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When Think Tanks Attack
x1048576 writes "The Alexis de Tocqueville Institution is only one of a dozen different think tanks that have attacked Open Source. Why are all these think tanks so down on Open Source? Well, the Small Business Survival Committee is concerned that using open source will expose small business to the risk of lawsuits. Citizens Against Government Waste is concerned that the government might waste money on Open Source. Defenders of Property Rights is concerned that Open Source might be a threat to intellectual property rights. However, I was able to detect a common theme to all their criticism. They all seem to be funded by Microsoft."
I hate Micro$oft as much as anyone, but does this really surprise anyone here?
They have to get their funding from somewhere... and I think that the large majority of it isn't coming from Open Source. That kind of lobbying costs money you know!
~/words_by_grainfed.txt
Turkeys don't vote for Christmas.
"Accept that some days you are the pigeon, and some days you are the statue." - David Brent, Wernham Hogg
Wasting money on Open Source? Evidently they haven't looked at the Wired article. The one that says that an average Malaysian worker has to work 1,100 (yes, eleven hundred) hours to buy a licensed copy of Windows XP.
Then again, think who these people are funded by.
Being attacked by a think tank? Sounds like we need to get Marvin to go and talk to it into submission.
("What a depressingly stupid tank.")
(Spudley Strikes Again!)
really needs a sanity check and anything they say really should be taken with a grain of salt. They praised Reagan for helping to keep the budget deficit in check.....Now THATS what I call revisionist history!
as opposed to what? Smartly shifting the taxpayer's money to the bank account of the world's richest man?
Someone was bound to think of slashdotting as an appropriate vengeance against the think tanks.
...is some Free Software using Institutes to come out against Windows and proprietary software.
I'm sure funding for this could be had from IBM, HP, Red Hat, etc...
Join the Free Software Foundation
And this surprizes you, why?
Now, if you'll excuse me, I have backups to corrupt.
I for one think that the public criticism of the Open Source developer community is healthy. While we never like being ridiculed or having our flaws pointed out, it does have one advantage: increased introspection.
M$ is playing the same card every corporation and goverment has done in history: taking advantage of people's fears of what they don't understand.
Which is nice.
That if Microsoft has that much money to spend on think tanks and spin doctors, if they spent that much money on improving their products instead of spreading FUD where would they be today!
Microsoft are by many considered the driving force behind the BSA, who seems to have co-authored the software patents directive of the European Commission.
the good text is at the bottom, imho. start here:
They have a word in Washington for the corporate-sponsored outcry, the grassroots movement that isn't: AstroTurf. By far the most comical example of this is to be found at the Freedom to Innovate Network (Fin), a "non-partisan, grassroots network of citizens and businesses who have a stake in the success of Microsoft and the high-tech industry". Fin doesn't try particularly hard to appear independent--its website, after all, is housed on Microsoft's own--but it has as its online centrepiece a lengthy collection of testimonials from activist groups with vaguely alarming names: the Centre for the Moral Defence of Capitalism, Frontiers of Freedom, Defenders of Property Rights. Their comments appear unsolicited and independent: it certainly looks like there is a groundswell of support for the beleaguered computer giant.
In the spirit of fair use, visit the website for the full story. It's interesting but don't take it as a rallying cry. Just remember to wonder why you see a think tank write a paper next time. In fact remember to wonder why the next person you see says something, in general.
...levels that one of MS's approaches to fighting open source would be to bring up the spectre of lawsuits. Considering the last few years, one would think that Redmond would have a healthy aversion to courtrooms and wouldn't wish that on anyone.
But then, I guess I'm not being a realist. What disappoints me, regardless of history, is that MS is not willing to compete against open source in the marketplace without trying to stack the deck. Have they no confidence in their product? If not, why not? And if not, then why aren't they working to make it better? And if they are, then where are the results?
Don't be a looter...and yes, I know that it's spelled with an "A" instead of an "E".
Just curious...
When old IBMs, Apples, and even Commodore 64s were in the offices of the 80s... was the risk of lawsuits, wasted money on computers, and digital property rights really an issue?
If not,... why now?
READY.
PRINT ""+-0
When think tank, funded by MS, attacks, it's more dangerous than ususal think tank, because it's unpredictable like monkey with a bomb.
Microsoft has been spreading FUD for ages. Now its just getting funneled through other parties. Who cares anyway? Any smart admin knows that Linux/OSS is the way to go when it comes to getting the job done.
How many small business owners do you see in the market for linux servers when they are going to be the admins themselves? None.
Steal This Sig
I am wondering here, is there no point where all this FUD turns illegal?
Can a company sponsor a dozen institutions to spread lies without running any risk of prosecution?
Is a misleading name... they're just lobby groups that are trying to give themselves some credibility.
I can't think of anything witty right now
And poeple say microsoft doesn't innovate
The more of this they do the more they look like morons. The sad thing is not so much that there actually are people out there who believe this dribble. It is that some of them get elected to high political positions. I wonder how long it is before some bunch of corporate arse-kissing politicians and/or lobbyists decalare OSS to be the most evil thing since computer viruses and more likely to bring about the collapse of Western civilization and the American way of life than Al Quaeda?
Oops my bad! they already have...
I wonder is somebody is developing special medication for this crowd? It is a growing market...
Only to idiots, are orders laws.
-- Henning von Tresckow
I misspelled clothes. God, never thought morning posting would be this tough.
But yeah, there's no such thing as 60s or80s close. And you can't wear it, either. Becaues it doesn't exist.
...I'm done.
Until Slashdot fixes the funny modifier, use insightful or interesting. The poster knows your intentions.
Think tanks have turned innovation, insight and thinking into a source of income, and they're seeking to commoditise it.
Put simply, free-thinking outside of a think tank is seen as a threat to their own jobs. In their opinion, open source development should be best left to companies that develop software, in the same way that opinions and insight should come from them, and them only.
Their biggest threat here isn't open source software, it's open source thinking.
A: Microsoft/SCO Dollars
Don't worry about them as it only gives them credibility.
Seems to me they've driven nearly everyone else out of business. BSA might as well be synonymous with Microsoft.
HBI's Law: Frequency of calling others Nazis is directly correlated with the likelihood of the accuser being Communist.
For many of us, this is old news. I can even add one to the list: SCO has also received a bunch of money from the fr?iendly software giant. It seems very obvious: Microsoft is afraid of OSS, but they can't fight it directly, so they hire others to fight it for them. These people play on the fears of managers to make them believe OSS is a Bad Thing. It's wizard's first rule.
Please correct me if I got my facts wrong.
Particularly if they are a small software house. I think its a common misconception here that OS threatens the big players most. It doesnt. They may start using OS tools but will keep getting the big enterprise contracts. If I am a small or niche vendor though and a viable free as in beer OS solution then I can pretty much kiss my business goodbye and find something else to do. I think there is a significant risk of OS polarizing the market into 'pure' OS and the big corporate vendors and taking out all the middle players.
Do not try to read the dupe, thats impossible. Instead, only try to realize the truth
What truth?
There is no dupe
"They all seem to be funded by Microsoft."
/. representing speculation as fact to feed the group think?
I RTFA. I saw lots of speculation that Microsoft funded all of them. I saw lots of examples of previous funding. I saw almost no proof though or in most instances even a strong case (they hired a consultant who had worked for Microsoft? Big deal). Another case of
Read reviews of shopping cart software
And I haven't received almost any funding from Microsoft.
This isn't going to come as any surprise but he's *not* the brightest bulb on the tree. However he's far from alone in that, more's the pity.
Brown sees MS as a *miracle*, like many he looks at the phenomenal financial success, adds the fact that it's nominally 'technology' sector and draws his conclusions.
Now the place I'm working for (which has posted market performance in the same range as MS) just did a celebration of thier 25th anniversary. The founders of the company are both very well off and pretty damned bright guys. One jokingly referred to his early talks with Wall street where he said "we're in the business of being a profitable philanthropy". The other mentioned that "we're in the business of doing the right thing" (does this sound like Google's founders?).
Shortly after, the chief financial officer got up and (predictably -- he's a fan) compared us to Microsoft. The reason is he's a money guy and all he can see is the money / financial success.
In fact if we acted in our markets the way MS does, our clients would show us the door. As it is they respect our engineering, and even our sales force, which is trained very hard to serve the *clients* needs.
Iff OSS follows that model, all the ADTI's in the world won't matter. The fact is that some oss projects (see the recent article linked on /. about why users are 'wrong' in not likeing the new Nautilus 'spatial' design) *don't* think this way, and more's the pity.
Fortunately, those are the exceptions.
Linux is Linux, if One need clarify their dist: <Dist>/GNU Linux
bsds are of course just BSD
Open discussion of both sides of a story promotes greater understanding, so people can make up their own minds. You should only feel threatened by this if you think Open Source has something to hide...
Much as I dislike Microsoft, it appears that Lambert is an archetypical gun banner, with all the errors of logic that implies; a quick glance at the rest of his site yields the usual arguments from authority, "tu quoque", strawmen, "victim as authority" and downright misrepresentation that gun banners are so fond of. Ergo, I have little faith in anything else he says.
Many thoughts hurt the eco systems because they are alien to the environment or may attract the wild life to intake them as food. At first it is hard to detect, but they accumulate and when measureable it might already be too late.
The park ranger will happily receive the wrong thoughts and put them away in think tanks where they are isolated from the wild nature. It is very important to prevent them from contact with the real world.
This message is sponsored by Microsoft, who actively supports all collection of thoughts into tanks
:-) = I am happy
:^) = I am happy with my big nose
C:\> = I am happy with my OS
In the name of Eris, some of those "think tanks" really are full of shit. For example, here's a nice article from the "Small Business Survival Committee" against the recent anti-SUV feelings among several key US people. Their motivation is to be doubted in the first place; why would a think tank that aligns itself with SMALL businesses care about SUV? Non "mom-n-pop" shop/small business will ever produce a SUV. Besides, look at some of their reasoning:
Brilliant. Fucking brilliant. That's an ammount of misinformation that would make many a discordianist proud. I love that logic, how many people died in M1A2 Abrams tanks lately? Probably less then that. So clearly, everyone in the US should drive a M1A2 Abrams MBT. Also, more people die each year by drowning in water then by drowning in hydrochloric acid. Therefore, hydrochloric acid is safer to swim in then water. I'm not even going tom start on their anti-"EC penalty vs MS" article. Since when does MS count as a small business, anyways, to attract their concern?
Hate me!
However, I have yet to speak to anyone who *likes* Microsoft the company, apart from a few people I've crossed paths with who "used to work there".
Therefore, based on the fact that very few people *seem* to like of trust Microsoft, why do Microsoft believe that funding pro-MS think tanks is going to sway public opinion away from Open Source?
To me, Microsoft just seems to be acting like a "spoilt child" these days. No longer is it getting everything it wants when it wants it and so has now gone into a "tantrum" mode and just lashing out to the world.
