Microsoft and 'An Open and Honest Discussion'?

Simon Brooke asks: "I have today received from Microsoft a flyer about an event entitled 'Microsoft and Open Source 20/20 Seminar: An open and honest technology discussion'. Microsoft are touting one of their speakers as an 'independent analyst'. All the other speakers are either Microsoft employees or represent businesses related to Microsoft. The 'independent' speaker is Philip Dawson of Meta Group, and his job title is given as 'Senior Program Director, International Infrastructure Strategies'. He's described as 'a leading authority on Linux, high end UNIX, Windows server platforms and storage'. Among the 'seminar benefits' is listed 'question the platform and Linux technical experts' so clearly their pitch will be to present this guy is a 'Linux technical expert'. Anyone prepared to help me out here? Have Microsoft held similar events in your part of the world, and if so how did you respond? Do you have any scoop on Mr Dawson?" Sounds like more par for the course from Microsoft. Nevertheless, it doesn't hurt to go into these things armed with more information...that is if you are in to events like these. "The event (which is free) is being held on:

• 10th June - London
• 17th June - Edinburgh
• 29th June - Manchester
• 7th July - Newport

There's more about it and a sign-up form here.

Consequently it would help enormously if people going to the event had some low-down on this guy. He's apparently written a recent report entitled 'Linux Adoption: An OS for the Masses?' but unfortunately it seems you have to pay chunky amounts of money to get access to it. It would be extremely interesting if someone had read it, particularly if it contained factual errors or obvious misinformation. It would also be interesting to know in what ways he has worked with or for Microsoft in the past."

Comments

He's ex-SCO

[ear1grey]

Mr. Dawson has a biog page on which it notes that he's ex-SCO.

Re:He's ex-SCO

[Da Masta]

Whoa, that's the quickest M$FUD (tm) rebuttal I've ever seen -- props!

Re:He's ex-SCO

[ear1grey]

Clarification: being ex-SCO could count either way, I'm not throwing stones; I'm just discussing the geology.

Re:He's ex-SCO

[andreMA]

Even more curious... (from the Bio):

Prior to joining META Group, he was competitive market research manager for Sequent Computer Systems, Europe. In this role, he worked within product marketing to help develop Unix/NT integration strategies and the introduction of Intel IA32/IA64 NUMA platforms. Previously, he worked at Santa Cruz Operation as product marketing manager for all layered products

My memory may be failing me, but aren't (1) the IBM/Sequent relationship and (2) NUMA both issues of contention in SCO v. IBM?

Re:He's ex-SCO

[ctr2sprt]

Guilt by association? A lot of people work at SCO, and a lot of them are just doing it so they can pay the bills. In fact, probably the overwhelming majority of SCO employees have absolutely no influence on the company's Linux policy. Even discounting all that, this guy used to work at SCO, but doesn't now. Who knows why that is? Maybe he saw that Unix was going out of style there, and since that was his specialty he quit. Maybe he heard about the lawsuits and thought "I don't want to have anything to do with this, I'm going to find another job." Or hell, maybe they just didn't pay him enough. The point is, you have no actual information, so it's incredibly unfair to paint this guy as evil just because he, at one point, worked for a company we dislike.

Forgive me if I read too much into your words, but the blind hatred of SCO on /. means that everyone else is going to read you the same way.

Re:He's ex-SCO

[ear1grey]

Guilt by association?

Absolutely not, for all the reasons you mention - hence my almost immediate clarification (7 mins after the original post).

Re:He's ex-SCO

[ctr2sprt]

Well, now you know it took me more than 7 minutes to write that out. You'll have to take my word for it that when I first started writing, your clarification hadn't made the comments yet.

Re:He's ex-SCO

[DjReagan]

One other thing to keep in mind when associating people with SCO - is which particular SCO is being talked about? There's the "Santa Cruz Operation" which had been around for quite some time, and produced Xenix, SCO Open Server, etc. They purchased the UNIX System V business from Novell. I like to call them Old SCO.

Then there's Caldera Systems. They purchased much of the assets of Old SCO (who then changed their name to Tarentella) and then renamed themselves to The SCO Group. These are the people who are currently involved in all the litigation etc against IBM, Novell, Redhat, Daimler Chryster and Autozone.

