MS Rails On Open Source, Appeals To Gov't Greed

Bill Harper writes "Open source software is a 'waste of money,' a Microsoft executive has said. He goes on to say that governments planning to use it will damage their own economies and that giving away source code is shooting yourself in the foot. What's interesting though is that this is just the latest in a series of nonsense arguments put forward by MS in Asia because it's scared of Linux stealing the market. An early one was that open-source software is anti-competitive!" Funny thing is, the MS executive (Chris Sharp) used to work for Red Hat.

Comments

FUCKALL! MS RAILS AGAINST MY COCK! COCK! COCK!

[Anonymous Coward]

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But what about Saskatchewan?

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm still under the impression that Saskatchewan is the greatest place on the planet to rasie a family. Can anyone confirm or deny this?

Wanna cyber?

[Anonymous Coward]

I've got my robe and wizard hat.

YOU FAIL IT TO MY GAPING ANUS, BITCH!!!!!!!!

[Anonymous Coward]

YOU FAIL IT!

MOD ME UP! I CAN MAKE FUN OF C# TOO! LOOK!

[Anonymous Coward]

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x__\______\/____--~~__________~--__|_\_____|____x_ _
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g____\______\_________.--------.______\|___|____g_ _
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a___|_____________|____/_______\__\___________|_a_ _
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s___|_________/_/______\__/\___/____|__________|s_ _
e__|_________/_/________|____|_______|_________|e_ _
x__|__________|_________|____|_______|_________|x_ _
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Very Interesting...

[somethingwicked]

he's just some greedy bastard

Do you know Mr. Sharp? My guess is no, BUT you never can tell, maybe he was your college roommate and he drank more than his fair share of beer while flirting with your girlfriend.

Maybe you read an article in some OSS mag that gave all the details of his betrayal and turn to the Dark Side...

Maybe he was fired from RedHat...and M$ offered him a job

Maybe he moved and was not permitted to continue working for Redhat.

MAYBE M$ did offer him F-loads of money and stock options and he decided it wasn't evil in any way to go there

I look forward to hearing your sources (just leave out the details of how he corrupted your girl if that's the case...)

Har har fuckface.

[Anonymous Coward]

no text for the rash-laden fuckwad.

Re:to the contrary, it's a more efficient use of $

[lukewarmfusion]

Their site alone is a fairly good support tool. There aren't nearly as many resources, comprehensive or not, for Linux support. That's not a flaw of Linux - it's just history and inertia. As Linux becomes more mainstream, there will be much better free/generic support.

Mid-size and large companies often have support agreements (for a hefty price, but it's usually effective) with Microsoft. Call 'em up, get a person, and sometimes you'll get a fix just for your problem. Kinda makes you wonder what drives their patches - the future implications and risks, or the immediate buck behind the phone call?

Re:to the contrary, it's a more efficient use of $

[Anonymous Coward]

I know, you are probably a liar, one of the slashdot idiots out there, but your stupid calculation of ROI is not credible to the people with money. The minute you tell your bullshit, they will kick your ass. The studies conducted clearly shows that Microsoft has a lower TCO than Linux in many areas. In addition, in most of the cases open source products are imitators of corporations. Linux stole ideas from Unix, Mozilla from Netscape, OpenOffice from StarOffice and so on. In almost all cases, people around the world never made any significant improvement using open source. Open source simply become a tool for IBM and others to attrack developers to work for them for free. But no serious developer will work for nothing.

Microsoft versus Slashdot

[bonch]

So a Microsoft guy said Linux was a waste of money. Cue the mocking article.

How is it different from Linux zealots saying Windows is a "waste of money?" You guys are just as one-sided, closed-minded, and full of self-serving ideology as they are, except that it's worse with you because for them it's just a paying job, but for you it's a religious belief.

Re:Microsoft versus Slashdot

[bonch]

Linux also costs time.

Hooray for Slashdot

[Darth Cider]

Calling attention to nonsense coming from MS is a huge public service. Thanks.

Re:to the contrary, it's a more efficient use of $

[Halfbaked Plan]

There are millions of Linux 'experts' in IRC channels and in Usenet groups. There are tons of half-written and often obsolete HOWTO documents. There are dozens of people telling you dozens of ways of doing each simple task.

That's not necessarily a good thing. It's not what management at a company wants to rely on. It's a good opportunity for sales-types to sell a Linux solution and clean up after the committment with support lock-ins, though. Again, that's not what management at a company wants to rely on.

I use Linux at home and have had a lot of success with it (I prefer NetBSD, personally, but that's an aside, I've used Slackware in various capacities since the first half of the 90's). I'm not sure I advocate it for everybody.

Re:And the Asian government reps just nod and smil

[JohnFluxx]

To be fair, you did say "..pushing their false religion" which is loaded enough to be asking for trouble.

Also why do you put your email address on slashdot if you don't accept unsolicited email?

Re:Religious Freaks in ChinaTown

[Ckwop]

Argh.. If theres one thing that makes me troll on Slashdot it's Christian fundamentalism.

Why do you think these people want to be converted? If they wanted to believe in Christ they would already.. the dude already gets enough coverage.

I think a key problem with religious fanatics is a total lack of perspective. They just can't see how someone living thousands of miles away from your local church might could come to entirely different conclusions on their choice of diety (if they even have one) - I mean there's only one god right and that *he's* American and *he's* Christian?

Listen up Christian America: "99% of people you try to convert (read: indoctrinate) think your ideas and your god are bullshit!"

Before you mod me as troll, Sit back and think about what you're *actually* telling these people! You're giving them the ultimate insult by saying they're leading a life on the darkside.. I life without Christ - A life of sin.

Simon.

Fucking hilarious, mods

[bonch]

Do you know I was paraphrasing a famous quote, "Linux is free only if you do not value your time?"

If I say something like that, it must be a "Troll," right? Way to censor a dissident opinion just because you disagree with it. I fully expect it all to be reversed in metamods--like it always is.