I'm no business guru but it strikes me that if you head up a company that no-one particularly likes, then you spend some resource improving your reputation in the eyes of the public - try to convince everyone that you care about your image in their eyes, that you want to be seen as a corporation that listens and that you change some of your business processes based upon what people tell you is wrong with the way you do things.
I don't actually care about what these think-tanks say about Open Source because I don't trust Microsoft to tell the truth, let alone the quangos they fund. Why should the rest of the world care about what these think tanks say?
Sometimes, I really get the impression that Gates and his cronies have absolutely no perception of customer perceptions and relaitonships...
Gentoo Linux - another day, another USE flag.
Has it occured to anyone that these people may genuinely believe that Open Source software is a bad thing?
If you think the report is rubbish, attack the report. Claiming Microsoft is to blame makes the whole community look like paranoid idiots.
Companies going with Open Source really don't give a damn about the license. They really (as always) care about functionality, security, and FLEXIBILITY. The whole GPL-is-a-borg-virus thing never really enters into the equation.
Asian and EU governments are sick of bending over and taking it in the *** from Microsoft, period. Proprietary software vs. open source (again) has nothing to do with it. Linux just so happens to be the best hope at sticking it to them right now.
Lawyers and small businessmen, in the end, are not the decision-makers. The ones who know what they are doing focus on business issues, and leave the IT stuff to their IT guy (CTO for big biz, the sysadmin for small biz). The IT guys are jumping over to OSS, no matter how many FUD white papers from "think tanks" get passed around.
MS is chasing the wrong fox here. The problem (for them) is that it's the only one they know how to chase.
davejenkins.com |
The question is did MS fund them to be anti-OSS? Or does MS go looking for anti-OSS organizations to fund?
... that there is gambling in this establishment!
"An unarmed man can only flee from evil, and evil is not overcome by fleeing from it." Col. Jeff Cooper
If you have a web page, make a link to thes /tanks.html
page where the names of all these `institutes'
and their common funding appears:
http://www.cse.unsw.edu.au/~lambert/blog/computer
If enough of us do this, the page above might outgoogle the very frontpages of their sites.
~ish.
Due to the very nature of open source, eventually, the best (general) programs will be open source programs. Period.
Its just a matter of time.
Everyone whose looked into "the business" of open source knows this. Revision after revision after revision. You can think of it like evolution. With the code out there, the only constraints are time and people. With enough time, there will be enough people to revise and continue working on the code.
They _will_ lose marketshare when open source gets popular. Firefox being the example of the first "big one." And boy, is it a doozy. Everyone I know who has tried firefox has stuck with it over IE. Including my mom, who now suggests it to other mom-types that are having computer problems. And thats a lot of moms.
Open source could be considered anti-competative, because the domineering open source program will be so good (in theory) that no competitor will be able to enter the market to compete. It could also be considered "communist" (propaganda-sense) because the work of the few massively benifits the many. Did I mention its free? So they cant compete with price? Not very capitalistic, is it?
Open source is pretty altruistic, at least compared to modern business practices. (then again, not urinating on people could be considered altruistic compared to modern business practices.)
but i digress.
Will this hurt their marketshare? You bet. Will this hurt the marketshare of the entire nation? Maybe, eventually.
no
...but remember, companies are companies. IBM isn't in business to fund HP or Red Hat, they will each want to push their own products. Ultimately, I think numbers will work better than trying to beat Microsoft at their own game.
If anything, one should try to expose it as a coordinated smear campaign. Try to argue that what is really is speaking is but one hydra with many heads. It's very hard to argue that hundreds if not thousands of OSS companies are cooperating to do the same.
Kjella
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
Here is the comment from Mr. APJ Kalam, the president of India, who says that.... To support it there is an example sited by John Perry Barlow, self-styled "Net prophet" and founder of the Electronic Frontier Foundation (www.eff.org) and an outspoken proponent of free speech in digital media. But he explains it very effectively and I think that must be very true and only reason behind this panicky against Open Source.
I'd probably believe Open Source was a bad thing if someone was giving me thousands of dollars to believe that too.
I've had enough abrasive sigs. Kittens are cute and fuzzy.
Linux most important problem is that people don't know about it and that people don't know that it can solve their problem at all.
Microsoft is now solving both problems for us.
Yes, I know that PHBs are in general pretty dumb, but instead of not even considering OpenSource, hundreds of TCO-studies about Linux and Windows will make sure they will:
I personally thank Microsoft for that free advertizing and see it as an act of desperation.
I happen to know some of the guys who run The Center for the Moral Defense of Capitalism. Yes, they are independent, and yes, they probably do get some money from Microsoft. That's right... independent *and* taking money from Microsoft. How's that possible, you may ask?
Well, the simple fact is that these guys are acting on moral principle. They would be doing exactly what they're doing whether or not Microsoft ever gave them a penny, and even if Microsoft opposed them as it (and Bill Gates) sometimes do, because the Center for the Moral Defense of Capitalism believe that their position is true.
I know, I know. Most of you won't believe that people can act on principle, or that ideas about morality can be true or false. I understand. I went to college, too.
One man's religion is another man's belly-laugh. - LL
M$ is playing the same card every corporation and goverment has done in history: taking advantage of people's fears of what they don't understand.
:)
In the software universe, something similar to the Borg from "Star Trek" seems to be at work. It's called open source software distributed under an agreement known as General Public License (GPL).
If you recall, the Borg are "Star Trek" bad guys. They're basically evil bureaucrats with skin problems, who assimilate every species they come in contact with throughout the universe. Societies are wiped out. Individual thought and creativity are extinguished as individuals are absorbed into a collective.
Something similar could be said of GPL-based open source software.
- Raymond Keating "Is Open Source Software Equivalent to the Borg?"
WTF!!! Why do you think we use a picture of BORGBILL to represent M$. RAY THE RETARD!
Secondly he used a bad analogy because Joe Average never watches ST
PS
DAMNIT now i've insulted "Sonia Arrison" by childish shouting and name calling!!! We all need to grow up and SUE people or make a fundamentalist militant group, isn't that how "grown ups" sort problems and make people listen, eh?
For instance, did you know that Windows on an Intel box is up to 5 TIMES cheaper than Linux on an S390?
Or that NTL (see also here) found Microsoft software to be considerably cheaper than open source?
I don't see what can be done to stop this without infringing freedom of speech though. We could start by getting our news from sources that check out their sources thoroughly. A responsible news outlet should check out the organisations that make certain claims to find out if they have an interest. Did publications repating the AdTI's claims check out the group beforehand?
Mod parent up!
That would be a very serious concern, but for that "viable free as in beer OS solution" bit. Generally speaking, the OSS projects that have succeeded are those that bring in the mass support necessary for OSS's advantages in rapid development and maintenance to shine through: Linux, Mozilla, OpenOffice, Internet tools, CD rippers, etc. In those mass-market application areas, there are viable OSS alternatives.
However, for the smaller, niche vendors that you mention, I'm not sure I see the opposition. I can't think of a single OSS product that successfully dominates a small-scale niche. By definition, that market is unlikely to attract a wide base of volunteer support, and without that, OSS has no selling points.
If you disagree, post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like.
For example, the Open Source, Open Questions piece says - and I paraphrase...
I'm an economist and I worry about the sustainability of a model which depends on people doing things for free. Call me onld and stodgy, but that's my concern. That said, it's for the market place to decide: if people prefer to use open source, it will win.
That's hardly some kind of anti-OSS rant. Rather it's a concern that would be shared by my outside "the community".
Maybe, instead of bashing these people for being Micrsoft's attack dogs (The Small Business Survival Council actually made some interesting submissions re the MSFT settlement), we should listen to what they have to say and give them reasoned responses.
--- My dad's political betting
Near-ubiquitous connectivity allows people to get bits from point A to point B very quickly. In the 80s connectivity meant acoustic coupler and there weren't nearly as many places to connect... to.
Storage is insanely cheap these days: prices of under $1/MB would have provoked scoffing and/or laughter to someone using an original IBM PC or XT [when these machines were new].
There is more stuff in electronic format to move around with the increased connectivity and more room to store is once it gets where it's going.
I'm sure some greybeard will correct me if I'm wrong, but in the 80s era you mentioned computers were not the essential-for-everyone tool they are today.
I want to drag this out as long as possible. Bring me my protractor.
The people who look into using OSS as an alternative are tech savvy people. This means they'll read both sides of a story before making a decision. Let MicroSoft pump money into these thinktanks, it's all a bit pointless. Do you think joe sixpack even hears about the studies? Do you think a sysadmin takes them at face value?
Whats the point in worrying about something microsoft is doing when it has a small impact?
Silly rabbit
After RTFA, you'll see that funding is disclosed in a table; then again, you're probably not new here.
While I still urge you to actually read the actual article, the most appropriate paragraph is (emphasis added)
Some of the points made inside the article are utter tripe. I would argue against the points made therein, but CAGW's stance I would agree with.
Remember, the world we live in is sometimes not so great, and doing the world a favor is not always repaid in kind. The GPL won't change that.
Up front: I *personally* believe that Microsoft has a whole group of people looking for yet more mouthpieces to make it look like something is wrong with Open Source. They likely fund it with millions of dollars...I guess in excess of $50M a year including indirect SCO-related attacks.
:}
While I believe that the above is true, and treat it as true, I don't have proof. It's a belief...not a fact...based mainly on Microsoft's past sleazy and illegal behavior.
There is no smoking gun, though no other company has as much of a motivation to pull the trigger than Microsoft.
If there is proof that these groups are funded by Microsoft, please point me in the right direction. Inquiring minds want to know!
If this doesn't start some severe fires around the Microsoft logpile, I don't know what will.
How can a company get away with this? Even if the government doesn't do anything about it, it sure is going to backfire in their face when its exposed to the public that Microsoft is behind all these committees... I wonder what 'backup plan' they've got to put this out?
Never use Microsoft products, if you can help it, ever again. It is clear that they are a criminal organization, with mob-like tactics.
Think Tanks generally serve political organizations in the role that "industry analysts" fill in the technology industry. Their opinions are hardly ever independent, they are dependent on support from the very institutions they analyze and they are woefully inaccurate. Think tanks create and idealogue that is often used by political parties, special interest groups and PACs to sell their ideas to the public to get support for a candidate, a vote in congress or buy in on an unpopular judicial decision. It's no different than Gartner, IDC or Meta saying that a linux based software package isn't ready for prime time or isn't in the "magic quadrant."
We should be happy that Linux and open source in general is now being taken on in a political arena... because the oposition is asking people to pay more money. Like it or not, tax cuts, handouts, cost reductions and the like get votes -- and those fighting open source will find themselves on the wrong side of coin in the world of fiscal politics...
-- $G
Of course. Giving the wealthy even more wealth is the epitome of fiscal common sense these days, and in fact it has always been the undercurrent assumption of economic health. Look at GWB's recent tax cuts; they were gift-wrapped in the usual trickle-down rhetoric.