Re:He's ex-SCO

[Spoing]

1. A lot of people work at SCO, and a lot of them are just doing it so they can pay the bills.

I'll cut him slack since he worked at SCO. I can't cut anyone slack who currently works at SCO. Have a spine and do the right thing, people!

Re:He's ex-SCO

[Spoing]

1. Quitting a decent paying job and starving your dependents because your CEO is an ill-informed moron isn't "the right thing".

Yes, it is. I've done it.

Digging the dirt... and dirtying yourself.

[Roman_(ajvvs)]

It would be extremely interesting if someone had read it, particularly if it contained factual errors or obvious misinformation. It would also be interesting to know in what ways he has worked with or for Microsoft in the past.

I'm not surprised at the presence of such an obviously prejudicial statement on slashdot. But it's concerning when the prejudice starts in the introductory write-up... but then, maybe I'm reading into things.

It could've been written like so:

It would be extremely interesting if someone had read it, particularly if it contained balanced arguments or accurate comparisons between linux and windows. It would also be interesting to know in what ways he has has contributed to the (FL)OSS effort.

Re:Digging the dirt... and dirtying yourself.

[Too Much Noise]

I believe you sir are in the wrong place - if you want an open and honest discussion, then MS has just the right seminar. We here on /. are only into digging for the dirty laundry (except if it's about some hot babes, in which case by all means, let's dig for some clean lingerie instead).

Re:Digging the dirt... and dirtying yourself.

[verittaas]

I'm not surprised at the presence of such an obviously prejudicial statement on slashdot. But it's concerning when the prejudice starts in the introductory write-up... but then, maybe I'm reading into things.

Well, come to the real world, my boy. The world is not fair and square, so "certain" subjects has to be dealt with in that in mind. Especially those involving M$.

Re:Digging the dirt... and dirtying yourself.

[Wardish]

Something to consider...

1000 statements that are true and correct don't carry the weight of one statement that shows someone lied.

So if you in fact suspect that someone may be prejudiced on a point then it's only prudent to search for evidence of that. No amount of evidence saying he's fair and reasonable can trump one solid example not being so.

puhleeze

[sydlexic]

this is an advocacy site. you're not seriously expecting 'fair and balanced' are you?

Re:puhleeze

[Roman_(ajvvs)]

I'm not expecting 'fair and balanced', but then this being an advocacy site, that must mean I can advocate it, right?

You should see the note on my info page... I wrote it when I first joined.

Re:puhleeze

[sydlexic]

yes, 'fair and balanced' was in the sarcastic typeface. most browsers fail to render this properly.

Relax

[blackwater]

How many ways does it have to be said: open source is winning so let's just relax. It should go without saying but most people at MS are just, erm, people with the same interests, ideals and values as everyone else. I know it's amusing (not least to me) to demonise them but I think that is a tad unfair.

I once had a MS guy wheeled in to tell me that J2EE was fundamentally broken and that he'd spent 2 years at Barclays bank (it's a UK high-street bank) trying to get it to work and it just wouldn't. This went on for 30 mins or so. Then I invited him to come around the corner (literally) and see the J2EE-based demo my team had put together in the previous 2 days...

I suppose the point is that all companies are basically all about winning contracts and never mind the truth. It sounds stupid to be pointing that out as I'm sure 99% of you deal with that in your daily working life. Yes, MS as a corporation is particularly ruthless but let's not get carried away. They are just the ultimate embodiment of what most corporations would like to be. Don't kid yourself that Apple, Oracle or whoever wouldn't be as evil if they could only figure out how. Well, IMO. If I'm wrong then great. Seriously.

Re:Relax

[krymsin01]

Yeah, just look at the way Redhat is going. *shrug*

Re:Relax

[Graelin]

How many ways does it have to be said: open source is winning so let's just relax.

It's not clear that open source is winning. Small battles here and there surely but the war is far from over.

Even if it were, the OS community should never "relax." This is business, and business is tough. Let your guard down at the wrong time and it's game over.

Re:Relax

[j3ll0]

Hmmmm...ya know, sometimes the rabid advocacy doesn't make sense to me.

I've deployed FreeBSD at client sites, I've deployed Linux at client sites, and I've deployed MS stuff at client sites. You know what the kicker is? You gotta pick the solution for the problem. I've lost count of the times I've thrown in a quick FreeBSD, PHP, MySQL solution to solve a problem, and I've done the same with Linux....

