and unemployed, would it be considered a bad thing and a "lack of integrity" to sell things for one company and then go over and sell things for another.
It's not like the rest of the world views everything as "Windows vs. Linux" like you do. It's just another product the guy's gonna be selling. More power to him! The anti-capitalism mindset that permeates around here is so silly sometimes.
A very brief peek of Microsoft's career website shows that that's probably not Microsoft's standard practice. For one, do a job search on their page. A LOT ot bachelor's degrees there. Second, have a peek at their tuition reimbursement page.
I remember laughing at Microsoft's posters at school. The company wanted to hire some inters for the summer, then, as the poster promised, the good ones would be offered full-time positions. At that point of time I said, "Bullshit, I am never going to work for them. I am a Linux geek. I hate that company!"
I have been out of college for almost a year. I wish I had applied to Microsoft and interned there instead of different small companies around New England. Why? Well, first of all, they offered a good paycheck, secondly, the company did not have major layoffs compared to some other IT giants. Finally, with $50K in loans, I could use a job that paid well.
Do not get me wrong, I still like Open Source and none of my home (and work) computers run Windows. However, paycheck is a paycheck. I am sure that sales guy felt the same way too. It is nice to do what is right, but sometimes you have to do what you must in order to survive. Good for him, I hope he does a good job and then gets out when shit hits the fan.
Joe Llywelyn Griffith Blakesley
[This post is in the public domain (copyright-free) unless otherwise stated]
Of what use is the opinion of someone who is paid to think a certain way?
being anti-capitalism doesn't have anything to do with it.
"Keep your friends close ... and your enemies closer"
Never by hatred has hatred been appeased, only by kindness - the Buddha
I would say that it's a bit doubtful, for a couple reasons.
First, Linus is first and foremost a kernel developer. As far as I can tell, Microsoft does not go in for particularly heavy development on their kernel.
Second, they know that it's unlikely that Linus would take it. Linus could make a lot more money by working at Red Hat or similar, but has chosen not to do so to avoid biasing Linux. He really likes doing the open source Linux, and it's unlikely that he'd stop doing something that he really likes doing (for Chrissake, he has a world-famous software product named after him) for something that he doesn't like doing as much but gets more money for.
Third, Linus is a nice, highly visible person. He'd be great for a tech company that wants to say "Linus Torvalds works here", but normally big software companies are going to want to keep their kernel developers a bit more under wraps -- they don't want people and media constantly prodding them and increasing the chance that information about new features will leak.
Fourth, while Linus is a skilled hacker, his most extensive experience is with the Linux kernel. Honestly, there are certainly going to be people out there more familiar with Microsoft's work.
If MS eventally loses enough of the market -- and I think that this will happen, though probably later than sooner -- they will probably quite happily operate selling an "MS Linux" distribution, just like companies that pushed formats competing with CD-R eventually fell into line. There are lots of ways to establish monopolies with a Linux distribution -- Microsoft's favorite tools, closed formats and protocols, are still available. *Then* having Linus onboard might be useful. But, I think, not in the current environment.
May we never see th
"Personally I think it's great that they recognize talented individuals and reward them well" Microsoft rewards self-promoters; I know no fewer then a gross of talented, hard working, money making machines that Microsoft allowed to be ass-fucked by bad managers and inept coworkers. Case in point: Alex StJohn single handedly (ok, three people...but who's counting) created DirectX in his spare time. DirectX made, and continues to make, MSFT a mountain of money. Alex was handed his head for being wildly succesful.