Monopolies and ultra-wealthy are returning to favor; the legions of stockholders are stamping their feet for those things, due to the stock bribes they've taken in the last 12 years. I don't expect much from elitist think tanks therefore. The only bright ray in this is that Linux isn't free, it's free-as-in-no-license-cost, and that's very compelling in this new age of artificial scarcity.
[You have a stable society when some nut guns down a schoolyard and the law doesn't change.]
This type of attack is clearly illuminatis at work.
Read
http://www.illuminati-news.com/
to see how they operate.
Ooops, you're right AC. I had forgotten about that! And yet the man officially lives less than 10 km away from me...
However, Ingvar Kamprad denies reports that he has surpassed Billy Boy.
There seem to be two dueling motivations here: (1) keep information secure and (2) follow Federal technology transfer laws to return the taxpayers "investment" (using the US model here, which I'm familiar with). So,
(a) We can place the developed code in the public domain, where it can be seen and used by all. Hmm... not good on the security front, since "all" can include nasties. Code IS returned to the taxpayers, but it's also available for commercial exploitation.
(b) We can release the code with a BSD-like license. As with (a), not good on the security front, but it's returned to the taxpayer and available for exploitation.
(c) We can release the code with a GPL-like license. Still not good on the security front. It's returned to the taxpayer, but NOT easily exploited by commercial entities.
(d) We can reach a technology transfer agreement with a commercial vendor. Assuming closed-source, it's not too bad on the security front (assuming the vendor's checked out). This might not be too good for the taxpayers, though, as they end up paying twice for the widget. If the cost's low and the added-value's appreciable, not too bad for the taxpayers. If not, it might/will be a bit of a pain.
(e) We can sit on the code. Great on the security front (assuming the government machines are secure). Horrible on the taxpayer front, since nothing goes back in any way. While this is appropriate for "items in the national interest", it's not all that great for non-secure work.
So, unless there is a pro-/anti- commercial agenda present, the seemingly best choice is the BSD-like license. This requires (as I understand it) acknowledging the authors, thus providing "career suitable rewards". This can be directly used by the taxpayers, returning their investment. This can be exploited by commercial entities.
It doesn't do squat for security, though. Thus, the authors have to consider the implications of any form of release when choosing a license (or choosing to release).
I think the worst solution is (d), since this will cost the taxpayers the most and possibly give them the least. The security aspects of such a licensing/transfer might not be too great as well.
>Non "mom-n-pop" shop/small business will ever
>produce a SUV.
But many, many Mom-n-Pop shops *use* SUVs. Want
to buy, license, and operate them at a reasonable
price. Would prefer that they not be torched by
whackos.
Client: "We have an, uh, certain amount of funding to pay for, uh, researching what the outcome of using product X is".
TT Rep: "What would you like the outcome to be?"
[recycled laywer joke]
try { do() || do_not(); } catch (JediException err) { yoda(err); }
But if a company funds the report it's advertising, not a factual report.
None of the articles contain much in the way of evidence or facts, they are just FUD. By showing that they are paid for by the company with most to lose from OSS you prove that they are just paid adverts for commercial software.
I can't believe the hostile, sarcastic tone that AdTI assumes on their site. I would have thought that they'd try to come off a little more professional - that "open sourcers hate to pay for copyrighted material" paragraph is just crazy.
Also, sorry if this has been covered, but did that quote from their page actually come from Eric Raymond? Has he explained what he meant? ("Linus Torvalds... didn't actually try to write Linux from scratch. Instead, he started by reusing code and ideas from Minix, a tiny Unix-like operating system....")
bhj
This is a classic means of attacking an individual on the internet: go to a forum known to have readers and posters dedicated to an idea like open soruce, monitor it for every syllable, every out of place comma, then use those comments to attack a person who most likely had nothing to do with those posts.
The report is rich with legal phrases relating to private property, but it is very careful not to apply such concepts to an individual: they apply it to a group they know cannot speak coherently against the author(s).
If Microsoft funded any of these studies, I fail to see to what benefit MS could possiblly claim. The code is there for anyone to use at least, hell even Microsoft can use it under the right conditions.
I can see how they getting antsy: I read somewhere that XP was only in about half the computers worldwide even two years after its release. MS is only just now getting caught up in the multi-user OS game, but Linux is rapidly getting on par with MS in the desktop game, and the other 800 pound gorilla in IT, IBM, is putting its weight and reputation behind Linux; the coming days may get pretty tough for Microsoft.
Dawn of the Dead
My taxes went down considerably, and I am not super rich.
The real problem that no one addresses is that even with high rates for rich taxpayers, the super-rich are often also liberal (and conservative as well) elites and the tax code has been set up by both parties to have huge loopholes for the super rich, regardless of the rates.
I'd guess there's been some serious cash kickbacks over the years to some big companies (individuals in companies) to get them to stick with microsoft. I can't think of another reason why they would keep using their stuff. I've read all the legit reasons,OK, I can see a few of them, but I bet the REAL main reason is from massive and ongoing kickbacks, and because it's so profitable for *some* people to have very well paying "busy work" fix it daily and forever jobs.
Anyway, it will change. I know it will. Bound to happen. Several years ago now I noticed the young geeks all using linux. Not someone's nephew who can play video games so he's the family computer "specialist", nope, I mean the geeks. The young people in any industry determine the trends of the industry, sooner or later, because thats where the innovation comes from, and also that's where the next generation of decision making bosses comes from.
Microsoft is hosed now, ain't nuthin they can do other than try and get legislation passed to save them. I'm serious on that. they are right at the exact point they need protection, even though they are still raking in billions, it's coming, they know it, that's why you are seeing this sort of stuff. Part of that is to have "concerned consumers" lobby for them. What a crock. IF they do that they will struggle along making billions for a lot more years, but if they *fail to get legislation passed that protects them and their business model of no warranty and mediocre product but maximum profits*, they are hosed. It might take some time, but they will crash and burn right along the opposite side of the curve of their rise to success. That is my prediction.
and I think this is endemic in the world today...
You should NOT be trying to convince people you have changed. You SHOULD CHANGE. Then you can convince people of that change.
No doubt, Micro$oft has done the economic
forecasts, and come to the conclusion that
having a captive customer base is more
important to their future than having better
code. And historically, the captive customer
base has a proven return. No matter how crappy
their software is, their legacy customers will
buy it unquestionably.
By seeding the primary schools, secondary
schools, and colleges with discounted software,
Micro$oft has assured themselves a continued
revenue stream for 10, 20, even 30 years
downstream. This is not so much unlike the
tobacco companies trolling youngsters for
their next wave of captive customers. Is this
drawing a comparison between Micro$oft and
our neighborhood "crack" dealers? You bet!
To make matters even worse, I would be willing
to wager that Micro$oft gets a tax break for
charitable contributions to these very same
non-profit organizations. It is a win-win-win
situation for MS to spread their FUD through
these "independent" think tanks. Welcome to
the brave new world of corporate national
socialism in America.
Im not an American. The way I see it, the US Govt loves MS because they bring in billions into the US economy. Sure, its good for people in the US but not so good for others in the world.
This is why nothing really happened with the anti-trust lawsuit a few years ago (yes, im speculating, I know).
At least the world economy will be better off thanks to FOSS.
Can your karma go above being Excellent?
Unbelievably, any person with a PC and an Internet connection can now logon to the NSA's website and print out the blueprint for NSA s Security Enhanced Linux software.
So we'd rather have the non-NSA approved Windows running on our computers? If the NSA believes it is secure enough to keep their sensitive information from being breached, I would think it would be secure enough for my porn.
Just because the NSA partially developed it, it doesn't mean there's NSA secrets and threats to our national security.
It's like sex, except I'm having it!
How many lawsuits has there been in the past 10 years involving Microsoft? Now how many has there been for open source? I do not know the numbers right off hand but I am sure it is extremely lopsided towards the proprietary folks.
What violations there has been with proprietary folks using GPLed software (ie, Linksys) have always been resolved in a non-litigious fashion. In fact all such violations have been resolved in a fashion that are magnitudes cheaper than had it been two proprietary sides battling it out.
While I don't know if all of these so called think tanks are funded by Microsoft, it would not surprise me in the least if they were, even if it were by playing the money shell game.
Frankly I do not trust or place any real value in Microsoft or these think tanks. Both have proved facts are a pesky nuisance and should either be ignored or twisted to suit their needs.
After all, Microsoft would not think twice about out right lying about anything to further their own goals. They have already proved their lack of morals by fabricating false evidence during their monopoly trail. You would think with all the money at their disposal they could have created a more fool proof video tape.
What this really boils down to is an attempt by Microsoft and others to, by hook or crook, convince the user they should use their product instead of open source.
My karma is not a Chameleon.
I love how /. now points to random blogs as "articles". Who is this guy who wrote this blog? And while we're throwing around unfounded bullshit, I've heard that he works for OSDN, too. It's an OSDN conspiracy!!
"Think tanks" get paid by smarmy politicians and companies to attempt to influence government policy and public opinion.
What's all the fuss about? OF COURSE, there's a shady money trail! Were you expecting otherwise?
Next news flash....Linen services and loan sharking run by mafia! Film at 11.
I keep getting 'This document contains no data.' when I click on the links. Is it a Slashdotting, or is Mozilla making a subtle comment?
M$ is playing the same card every corporation and goverment has done in history: taking advantage of people's fears of what they don't understand.
"Chewbacca is a wookie from the planet Kashyyyk. But Chewbacca lives on the planet Endor. Now think about that; that does not make sense. Why would a wookie, an 8 foot tall wookie, want to live on Endor with a bunch of two foot tall ewoks? That does not make sense! But more importantly, you have to ask yourself, 'what does that have to do with this case?' Nothing. Ladies and Gentlemen, it has nothing to do with this case. It does not make sense!"
- Johnny Cochran in his Chewbacca defense
Also, whether or not a project is a "waste of taxpayers money" really has nothing to do if it's open source or not.
I'm just impressed -- and grateful -- that this guy bothered to take the time to look so deeply into the whole sorry mess. Now that he's done the legwork, and gotten attention on /., maybe the astonishingly lazy journalistic community will parrot some of this into more mainstream press.
When you have something as large and as diverse as "Open Source", including all projects and all the different licensing schemes, finding 12 things to complain about is like shooting ducks in a barrel.
Microsoft funding these think tanks is really no different than a politician funding TV commercials against his opponents--they'll say pretty much anything to further their own interests.
-- "Makes Little Debbie look like a pile of puke!" - Moe Szyslak
Will Microsoft gain a monopoly in "Think Tanks"?
If they do, will it be considerd illegal?
How many have they got to go, before they own every "Think Tank" in the world?
What will "Think Tanks" be called when Microsoft owns every one, since "Microsoft Think Tank" is an oxymoron?
Inquiring minds want to know!!!