The problem is, you rabid *nix d00dz want OSS installed for everything. I'm sorry....point me at the OSS equivalent of Sharepoint and I'll start deploying that. But until there exists an OSS equivalent of genuinely innovative stuff like this, then Sharepoint is the solution.

You can bitch and moan about MS insecurity, but at the end of the day, if you know your job as a network\system engineer, those problems go away.

As far as open viewpoints go, yep....some of those MS solutions address problems that the zealots haven't even thought of...even MS is allowed to tell us about them

Re:Relax

[MrIrwin]

These are good points. Just don't go to the seminar. People who believe MS has a lowwer TCO will go, and they will believe it whoever is there.

Re:Relax

[Dunkirk]

I'm sorry....point me at the OSS equivalent of Sharepoint and I'll start deploying that.

Plone. Now start deploying that.

But seriously, I had a very high-level IT manager complain that she wanted to replace a home-grown collaboration-site-creation web application with the more polished and integrated SharePoint, but that the costs were enormous. (If you really have installed it for clients, you have already gone through this exercise. For my Fortune 250 company, this is going to range into about a half a million dollars, not counting the hardware and other infrastructure.) Unfortunately, Plone only does a little more than what our home-grown app does, but I throw this out there so that other people can benefit from the technology that 1) don't have a ton of money for it and 2) don't have a talented web development group. Plone does most of what SharePoint does. It only lacks the usual Microsoft lockin..., er, integration.

Re:Relax

[Etyenne]

You can bitch and moan about MS insecurity, but at the end of the day, if you know your job as a network\system engineer, those problems go away.

Wishful thinking ...

• Network/system engineer (whatever that mean) that know their job are, unfortunately, a minority. If this was not the case, all these worms that exploited vulnerabilities for which patch where released would have been dud.
• Security problems never go away. They come back, and back, and back again. Not that Linux is any better, mind you.

Re:Relax

[Spoing]

Sharepoint is Microsoft's MS Office-centric Wiki-like document repository. It's good for storage of documents and modest sharing/colaborating. It is not a great tool for colaboration, though. Other Wikis are.

IF the customers are intested in maximum MS Office integration and a filing cabinet-like repository, Sharepoint is great.

IF the customers want to use it as a colaboration tool, or manage non-Microsoft Office formatted data, it's not.

Re:Relax

[0x0d0a]

The problem is, you rabid *nix d00dz want OSS installed for everything.

Damn straight. I've had it up to here with Darl and SCO users pushing for OSS for everything.

Re:Relax

[CaptainTux]

Even if it were, the OS community should never "relax." This is business, and business is tough. Let your guard down at the wrong time and it's game over.

I think that your statement about business actually addresses one of, IMHO, is OSS's weakest point: companies like Microsoft, Oracle, etc are fighting a *business* war. Much of OSS is still stuck fighting an ideological one.

Re:Relax

[Theriault]

Actually, the ideological one will usually win over the long term. Otherwise, humanity looses too much of it's freedom.

Re:who cares?

[krymsin01]

People that don't know what you claim to.

Re:who cares?

[E_elven]

People who hire people like you?

only has a BA

[nri]

in Australia a BA is a bachelor of Art. Its a bullshit degree. Whats a BA mean in the US ?

Re:only has a BA

[ear1grey]

This is a UK Degree: a Bachelor of Art. What you may read between the lines is very limited.

It's common for UK Uni's to share modules between degree courses. The obvious parallel is a BSc (Bachelor of Science) and because this BA is in a scientific subject it's a possibility that this is the case.

I sit next to someone with a BA in CS who's on his first year of a Distributed Computing PhD, he also helped me through my first stage 1 Gentoo build and is a more than competent coder, so like I say, there's not much you can infer here, and to call it a Bullshit Degree is a mistake.

Re:only has a BA

[miyako]

While it may be true that the degree is generally rather easy to get, I don't think that it would necessarily be indicitive of the persons skill in the subject. I'm currently working on a bachelors degree in Computer Information Systems (yes, pretty uch a bullshit degree), however I often find myself aiding a couple of my friends who are working on getting their doctorates in Computer Science.