What's sad is that those organizations usually do good things. The problem is that they haven't actually been versed on the logic behind FOSS. All they know is the FUD.
Where's the Linux Jesus?
From the article:
"As unlikely as this might seem to the skeptic, the National Security Agency (NSA), that coordinates, directs, and performs highly specialized activities to protect U.S. information systems and produce foreign intelligence information, made the folly of developing GPL-licensed code to improve the Linux operating system. After reading the terms of the Linux GPL, the NSA realized they needed to post this enhancement to the Internet in source code form for the world to see. Unbelievably, any person with a PC and an Internet connection can now logon to the NSA?s website and print out the blueprint for NSA s Security Enhanced Linux software."
This is just wrong. NSA had no requirement to distribute the source since they were using it all in house. But since the people who work at these places are on the mission of creating disinformation, they obviously would ignore this:
From http://www.nsa.gov/selinux/info/faq.cfm:
"Does NSA favor open source software?
NSA initiatives in enhancing software security cover both proprietary and open source software, and we have successfully used both proprietary and open source models in our research activities. NSA's work to enhance the security of software is motivated by one simple consideration: Use our resources as efficiently as possible to give NSA's customers the best possible security options in the most widely employed products. The objective of the NSA research program is to develop technologic advances that can be shared with the software development community through a variety of transfer mechanisms. NSA does not favor or promote any specific software product or business model. Rather, NSA is promoting enhanced security."
It seems to me that NSA's intentions and reasons can be inferred from that above statement quite easily. But if these think tanks are being used solely for propaganda then I'm not all that surprised.
if MS is so successful, why do they need to do a behind-the-scene smear campaign like this? this is more like an act of desparation.
OSS is great for geeks and companies using it, no discussion about that. However, for most software companies, OSS is a significant challenge. They need to fully rethink their business models in order to cope with this change. And many of them shall not survive. It is a pity that such organizations as "think-tank" are now sometimes merely new marketing tools and cannot be trusted of any objectivity. This approach ruins the validity and creditibility of these organizations, thus the damage done here apparently by Microsoft affects much more than the software industry: it's shocking. And finally, what I was wondering is whether OSS is positive or negative for the economy as a whole, and the competitive advantage of a country over another. Are there any objective (or at least not grossly biased) studies that analyze the effects of OSS on GDP for example?
There's nothing like coming in to work in the morning and reading "When Tanks Think and Attack"
I always wondered why Aristotilian logic never added an additional fallacy, that every arguement should be tempered according to its funding. Sure, you can make arguements and have lots of free cash, but is it someone elses - and are you just espousing their opinion? "Follow the dollars" is one of my favorite games.
meh
Bullshit. If you read the article, you will see that Microsoft indeed acknowledges that they fund these "think-tanks" just as the tobacco companies had done in the 1980s so that they could tell us how good smoking really was for us.
Pragmatism as an ideology is not particularly pragmatic in the long term. Keep it in mind when you dismiss Free Software
OK the first though I had running through my head when I read the headline was...
"When did Army tanks start running Windows? And how do you stop a tank that is running amuck? Did it get the latest M$ virus?" Then I read it again...
the realy funny thing here is that what the GPL uses to work is their holy intelectual property laws.
there is one thing selling something and claiming that its yours when its not. its something else to shrinkwrap what other people have created along with a nice manual or 5 that you have made and selling the package. there in is the point, your sales price is there to cover the expences in packageing and so on. not a one time rental sum for allowing me to use your code.
i dont know who twists the intelectual property laws more, the companys that licence out stuff for use or the GPL. but i get a better feeling from thinking about how the GPL works.
allso, there was one think tank listed on the page (i dont bother to read the quotes from them all, it was just to mutch sewage at ones) that commented that after the NSA had created the changes that went into the NSA secure linux project they had to release it to public use. this is totaly wrong, the only time you have to relase code changes is when you give away or sell the object version of the changed code to a third party. for internal use you are free to do whatever you want. so the NSA didnt have to release the code changes as long as it was only used within the organisation.
there is allso the talk about linking, if you link to a library that is under the gpl but its contained in its own binary files then you dont have to release your source. its only if you compile it into the resulting binary directly that you have to release the code as then it becomes part of the same product rather then a product that works on top of a diffrent product.
comment first, facts later. http://chem.tufts.edu/AnswersInScience/RelativityofWrong.htm
These Windows vs Linux banners at the top of slashdot.org are starting to make me sick....
You all say the same things. There is no debate or discussion here. You are Groupthink incarnate.
You all just imediately believe the "article" which IS JUST SOME RANDOM DOUCHE's BLOG!!! And you take it as the gospel! What proof is offered? To the groups that DO receive MS funding, what makes you think they don't receive funding from many other sources as well. Who the f are you to blast people's integrity like this when you know NOTHING of their organizations?
Before you go disparaging beneficial non-profit groups like the 20-year old Citizens Against Government Waste, you better have a little more proof than some blog entry.
One sided, closed minded idiots.
It is sooooo fashionable to believe that tax systems are weighted towards the wealthy, and benefits to the poor. In other words, the down-trodden middle classes are bearing the burden of the rich and the poor.
Unfortunately, it is almost completely untrue. I am British, and most Americans would regard me as so kind of communist or socialist as I support some limited redistributive policies.
But I think you believe far more in rhetoric than facts if you believe that the rich and corporates are sucking up all your wealth.
Truth be told: the middle classes (who actually vote) and the elderly get almost all the tax breaks. There aren't enough of the rich to matter, and the poor don't vote. Result, budgets like the recent US one, which is so full of special interest and pork, that it's a disgrace. The real benificiaries, the middle classes who administer all this crap.
And another thing: all wealth ultimately goes to people. There is no such thing as a "rich company"; companies are owned by stock holders.
You know these poor middle classes; all these stock bribes and the like were perfectly well documented. And what did you do? You put more money in your Fidelity mutual fund, in the hope that some of the money would come your way too. Did you protest? No, you hoped to benefit too.
Sorry: I'm ranting. But I get so angry with perception when reality is so different.
The middle clases, who have borrowed on their credit cards to buy pets.com stock. Fuck 'em. They deserve to lose their money.
The middle classes, who think that adjustable rate mortgages, 7x income multiples, and $500k for a two bedroom apartment are sensible. Fuck 'em. Why should I pay for their financial naiviety? (Or more accurately, their unwillingness to take responsibility for their actions.)
The middle classes are the problem in the US. Give the money to the rich, at least they spend it on Space Ship One rather than over-priced real estate and ooooh oooh another SUV.
Sorry. Rant over.
--- My dad's political betting
I don't get it - why do rich supporters of organizations like these (invariably anti-tax, pro-tobacco, anti-government, pro-gun, anti-liberal, pro-life, pro-Pro Wrestling...) need 'Think Tanks'?
Is it possible they're of the opinion that 'thinking' is something you should hire someone else to do? Maybe they've come to the conclusion that unfunded displays of cognative thought processes are just another commie tool of the liberal academic elite, showboating to make them feel inadequate.
Or perhaps, they realize that if they succeed in 'starving the beast', public universities/high schools will be a remanant of the past. Without funding a 'think tank' or two, they're going to be hard pressed to find someone with enough brains to read a service manual and fix the alternator on a gas-guzzling humvee...
The CowboyNeal Foundation!
Oh, if only we still had McCarthy. He could clear up all this open source nonsense and expose it for the grave threat to multinational corporate syndicate control that it is! Do you think there will be a "developer's blacklist" coming soon full of open source advocates that suddenly can't get jobs?
i have to commend you on that comment, nice work. Level, honest, and ready to fight :) i do have to relay a thought that has been gnawing at the back of my mind. i think we've yet to see the "survival instinct" of MS kick in yet. They are a large beast and slow moving because of it. i am a bit concerned about what happens when they stop pussyfooting around and go all out, bet-your-company-ibm-style in war on linux. That will be quite interesting to see.
:( heh.
:)
i'm no expert, but damn, i do think we've yet to see the death throwes. Sun is closer and still hasn't gone completely bonkers (yet). Disclaimer, i do love Sun, but you gotta let 'em go sometimes
Anyway, back to my point: excellent writing and points. i'm keeping a copy; you mind if i distribute pieces and parts (of course with proper acknowledgement!)?
No karma bonus, because it's you that i want to read this!
I'd like to share a revelation that I've had during my time here. It came to me when I tried to classify your species. I realized that you're not actually good users. Every Windows user on this planet instinctively develops a natural equilibrium with the surrounding environment, but you Linux users do not. You move to an area, and you multiply, and multiply, until every natural resource is consumed. The only way you can survive is to spread to another area. There is another organism on this planet that follows the same pattern. A virus. Linux users are a disease, a cancer of this planet, you are a plague, and we are the cure.
Love,
Bill
DISCLAIMER:
I don't believe what I write, and neither should you.
...at Disinfopedia.
- Hail to our fearless misleader! Fool speed ahead!
Using think tanks is not something Microsoft, or the software industry has invented, in fact this strategy was used extensively by tobacco companies.
Look at some of the gems here. Specifically, The importance of young adults, Tobacco And Health Research Procedural Memo or this for a specific example.
Microsoft and big tobacco are'nt that different, really. We have significant evidence that the product is bad for us (causes security issues, promotes questionable technologies like DRM, etc.), the manufacturer is trying to deny this and publish evidence to the countrary to the masses (who haven't seen the ads on Slashdot comparing Linux vs. Microsoft as file server in term of costs).
It also, not surpsisingly lobbies think tanks in order to discredit any evidence to the contrary.
And lets of course not forget the emphasis on young adults for brand loyalty (Microsoft is pushing hard into colleges).
This has been all tried before, and in big tobacco's case, worked very well for quite an extended period of time, and remains a debated topic until today.
Have we gotten any smarter?
The CSE article, at least, did not attack the concept of Open-Source, but the mandate that government must purchase open-source.
I read an article on their site against the idea of allowing only open source to compete for a bid. They would rather have it open for all to compete.
I agree. If the goal is to lower the cost of government, you never reduce the competition for a project.
From the article:
The last argument was countered with a statement made by Chief Information Officer Peter Quinn at "Doing IT Business with Massachusetts State and Local Government," an American Electronics Association forum in Cambridge, Mass. Quinn told the conference, "Massachusetts will spend millions on open architecture systems. Everything will be open source. It will take years to implement, but if you are a parochial vendor, you will not be able to do business in Massachusetts." Quinn clearly indicated there would be no exceptions to the rule permitting only open-source/Linux software.
Y2k is the way of the future? 1999 called, they want your business model back.
12:50 - press return.
Do we ever see Microsoft ratting on Tru64 or any other big-iron Unix distro ? No. So why is Linux any different ? Sure, the uber-hackers like to run it on the desktop, and I'm personally getting intimate with Gentoo's ridiculously tortutous installation methods (which would be better served by a 10-line shell script). But if I walk 10 feet to the family computer where unbeaten fools download games and virii all night long, I couldn't even dare trying to use Linux on that toy.
I tried once at an internet cafe, to use Linux on the master rig (which would do access control and later, pr0n filtering). Well it didn't get very far before he installed XP on it and used the built-in internet sharing instead. Windows is easy for idiots, when something breaks you can just right click everything until you find a workaround. To do the same with Linux, these same idiots would need a second computer for googling the answer.
So quit the whining please, Linux is a threat to Windows Server right now. When we finally have a seamless distro that has tons of pretty little automatisms to diagnose/repair itself and enough GUI tools to not even need a bash terminal, then we can set our phasers to "kill" and have a stab at Redmond.
-Billco, Fnarg.com
I doubt that Microsoft created these so-called "think tanks" (I haven't seen much evidence of thought in much of their material), but they have found organizations whose opinions jibe with their own and amplified their voices by giving them funding. The interesting thing to note is that the "pro-Microsoft" voices are moving to the periphery. As a result, Microsoft is funding less mainstream material and more from "think tanks" which support extreme points of view. I wonder how long it will take for the pro-Microsoft stance to be associated primarily with these fringe viewpoints.
===== Murphy's Law is recursive. =====
Of course we're speculating based on whatever evidence we have to go on. They don't publish their sources of funding. If they took this basic step of declaring their interests we wouldn't have to speculate about what was really motivating them.
The guy even asked several of the organisations about whether they were funded by Microsoft and received no reply. A reply would have put an end to this speculation.
As it is, this may be poor evidence but it's the best we can do. And given how ridiculous some of the cases they try to make against open-source are, it's not unreasonable to wonder whether they're motivated by something other than a spirit of honest inquiry.
Xenu loves you!
They , and all of these power elite shills,
should have their tax exempt status YANKED.
Make them pay taxes and see if they still crow
for the beast
After all, in scanning the online petition, one can't help but be struck by the many comments such as "get your hands of my linux you damn, dirty, corpo-apes!!" and worse. These words suggest we can expect defiance, not cooperation, on serious issues like intellectual property from the open-source community, at least in the near future.
If you have spent any time here on slashdot, then you know that there are just as many rabid pro-Microsoft posters. But, somehow, that never reflects on the general Windows user community. Microsoft has settled so many court cases for IP theft that nobody counts anymore but those things never reflect on the integrity of Microsoft with phrases like "...we can expect defiance, not cooperation, on serious issues like intellectual property...".
Regardless of who is paying the bills, none of these organizations deserve the label "think tank".
This is a poorly framed question: using ``attack`` has overloaded connotations of negativity. Some of these think tanks and organisations are offering constructive criticism (not all of them, I give you) as they evaluation how open source works for their constituency.
For example, it is true that Linux is not entirely free. If you, as an organisation, use Linux, you still have to pay someone (whether your own staff, or external support) to help with problems and support: this costs time and money.
Now, as soon as a I make statement, I expect to attract lot of flame, and suggest that I'm ''attacking'' Linux: but I'm not, I'm just laying the reality out on the table.
Last thing you want as a techie is upper management thinking that Linux is free, because then they'll just ratchet your budget claiming that now that you're on a free OS, it shouldn't cost anything: yet as the techie, suddenly you have 2x as much work because you have to take care of things you could have previously lobbed back onto the vendor. The point is, that in this case, Linux is _low cost_, not _free_. Therefore, it's good that small business associations (and otherwise) raise these points, to make sure people have the right expectations.
Equally, now that we're talking about small business associations: it's true that when you buy PC hardware, it _always_ supports Windows by way of drivers, vendor support, etc; but it doesn't always support Linux/BSD/etc - now whether this is a poor reflection of vendors or whatever doesn't matter, because the commercial reality is that if you're a small business owner, you may find that if you go down the Linux route, that you lock yourself out of some hardware possibilities. And I tell you, small business owners don't care about Linux v Windows: they want a business that works, and they want _low risk_, therefore, as much as Windows may have some costs and suckiness about it, the reality is that it largely works with just about any hardware you can buy off the shelf.
These aren't ``attacks``, these are realities.
Agreed. But I hate to see Free Software being discussed as only monetary or practical. Free Software is about Human Rights, Freedom, and not shooting yourself in the ass. That's a much bigger 'sales point' than money, imho.
Ummm... but the tax rates are weighted heavily towards the wealthy paying more (CBO Numbers for 2000 sorry... latest I could find [CBO = Congressional Budget Office])...
This is where the argument about what is fair for rich people to pay... and what is fair for poor people to pay... and what is fair for middle class people to pay...
And our CongressCritters here in the US aren't dumb... they know that there are less wealthy people then average/poor people... So the tax breaks and redistribution (not tax credits... not tax rebates...) so raising taxes on the rich is usually a popular idea...
Wow... wondered off topic far enough here...
But to try to put some tie into the main Topic... what about other Think Tanks... havn't any Think Tanks come out in favor of OSS???
Nephilium
"I'd like to know why sociologists can't decide whether movie sex and violence has any effect on children, but there's a universal consensus that even a glimpse of a camel will force children to become lifelong smokers." -- Jonah Goldberg
...eliminate the fallacy that allows corporations to be defined as "persons" under the law. This was a bad decision that prevents real persons from containing soulless and consciousless entities with virtually unlimited resources from pillaging everything in reach just because that's what they do.
Remember "No Face" from Spirited Away? Best to keep them out of the bath house.
- Hail to our fearless misleader! Fool speed ahead!
which makes software prohibitive in many not so rich countries, at the same time, PC games, legall copies of them, are offered in reasonable price, such as 48RMB (less than $6) comparing to $40 in USA. well, as long they can sell millions of copies of that in china for that cheap price, they still profit well.
The author might not be paid by anyone but he's clearly a crusader. As he rambled on about Philip Morris and Exxon he posted a graph linking anti-open source with anti-global warming. He posted it at stopexxon.unfortu.net.
In writing about the response of one of the think tanks when it was accused of being a Microsoft shill, the author wrote
This is your basic non-denial denial. IPI is upset that their integrity was questioned, but they did not actually deny the charge. I pointed this out in my email to them, but they did not reply.
So they didn't actually deny the charge. That makes them guilty? And why would the respond to some blogger with an axe to grind? Oh, they didn't respond to my accusation that they're in Microsoft's pocket - that means they really are in Microsoft's pocket!
Personally, I would think that the failure of the anti-trust case had more to do with lobbying(and behind the door bribes) than with economics. I think the case just proves that we can't even trust the highest court in our country to give justice even when the evidence is clear.
No matter how you think about it, Microsoft making money is never good for people in the US even if it does help the economy because it only strengthens Microsoft's power. Also, I think for an economy to function well, money needs to circulate between more than one entity. And I don't think Microsoft really likes to let much money go in corporate spending. Also, it's pretty important for the economy that the companies making big earnings actually pay big taxes. In the US that is most certainly not the case. Microsoft like many other super-huge corporations pays MINIMAL taxes.
Overall, I'd say Microsoft is just bad for everybody, including the US. If a handful of small independent companies producing competing products completely replaced Microsoft, they would each contribute far more to the economy than Microsoft and create a much healthier market.
Yes, we do need to thank Microsoft for th efree advertising.
But Microsoft knows after it has milked the Windows product to death and they too adopt Linux that people will buy it from them.
Maybe they will ask Linus Torvold for a 20B commercial Linux license.
Starting to understand now how those loopholes come into effect? Even worse, think about what happens when a loophole that's being widely exploited is shut down. It works out to the same thing as a tax increase, and you know how Americans feel about those. Which is why so many genuinely accidental loopholes become permanent parts of the tax code. And the loopholes work both ways, like the now-gone "marriage penalty" (where a married couple pay more in taxes than they would filing separately). Those loopholes tend to last forever too, because tax reform - even tax reform that reduces the overall tax burden on a popular demographic - never plays as well as tax cuts. And if there's one thing politicians love, it's spending my money.
And another thing: all wealth ultimately goes to people. There is no such thing as a "rich company"; companies are owned by stock holders.
In the USA, companies (i.e. corporations) are considered to be persons. So of course all wealth goes to "people."
Besides, ultimately we're all dead. It's what goes on while we're waiting for the ultimate that concerns me.
You need to learn some history. If you look at the history of the US and Britain over the last 70 years you will find that the tax burden has increasingly moved away from the wealthy, the poor, and corporations, and onto the middle class. This is a documented fact. I don't remember the precise numbers, but it's something like: the middle class payed 20% of the tax burden in the 1930's and now pay something like %50. Changes in the size of the middle class clearly have something to do with this, but that is only one limited factor. Learn some history and get some facts before you start raving next time.
The interesting thing is that these so-called think tanks are taken seriously at all.
Here is the history of Think Tanks. In the sixties, the conservatives in the US realized that advances in science were undermining the core of their beliefs. They set up these think tanks like the Heritage Foundation to generate pseudoscience promoting their agendas. Of late, liberals have got into the act as well.
Every think tank, by definition, is set up by some entity/corporation to further their position in the face of independent scientific research that might undermine them. These think tanks, or foundations, are chock-full of "scientists/researchers" who have sold out long ago to the almighty dollar.
Magnus.
...by continually shoveling think tank PR at us as if it were fact. Journalists have become too lazy and too corporate-oriented to do their own, independent research so they just shove PR at us and say, "Here's the facts."
Witness the whole "Lawsuits are out of control" meme they're currently pushing. That's just a way to limit citizens' rights in court to put checks on out-of-control corporations who want to be free of any liability so they can do whatever the hell they want to us in the name of profit. We'll be slaves soon if it continues.
- Hail to our fearless misleader! Fool speed ahead!
dunno how random the /. adserver is, but I'm getting the "Linux mainframe costs 10x as much as Windows" line at the top of the thread - anyone else?
Well, I live in Japan and not the U.S. (and don't pay taxes in the U.S. even though I'm a U.S. citizen). The U.S. may or may not have created massive tax breaks for the rich and relatively rich, but recently my taxes have gone up considerably in Japan. Part of it is due to the fact that I've been lucky enough to be successfull in what I do (IT), and have gotten enough pay raises over the last 3 years to nearly double my income to a much higher than average level, but the tax rates over here seem relatively linear. It sucks when I look at the total amount of money I pay in taxes each year, but it's not like I'm suffering or anything. I'd say it's pretty fair, although the Japanese equivalent to Social Security seems like it is doomed no matter what they do, and I'll never see a single penny of what I paid. (And I've paid A LOT!) Hmmm. This is totally off topic, but for what it's worth I'll submit.
And another thing: all wealth ultimately goes to people. There is no such thing as a "rich company"; companies are owned by stock holders.
The problem is that the wealth is flowing to a very few rich guys (numbered in the single digit thousands) who control probably 20% of the wealth in the country.
The middle classes are the problem in the US. Give the money to the rich, at least they spend it on Space Ship One rather than over-priced real estate and ooooh oooh another SUV.