Re:only has a BA

[Pelops]

Don't confuse education and intelligence. There are lot of people who are extremely good at their job, while they don't have the education for this job. Some people can't afford to study a long time, and well, sometimes, you have to make choices for many reasons and dropping school while you could continue, is not necessarily easy to explain. It is difficult to say this person is dumb because he has only a BA.
Again don't confuse education and intelligence. But again, neither education nor intelligence is preventing people from having no ethic :)

Re:only has a BA

[n3bulous]

In the US, a BA implies less coursework. At my old almer mater, you can get a Poly-Sci BA with 6 in-field classes, whereas my Physics and Astronomy BS required something like 12-14 plus five labs, not including the required math. A BA in Physics required about 7-8 classes.

Re:only has a BA

[Frizzle Fry]

Depends on the school, I think. I got a BA in computer science at Harvard (actually, we call it an "AB" since we insist on doing everything differently). Basically all undergrads there get a BA. The only major ("concentration" for us) we had where a BS ("SB" for us) even exists is engineering, as far as I know. So really, for us a BA just signifies "an undergraduate degree". But there also exist schools where they would call your cs degree a BS, or where both degrees exist and you can pick which one you want. So I wouldn't read to much into it without knowing the school.

Re:only has a BA

[sd3]

It means you can say "You want fries with that?" in another language.

Re:only has a BA

[tverbeek]

The majority of graduates of US four-year college programs get a BA. My BA would have been switched to a BS if I'd taken a few more "science" classes (I think another one in Electronics, more upper-level Math, another CS class) and a few fewer "humanities" classes (in my case I would've had to skip Analytic Philosophy, Psych 2, and Writing Satire). I don't think that makes my degree "bullshit". It just means my studies were broader instead of deeper.

Unless your point is that any four-year degree is "bullshit", which I'd simply have to disagree with. Getting a Masters or PhD is well and good, but it's not at all a prerequisite to being an expert in one's field. Experience is where that comes from.

Re:only has a BA

[JaJ_D]

BA is a bachelor of Art. Its a bullshit degree

I'd disagree. In the UK a BA is an arts degree equivelent to the BSc (both are bachelors degrees).

However Hull Poly is not, how shall we put in, in an Ivy League, more of 2nd tier uni.

I am not slagging off Hull Poly, but it doesn't rate with Oxford, Cambridge, UNIMIST, Durham, Imperial etc..

Jaj

Interesting Tactic: Pay Per View FUD:

[the_other_one]

If you pay for it it must be true. Mega Corporations paid to create^H^H^H^H^H^H find this truth for you.

If your opponents generally can't afford to view your FUD before you present it with a paid shill arguing your opponents view point then your truth shall reign uncontestible...

Well that's just my take on the matter. But then again I thought the Maginot Line was a good idea (tactically speaking).

google?

[Hinkey]

i know its not the most reliable source in the world but you can see his stances on a number of issues by simply googling him, http://www.google.ca/search?q=Philip+Dawson+of+Met a+Group&ie=UTF-8&hl=en&btnG=Google+Search&meta =

The /. Lynch Mob.

[torpor]

He's a witch, can we burn him!

How do you know he's a witch?

He looks like one ...

Sheesh. /. is rapidly devolving into a Fascists paradise.

Re:The /. Lynch Mob.

[peragrin]

Well when he comes flying in on his corporate broom that is labeled Microsoft, and crashes into a house because his broom turned blue. Yea it's an MS Witch.

Beisdes it's fun playing with the minds of the Fascists.

Uhhh

[andfarm]

Microsoft?
Open and honest?

I believe I speak for all of us here when I say: "When pigs fly."

Meta rank themselves among the FUDmeisters

[leonbrooks]

Several of their consultants (Kevin McIsaac comes to mind) have been damning Linux with faint praise for a very long time. I don't know if that converts the leadin from "prejudicial" to "going in with your eyes open" or not, but it certainly raises its point average in my eyes. (-:

"Relax, this won't hurt a bit"

[leonbrooks]

The missing word is, as usual, "me".

This is business, and business is tough. Let your guard down at the wrong time and it's game over.

Agree. As long as Bill has an unfair advantage, he'll be out there pumping it for all it's worth. You'll probably have to drive a stake through his heart to stop him from being greedy and obsessively competitive. He's one bloke I would like to see the JW's get through to.

Anyone who goes to a Microsoft seminar...

[dpbsmith]

...to learn about the respective merits of Windows and Open Source has already made up their mind. There's no point in trying to counter such a seminar.