That's one guy. Most rich people do stuff like own companies. For an idea of what your normal ultrarich guy does with his money, look at the Rockefeller clan, or the descendants of the guys who started Johnson and Johnson. It's mostly about protecting and growing their money.
"We returned the General to El Salvador, or maybe Guatemala, it's difficult to tell from 10,000 feet"
It's not just Microsoft-funded think tanks that have criticized open source, a lot of intelligent people in the technology world have too (and I'm not talking about people of the Robert Cringely class!). Note that "criticism" does not mean "stating the open source is worthless." Hardly. But thee really are some valid things to say about open source that aren't all roses and rainbows:
1. There's far too much willingness to put hobby projects from seventeen year olds with no software engineering experience on the same footing as Perl and gcc. "Open source" isn't a general moniker for "great software." When zealot promotes some half-assed IDE written by some bored college students as alternative to Visual Studio, then that does more harm than good.
2. Many tenets of popular open source theses lean more toward grandiose pet theories than fact. You have people talking about how more eyes find more bugs, when in reality hardly anyone really understands the source to something like gcc, and this only applies in a significant way to fundamental applications that many people use as a basis for further development. In fact, a basic principle necessary to make open source really work is _simplicity_. How can anyone understand the architecture of several hundred thousand lines of code enough to make more than ad-hoc changes?
3. "Making the source freely available" is turning out to be more valid than "open source development." Many of the big projects _besides_ the over cited Perl, Apache, gcc, Linux kernel examples, are developed by core groups of people who listen to outside opinions, but do all development internally. The developers of OCaml, for example, all work together in research institute in France. Erlang is still primarily developed by a group that works within Ericsson. Sure, they give the source away, but this isn't bazaar development.
The important part here is that they are not open about it. Go read Animal Farm by George Orwell. There you will see how bad things go when agendas are hidden.
Openness is the fundamental safety mechanism in democracy. This is the failure of most of the former communist countries. Not because of communism per se, but because of the lack of openness in the leadership. Animal Farm is indeed a very strong criticism of and a satirical allegory of the russian revolution and Stalin's Russia.
Go read 1984 as well. The term "language" (especially connected to "propaganda") will have a new meaning after words.
When you are sure of something, you probably are wrong (search for "Unskilled and Unaware of It").
No they didn't. Your taxes were deferred for an indeterminate period until the debts incurred to pay off the reductions come due. At which point you will have to pay back not only the reduction, but interest rates well in excess of the rate of inflation. The government did not reduce your taxes, they took out a high interest loan in your name. It's one thing when you have to do that for economic stability, but as an electoral gimmick it's terrible public policy.
The "tax reductions" we're seeing now are every bit as real as the "free money" people get with a credit card.
And yet, the richest 10% in America still pay 80% of all tax monies overall. That money isn't all coming from the hard working, honest, merely rich. Even with the loopholes, the super rich pay plenty of taxes, too. Whether they pay enough, or too much, depends which side of the fence you're sitting on. But it's not like they're getting off scot free.
Hey freaks: now you're ju
Get some facts before ranting to the extent you did.
... thanks for asking, Ace.
The pro-wealthy weighting of America's tax system isn't fashion, it's fact. The tax system in America is so Byzantine that the wealthy and corporate take monstrous advantage of it time and time again. This is opposed to the wage-earner who is assaulted by a mandatory system he can't afford to escape through the hiring of a tax accountant. For instance, can YOU (British even so) park your assets offshore while parking your expenses onshore, escaping taxation while also piling deductions under your tax system? Can YOU pay a relative 1% fee to a tax accountant to draft an opinion letter outlining how all that asset movement is legal? Can YOU move compensation from tax-deferred instrument to tax-free account, eventually escaping all taxation on it? Can YOU escape taxation by being so diversely embodied that you simply end up paying yourself?
Enron (an egregious example, certainly) managed to use the tax system so well -- creating almost 900 partnerships for tax-dodging purposes -- that for the last 5 years of its existence, it had no yearly tax liability for 4 of them.
Just because a middle-class person can rack up enormous debts and play a little with his income tax return, doesn't mean that the wealthy and corporate aren't escaping away with billions.
As a Brit, you may find the book dreadfully dull due to its American focus, but go out right now and obtain:
"Perfectly Legal: The Covert Campaign to Rig Our Tax System to Benefit the Super Rich--and Cheat Everybody Else" by David Cay Johnston
As far as I'm concerned, exposees like Johnston's only illustrate that the American tax system is arranged for the collapse of the American Empire. The complexity, and lack of enforcement in fixing it, are fatal wounds. When tax frauds can happen much, much faster than they can be stopped, then tax frauds will become the usual. When tax dodges can happen for the wealthy equivalent of pocket change, and the very mentality of fraud settles in, then eventually the wealthy will pay no taxes.
P.S. I own no stock and voluntarily participate in no benefits program (a la 401(k)) of any kind
[You have a stable society when some nut guns down a schoolyard and the law doesn't change.]
One of the characteristics of a mature profession is pro bono work. Whether contributors to the open source movement do it out of concern for their fellow humans, a personal need to give back or as an ego trip is of no consequence. Service in support of the greater good is a noble act whether its money, time or brain power. Some might argue that the counter-balance to market-based capitalism is compassion.
The level of misinformation being cast is surprising to me.
If GPL-covered code were to find its way into a proprietary system or application, it would become public and free to use by anyone.
First, it's only true if you are shipping a product. If you use the code in house you are under no obligation to distribute changes. Second, "find it's way????" I can imagine the developers coming into work one morning and being shocked to "discover" GPLed code in their project. "Honestly, I don't know how it got there!!"
How do those providing and using open source applications know that someone's intellectual property wasn't stolen and inserted?
It's been mentioned before but I'll include it for completeness: how do those providing closed source software know that someone's IP wasn't stolen and inserted? And how much harder is it to verify this in the case of closed source versus open source?
The pure open-source model is not capable of supporting for-profit firms. While the service-support model can provide sustainable profits, as the U.S. experience has demonstrated this model can only support a handful of firms at best.
The fault here is in thinking that the software industry is the only industry that matters. Software features that once cost thousands are now available to other companies for free. Less profits for the computer industry means lower costs for every industry using computers (um, all of them?) Even if this means the complete death of the entire commerical software industry, how can this not help economic growth?
Much of the questions about open source software and applications come back to basic economic incentives. What incentives exist among volunteers to do their best, most innovative work? There is little.
The answer to this question should be self evident given that people are currently motivated enough to be putting massive effort into free and open source software. Money is a terrible motivator. Anyone who has taken rudimentary human factors classes knows that. Pride, while one of the deadly sins, is actually a much better motivator.
The part that cracked me up were the Netcraft links.. and it gets even funnier, because not only are they using Apache to serve their sites, there was a conscious decision to use Perl/PHP/JSP for site functionality!
I guess that for all their corporate funding, Open Source hosting companies are the cheaper, more reliable solution.
They don't even realize that their geeks are a fifth column within their own organizations.
MUAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA....
Just to add: CSE, IPN, PRI, are all using sendmail as well
Responsibility is the punishment for compentenc
Truth be told: the middle classes (who actually vote) and the elderly get almost all the tax breaks. There aren't enough of the rich to matter, and the poor don't vote.
Oh yeah, sure, its the middle class and elderly who vote to flood your country with third world immigration, driving up the costs of social programs, and forcing the elderly to flee your country due to the incredible cost of living.
The middle classes, who think that adjustable rate mortgages, 7x income multiples, and $500k for a two bedroom apartment are sensible. Fuck 'em.
We call this inflation, a monetary system originally started by your country and imposed on the world. In places where apartments cost $500K, most people rent for a long time before they can afford to buy. Interestingly, in the countries most controlled by International Finance, The United States and Great Britain, housing costs are not factored into the national inflation rate calculation. Who cares if your bag of rice costs pennies if you spend 55% of your income on your house.
Trust me, if I could go back in time and assassinate Disraeli I would.
It least I can take pride in knowing the powers of global capital will collapse soon, and your country which has now become a cess pool, will be enveloped in anarchy.
I don't read or respond to AC posts
I don't use Linux. I've had it pounded into my head that it's difficult to use, and it's buggy, and so on and so forth. Essentially, I'm scared to use it.
The truth is, I'd LOVE to use it. I'd love to have a friend say "see how easy this is? See how stable this is?" I'd love to have it installed on a box here and tinker with it after someone showed me the basics.
Microsoft has at least scored a victory with home users because they're scared to use it, and I'm one of them. I know a lot of the stuff above just isn't true anymore but trying to forget what you heard is just about as easy as trying to not think about the color blue.
when you say that your tax rate has gone down, are you talking about FIC, or overall tax burden?
because, i think that you will find, that the overall tax burden has risen slightly, but been shifted away from the fed to the state/local.
christ - my school taxes just went up 40 mills this year.
... hi bingo
Hell, Microsoft's buying the EU president. Look at http://www.eu2004.ie/sitetools/sponsorship.asp
Is it just me, or do all of these think tanks, research groups, new government agencies, etc. all sound distinctly like all of the groups out of Atlas Shrugged -- seemingly innoculos groups of like minded people joining together for community betterment, or the destruction of western civilization as we know it (depending on your point of view).
Too obscure maybe, but the MS funding, and the quality of some of the research, would suggest they be called "thunk" tanks instead of think tanks.
There was an interesting exchange between the Competitive Enterprise Institute which claims Linux is unsuitable for government, business use and Julian Sanchez from the Cato Institute, who thinks government should consider OSS if it fits their needs.
I wonder if we could pull a mega prank by creating one of these things. What would it take besides an official looking web site and a fax number? How far could we push our own FUD?
It would be nice to see the Wall Street Journal quote the "Institute for Proprietary Software" recognizing that Linux is cheaper /better /safer than Windows after all...
os trabalhos e os dias: http://zmoreira.net
Exactly. If you are part of the "working rich", you are absolutely hosed with taxes. Doctors, lawyers, accountants, etc pay well over half their income to taxes. But if you are a CEO, or just someone living from the interest of your wealth, there are a lot of ways to reduce your taxes and make your income appear smaller for tax purposes. I'd say this is the biggest difference between rich people who vote democrat and those who vote republican.
Ummm. That was what I was saying.
Why are you disagreeing with me?
--- My dad's political betting
> My taxes went down considerably, and I am not super rich.
Oh, that's good. Yeah, I could say the same thing. Only thing is my income also went down considerably. And then there is the inevetable increase on the state and municiple levels. Oh, but that's ok, since I'm not making so much, they don't get much anyway. And since they aren't making much, they can't offer the extra special deals to the local companies, and they're leaving. So, now it looks like they're leaving and taking the business I had with them out of this city, this state, and quite likely, this country. But hey, I got a tax refund, ho-fucking-ray!
Actually, no it wasn't. What was I thinking. Please feel free to ignore me.
--- My dad's political betting
Ernie Ball.
This sig no verb.
the link quotes Citizens Against Government Waste as saying: "Yet while the software itself is free, the cost to maintain and upgrade it can become very expensive. Acquisition costs commonly represent only a small percentage of the total cost of ownership. Maintenance, training and support are often more expensive with open source than proprietary software.
Imagine the state DMV being responsible for programming the software that runs its computers. Every little problem would require an outside consultant, racking up fees and slowing down services."
Every little problem already does require an outside consultant. I work for a large government agency, and, quite frankly, there are consultants galore needed to support Windows 2000 and Windows XP. The Exchange servers go down with frequency, as does web access which is controlled through a SQL powered proxy server(which crashes), not to mention IIS, which gets kicked in the nuts every time a new virus comes out. Not only is an army of permanent government employees needed to maintain this very unstable network, but they hire literally hundreds of consultants to provide tech support for every department, and even more to ensure wider network stability.
When I need something done for my computer, I don't call the regular tech support, but the consultant working on location, because he/she is always more knowledgable and competent. And we're talking about an agency that only uses Linux when someone illegally installs it to test LAMP.
The one thing that bothers me about your "The government shouldn't borrow money to spend so we should raise taxes argument" is that the politicians in Washington so absolutely, completely no desire to be fiscally responsible in spending!!
My belief is that if they increased taxes to balance the budget, they'd see all that money coming in a just go on a binge spending spree until we went back into debt and needt to increase taxes again.
The current budget defict is a direct result of our lousy, good for nothing representatives in congress seeing a big pile of money in the "surpluses" during the 90s and concluding that they didn't spend enough.
I know, I know, Mac OS X isn't the same "open-source" we all talk about, though it's encouraging to see RAND (http//www.rand.org) "the mother" of US think tanks, in Santa Monica, CA., have almost exclusively chosen XServes and G5s for the research stations (PCs with Winblows for administration/ Alumni/ etc) using Mac OS X. Though I don't know what X11 software they use in addition to the OS X native software, it's a nice trend that I'd like to see continue and grow. And for those of you who don't know of RAND, check the above link and remember that in Washington/ Political/ Military circles, RAND is often called "the West Coast Pentagon".
James
"All that we have to decide, is what to do with the time that is given us." - Mithrandir
Be True, Unbeliever
Corpse fucking jackals.
"You, a think tank? All you think of is tanking up."
- Julius Caesar, in Obelix and Co.
No, the only tax increase I have seen is in property taxes, and it is not as large as my tax cut was.
Of course, I'm lucky to live in a state with no income tax, so they don't have that avenue to pursue.
There's another distinction: liability. Doctors are a good example, but it's true of many professionals, especially self-employed ones. You are liable for any suits levied against you. You have to carry an enormous insurance load to cover you. No matter how well they do their job, their personal assets are always at risk.
The incorporated rich, on the other hand, are bulletproof. You can sue the corporation, but their personal assets are almost always off limits. So no matter how bad a job Bill Gates does, no matter how directly any problems are his fault, you can bet the worst that will happen is that shareholders will get hosed while he runs off to the Caymans with enough cash to buy a country.
Microsoft supports groups who produce papers that support Microsoft's position. This doesn't mean the papers were written for MS. If I send Ralph Nader a check and he comes out in favor of stricter emissions standards, I haven't bought him. We just have similar interests, which is why I sent him a check in the first place.
Sure, MS supports these organizations at a level higher than I would support Nader but I believe the principle still applies. MS sends money to organizations with congruent interests. Those organizations need to produce something to benefit their benefactors so they lobby or write white papers. Of course the papers support Microsoft's positions - that's why MS sent the money in the first place, because the group already held those views to start.
MS sent $380,000 to one group. If RedHat came along and donated $1,380,000 to the same group that group wouldn't suddenly start favoring open source software.
If you find a group like this that thinks Open Souce is great how much do you want to bet there is some IBM money behind it. I bet if you read it you would not even try to find out who funded it and if you did find out that it was IBM or Red Hat you would tend to think "Wow it is so great they they spent money to get the truth out" Companies paying for to get there point of view out is common. Let me give you all a hint. If you think a news source is unbiased the truth is they are most likley telling you what you want to hear. You think it is the truth so it is unbiased. You can see it all the time on slashdot. Someone disagrees with someone else so they are closed minded.
The best way I have found to seek the truth is to look for news sources that you think are totaly biased. It is the best way to slay your own bias.
I do have to admit that the idea that the NSA was did not know "dangers" of releasesing their secureity upgrades to Linux very funny.
My favorite line from the bible is "What is truth? Is my truth the same as yours?"
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
Half the organizations or more listed are all tarred by one article I couldn't find, with no other references to check. The magazine apparently referenced also says the press favors the bush administration ( despite the fact that only 7% of press voted for Bush ) .
Clearly not the most objective journalistic source.
I'm certain that Microsoft does fund a considerable amount of FUD, but I don't think they're alone here. It makes me wonder who funded the research upon which the article was based. Transparency ought to go both ways, not none.
For example, the Citizens Against Government Waste says this about Massachusetts' Freeware Initiative:
As for the argument that open source is better and cheaper, such software has its advantages and should be considered an option. That being said, all but the most die hard Linux fans will admit that some functions are better performed with proprietary software. There is simply no reason to slam the door on proprietary vendors at any level of government. If Massachusetts chose one proprietary vendor as the state's only software provider and excluded open source, CAGW would also object to that.
As one example cited by the author, it turns out that it doesn't look like any kind of passionate pro-M$ screed. If that's what M$ got for their money, M$ would be better off using that money to fix IE.
#-#
Ad Astra Per Aspera
A rough road leads to the stars
There is nothing Microsoft can do to redress history. Microsoft is purchasing time right now, and at cost. The end is near now.
Bingo. I hope you get moderated up.
This is the basic leap most people fail to make. Note that this doesn't mean cutting taxes MUST be bad policy. If it was always bad to borrow money, businesses would never do it. It is all about whether the economic activity you spur by shifting back tot he private sector will produce enough revenue to more than offset the cost of the bonds sold to cover the deficit.
The debate on fiscal policy is about *that*, not about tax cuts.
The problem is that thinking about taxes and spending at this level requires just a little bit more time and attention than TV generally allows. People doze off. So both sides reduce fiscal policy to sound bites:
"Tax and spend liberal!"
"Tax cuts for the rich!"
Both are shallow and largely irrelevant.
The real debate is in your observation. But tax cuts do cause economic growth. But economic growth can lead to inflation. The Federal Reserve fights inflation by raising interest rates. Rising interest rates slow economic growth. Slow economic growth and you don't get the increased revenue (I think you can tell where I come down on the tax cuts).
The next time you hear demagogery from the right or the left on fiscal policy, think about this person's comment. The issue is deeper than the debate.
Oh, I agree absolutely. Spending has to be controlled in addition to covering your outlays. It's no different than personal finance.
Where I do disgree with you is blaming the politicians. They vote for massive spending increases coupled with massive tax reductions for one simple reason: the American public demands it. Anybody in Congress who either refused to buy their district an inland naval base, or insisted that said base be paid for out of tax receipts, would be tarred and feathered. Until Joe Sixpack figures out that money isn't magically falling out of the sky, we're screwed in this regard.
Yep, you're right there. I the senate race in my state the incumbent is running boatloads of ads talking about all the money he's brought back to the state.
And the only way he gets elected is when people registered with the opposing party (which has many many more voters in my state) vote for him in large numbers. The only reason they're voting for him is to bring home more pork.
Ah god damniit!! My grand plan to outlaw open source has just been exposed by a script kiddie on slashdot. Guess I will have to resort to poisoning the Mountain Dew.
Sincerely,
Bill Gates
I went through the linked article and I couldn't find much hard evidence of how much these think tanks get from MS, and what percentage of their total income MS donations make. There are few dollar figures to verify independently; the only one I noticed was about $10k MS sent to the Pacific Research Institute. Of course, if one follows the link, one sees that the total contributions from ALL corporations makes up only 10% of their revenue; I wish there were more data elsewhere.
This piece seems to be a classic conspiracy theorist bash that takes a few sparse facts and uses them to paint a complete picture that coincides with the author's ethical/political alignment. It doesn't logically follow that a think tank received a payment from such companies is "in their pocket" or propagandizing as a quid pro quo. Nevertheless, the author uses it as evidence that big, nasty companies are trying to influence your view through thoughtful argumentation, a fact, while true, is morally neutral. Would we as thoughtful people prefer a reasoned argument, though wrong, or plain and simple advertising?
The author certainly doesn't care; anything done by companies he dislikes is automagically "evil" and ignorant of the facts stated above. The whole "funded by big tobacco" slant is ignorant of the fact that tobacco companies and their subservient foundations, like many companies, spread their wealth around to many different sources.
Should we complain that our schools are funded by the sweatshop-using Nike Corp. when they are donating money for new playgrounds in inner city schools, and creating new fields, parks and open spaces there?
I haven't read the articles written against Open Source that this author cites, but it strikes me that attacking a group's financial backing is a a red herring, a disingenuous tactic that plainly ignores the content of the articles. Who cares who funds them if the ideas therein are sound? Should we reject the teaching of evolution as opposed to creationism, simply because some think tanks which promote it are funded by companies we dislike?
B
"I'm payin' taxes, but what am I buyin'?" -- James Brown
As well they should, considering the proportion of wealth that they hold. Ever notice how a proposed simplified tax scheme ALWAYS gets shot down? If you think the IT job market sucks, just wait'll the day when people get fed up and the tax model is simplified. I can assure you IRS employees, accountants, and tax lawyers do NOT want this to happen.
How about for a start, the first 40k (figure pulled firmly from ass) a family makes (this is the lowest figure, adjusted upward for higher cost of living areas) is tax free, everything else is hit at a given FLAT rate.
A friend of mine from Australia was up here for a couple of months, and she about shit when she looked at my 1040. I guess things are simpler down under?
Linus should sue Alexis de Tocqueville , and name Microsoft too.
That way we could make plenty of headlines worldwide about Microsoft's systematic funding of fake studies and Astroturf.
Maybe he could go for a Tortuous Interference in Business lawsuit too, but IANAL.
The super rich aren't getting off scot-free, but they are getting off paying less taxes than the middle class per dollar. The top 10 taxpayers in the US in 2001 paid taxes on only around 50% of their income.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
"Linux apps are inconsistent as hell! "
I guess that's what makes those vertical apps wierd.
"If I'm going to expect a dept. to make the switch I have to at least be able to give them a consistent environment and that requires spending many hours on a "model" machine changing about a zillion attributes scattered all over the place."
Used KDE have you? That's one of the reasons GNOME will do so well in the business space.
"But as near as I can tell it's going to be a few more years before we really see wide-spread adoption simply because it takes too much time to configure a solid environment. Time which has to be amortised over the number of machines on the network. "
It's easy to push configurations out remotely. Amortization is easy with Linux.