The only thing worth doing is to try to understand the internal politics that must be going on in your organization if they intend to send anyone to such a seminar.

Whoa.

[/dev/trash]

So Open Source gets one speaker and MS gets how many?

Re:Whoa.

[Duhavid]

Open source gets one speaker *chosen by MS*.

Let someone affiliated with Open Source chose their champion, then the "open and honest" becomes a bit more believable. As it is, it is propaganda.

Not to take away from your good point about the inequality in the numbers....

Information search reveals

[Lando]

Article published in 2000 which says Windows will be the dominate software model displacing UNIX on the server, might be nice to ask him about this. Also since meta group coordinates the opinions expressed by their 2000 consultants worldwide, eg from their corporate info, this is meta groups opinion you might want to ask what meta group's current position is on Linux in both the server and desktop market.

The only bright spot for UNIX is the fact that Oracle scales better on UNIX than on Windows.

In another article he talks about how with the introduction of intels ia64 chip UNIX will be regulated to the back room running a Database and will basically die out.

In article "Wintel Vendors: Data Center Addition?" Sorry no public link.
He opens saying that the impact of Linux on the data center is negligable compared to Windows which growth is expanding faster than anything else.

Looking through this information it also strikes me that he has always help product marketing positions, but has no listed experience actually having implemented and designed any of this.

He is also one of metagroups leading open source knowledgeable people without ever having worked with Linux. link

In this article
he states "anything but Linux on Intel is niche." and seems to poo-poo any thought of running linux on non-intel equipment... Which doesn't speak well for his Linux experience... He claims that they only look at what his clients are doing, so it seems that he won't know about it unless they are doing it and his job is to advise them on what to do... Make your own conclusions...

In this article dated April 20th, 2004 so it should reflect his current position, he seems to be promoting Linux. Definately worth a read through.

And this article back in dec 09th 2002 he states he see's in 5 years windows at the low end and linux at the high end of computing.

Meta Group's position
2001 Linux not on their roadmap
2002 Linux is immature and should not be used in mission critical applications
2003 - current not sure

Overall it looks like he isn't a techie, just a manager that overlooks what consultants in the field are do and provides a "face" for the UNIX department. Doesn't look like he's a Microsoft shrill especially considering the last two articles I left on him.

Hopefully this helps, going to sleep.

Re:Information search reveals

[Lando]

Heck one more link this one April 5th of this year stating Meta's position.

META Trend: With distributed n-tier (DBMS, application, Web) server architectures standardizing on Intel, proprietary Unix (Solaris, HP-UX, AIX) will recede to high-end, low-unit-volume, legacy-platform status by 2005/06, displaced by OSs designed for Intel economics: Windows and Linux. Linux will rapidly mature and gain momentum as an ISV reference platform, moving beyond high-volume Web, technical computing, and appliance server environments into mainstream application and DBMS server roles by 2004/05. Linux server growth will initially be at the expense of Unix (2003/04), but will eventually vie for dominance with Windows (2005/06).

an agnostic/moderate for balance?

[tverbeek]

Another possibility is that he's just a guy who's worked substantially with *n*x (thus making him something of an "expert" on the topic) but who has also come to see some merit in Microsoft's stuff and doesn't mind admitting it. And yes, it has some good points... they're just overshadowed by the bad.

Obviously MS isn't going to hire someone sincerely hostile to their wares for this "open discussion". But that doesn't mean everyone there is necessarily an MS partisan. So, kind of like one of those political-pundit shows where they take a few conservatives then add a moderate or two for "balance", this program will probably have a handful of MS lieutenants giving their sincerely-held variations on the party line, and one or two folks to chime in with "yes, that's true about Windows, but open-source software can do that too" or "but closed-source software isn't always better".

Re:an agnostic/moderate for balance?

[sumdumass]

well, reguardless of how you look at it, it will be nothing more then an infomercial for Microsoft.

The really god ones that actually make you think your watching some news program, then let you down when you belive everything being said and then find out it is on 5 more time that week. If it was an open and honest debate then there prolly would be some people there that we didn't need to look in thier bio to find out who they were.

Or a BS

[Noren]

...and then there is the reverse- Caltech awards no BA degree. It is possible (albeit rare) to earn a BS in Literature. To do so, of course, you'd have to take the core curriculum requirement of six course-years worth of math and physical science.