"It's virtually impossible to get funds in the budget to hire an extra body just so you can try out something which might save the company a few bucks in the long term."
Tell them, Bill says it's OK.
"This is why you only see two classes of business switching these days:"
Three: Those that don't have a huge investment in MS and MS philosophy.
Until Joe Sixpack figures out that money isn't magically falling out of the sky
I don't think it's Joe Sixpack that's the problem. Rather, Boomers Bill and Ted who're running the country into the ground.
Max
My god carries a hammer. Your god died nailed to a tree. Any questions?
Like communism, GPL-covered software will fail to reach its Utopian dreams
I just love this site it screams bias all over the place
they make a few good and true points but they skew the results up nicely
this sig intentionally left blank
The real benificiaries, the middle classes who administer all this crap.
And yet, as a percentage of the population the middle class is smaller than at any other time in the last century, and getting smaller by the year. So if us greedy bastards in the middle are the ones making out like bandits, how come record numbers of us are dropping out of the middle class and into the ranks of the poor?
Max
My god carries a hammer. Your god died nailed to a tree. Any questions?
This is one of the reasons I've wondered why the founding fathers didn't add a fourth branch. The other three are creationist, and regulatory, but NOT death for the output of the other three. In other words life has birth and it has death. Were's the death for laws that are bad, and/or obsolete?
People make similar mistakes when they think of political campaign contributions as bribes. That isn't always the case (besides often it is more of an extortion payment than a bribe as Microsoft learned). The Sierra Club, for example, may give money to a candidate which *already* agrees with them. The agreement may precede the contribution. Who wants to give money to someone opposed to you? Microsoft may be giving money to groups that already agree with a thinktank which doesn't like Open Source. What else would you expect? No, let's give money to those people who despise us?
I can't help but compare the Corporate funded think tanks to the Political ones.
...etc.), and how they put out reports on terrorism, foreign policy, international affairs, ...etc.
For example, this article is about how big entrenched businesses (Microsoft is the one here) find shills to lobby its cause with the decision makers in business (IT) and government, in order to protect its interests.
Compare that to the neo-con think tanks (Project for New American Century, Rand Corp,
A dangerous alliance.
The difference I see is that in the political scene, it is the tanks that drive the administration, while in the software/IT scene, it is corporations who drive the think tanks. Also, the danger of the political scene is far more reaching across the world and the future of civilization as we know it.
2bits.com, Inc: Drupal, WordPress, and LAMP performance tuning.
Interestingly, the ACLU runs Windows and *only* Windows. My boss (an executive director of one regional office) told me of another regional office that got a grant from national HQ to do some IT upgrades and experimentation. They planned to use a Linux server for their office, but national stipulated that they *must* run Windows on their server to get the grant.
Of course, the "agreed" to these terms and ran Linux anyway. The regional offices from what I hear aren't thrilled with national's IT policy. Apparently, MS gives the ACLU quite the deal on their products. My office, of course, runs Linux exclusively.
You are wrong to claim that tax cuts necessarily mean borrow money. It is more like a store giving a sale, but it's a sale on money rather than on goods.
E _C ORRUPT-O-CRATS.htm
t ml
Remember, after Reagan's tax cut revenues to the government DOUBLED. The surge in the economy caused by the tax cuts caused MORE money to be available, not less. The government is overpriced, and is weighing down the economy. That's why people want taxes lowered. At some point, you will hit the point where taxes are too low, but we are WAY far away from that now.
Indeed, we also need to lower our spending habits. This is even more true than lowering our taxes. Probably a better approach would be just to audit the funding we already give out.
http://federaltimes.com/index.php?S=1868885
http://www.regularguy.com/notebook/ENRON_AND_TH
http://speakout.com/activism/apstories/9948-1.h
Engineering and the Ultimate
I think you are correct, and there will be legislation to that effect attempted. I give it a 50/50 of getting passed. Depends on how much more "terrorism" they can keep pushing and connecting it to the internet. I have yet to see lately ANY privacy or pro freedom actions triumph over anti freedom and anti privacy legislation. The US people will keep sucking it up and putting up with it as long as they stay scared and buffaloed over -pick a subject.
Get the original article to your press contacts! This is a real story. It should be picked up by the Washington Post, New York Times, and a few news magazines. Get busy!
Now wait, let's think for a sec:
M$ principally is attacking Linux. M$ really couldn't give a rat's ass about the rest right now. OSS applications they (perhaps) mistakenly don't view as a threat to their business. Office file formats are essentially a de facto standard in most of the business world, blah blah blah. What these OSS applications have done is make Linux a viable alternative. Rightly or wrongly M$ figures if they can kill the head (kernel) the body will die...
Okay then, given that M$ wants Linux dead, and badly, shouldn't that open the door for some silver tongued devil to convince M$ that *BSD is also the enemy of Linux, and that the enemy of my enemy is my friend? Would it be that hard a case to make? After all, all those years of toiling quietly with BSD, never threatening M$, or anyone else for that matter. Then along comes Linux, and all of a sudden BSD is the red-headed step-child. Then haul out the numerous BSD/Linux jihad posts, toss in some tasty Stahlman quotes (there have to be some, let's face it, the guy is a shotgun, not a sniper rifle...) Take the whole mess, wrap it up with a goodly amount of spin (the last thing M$ expects from our communities, and quite possibly the only thing they respect anymore...) and go with hat in hand, and dagger carefully concealed behind the back...
Possible, maybe, likely, never. But you got admit, the irony would be delicious...
"Talk minus action equals nothing" - Joey Shithead, D.O.A.
"Talk minus action equals
Ah, but definition is everything! "The rich" means anyone not on public assistance, apparently.
They got that way because they established a monopoly, not necessarily that they were the best at anything. You got to have an OS before you have an app, business or otherwise.
My point was, I think in large terms that monopoly got established through illegal actions, such as large scale kickbacks, which I can't prove but will allege. Once they had a monopoly (conversational purposes monopoly I mean, huge significant market share) of significant size, of course more apps were written for their platform. Now, when they see that monopoly be threatened, they are apparently resorting to these "independent consumer groups" for lobbying purposes, to get their dominance legislated into perpetual existence. I think that is pretty skunky behavior myself.
And WHY other billion dollar businesses ACCEPT spending millions for a product that has no warranty is unfathomable. they wouldn't do that with anything else they spend millions on, that's why i think there musta been some serious kickbacks ongoing. It's an opinion, but it is one of only a few rational reasons that are readily apparent, but I haven't seen it addressed much.
I know why too, once you start talking about millions going to pay off people, they certainly don't brag about it in public. Stuff happens in the real world with that kinda money involved-sometimes some pretty bad stuff.
I pay less in taxes now too.
Now if only I were making as much money as I was before I Shrub took office. Net difference, $1000/month less in my pocket now than 3 years ago.
I'm a writer and editor at Heritage (look it up). I've never seen anyone get pressured about anything w/r/t Microsoft here. A few months ago, someone sent around an email touting Mozilla--no pushback from anyone at all.
I can't speak for any of these other places, but there is no Microsoft influence at Heritage.
For what it's worth, Heritage has long been suspicious of antitrust law. Perhaps this encouraged some MS funding, but that didn't change any positions here one iota.
What bothers me most about this is that the mainstream media is more than happy to provide airtime for these organizations. It seems the mere fact of a foundation or think tank's existence is enough to lead credence to its pronouncements - no matter how ridiculous the propoganda.
On the other hand, open source advocates are seen as less than scholarly - hackers with quaint ideas who don't understand that big business knows what is really best for the people and the country to prosper.
This is just a covert continuation of paternalism and the idea that certain types of people are better equipped to know what is best for the rest of us - the unwashed masses. What unbridled hubris! I marvel at the sheer audacity of these people to be so presumptuous.
Logic and sound argument will not snare these people; their souls are bought and paid for by their backers - and no amount of discourse will change that. I have difficulty understanding how they can live, day to day, with their hypocrisy staring them in the face? Have they no shame?
Lodragan Draoidh
The more you explain it, the more I don't understand it. - Mark Twain
Don't forget that many think tanks exist to provide sinecures for defeated politicians and party loyalists who can't hold down real jobs.
It's like a "military attache" in an embassy. What exactly does he do? Nothing. So that he can have the time to do the spook work that's his Real Job.
Same with think tanks. Guys get paid by rich patrons to write books that the rich patrons want written. That takes what? a couple hours. (We have an existence proof that AdTI didn't spend much time delving into insightful research. And they jobbed out the technical business of actually looking at source.) The rest of the day is available to spend smoozing with buddies from your party who are either politicians or some politician's staff.
Note to monopolists: be sure to buy an equal number of Republican and Democrat camp followers. You never know who might win the next election. And if you have to screw over one party this election, and they lose, you'll have guys in position in the new administration.
In so doing, Microsoft buys the lunchtime buzz that the politicians and those around them hear and that informs their thinking.
This is all covered in the excellent book Trust Us, We're Experts. Basically, think tanks, "citizen groups", and many research centers are just another pr tool a company can use - the appearance of unbiased opinions to bolster what the company wants to do.
I highly recommend this book.
I'm not being paid money to write this. My payment is a freer, richer, more just society, built under the only system that can provide those ends: capitalism.
Two years ago, I bought a shirt from Microsoft (the "Freedom to Innovate" shirt), which I wear proudly on occasion.
I'm not a Microsoft employee, nor have I ever been one. The limit of my association with them is that I buy and use their software. Articles such as these attempt to minimize actual grassroots people like me. But I exist!
And what right do they have to attack people for this funding friendly groups, anyway? Other corporations are not attacked when they give money to the Sierra Club, SaveOurEnvironment.org, and "Rock The Vote", or to thousands of other politically-tainted groups. It's only "astroturfing" when the author of the article disagrees with the viewpoint being promoted.
Microsoft should fund the Ayn Rand Institute. They have the philosophy that could properly defend them, but I think Microsoft is afraid of appearing too radical or offensive to some people. And that, I think, is going to hurt them in the long run.
Actually, its not a misconception. OSS *does* threaten the bigger players most, because the products that they produce are those that are widely used, general purpose in nature (able to be used by many different persons and businesses from different industries), and therefore an attractive "target" for an OSS project.
Look at the most mature projects: Linux (an OS for a small computer), KDE/GNOME (desktop environment), OO.o (an office suite), Apache (web server), etc. All of these can (and are) used by a very wide-ranging group of people.
On the other hand, let's look at "niche" products. Niche means that your product does one thing very well, and you have a very limited audience. I have a friend who sells a reasonably simple package for fitness studios: it keeps track of client in and out, account payments, fitness achievements, etc. I would think that it would be highly unlikely that someone would create a Free project that duplicates the functionality and appropriateness of use of this package anytime soon. I would not be worried about Free software putting me out of business because any solution for a fitness studio would have to involve a lot of migration of proprietary data, and customization of a general database application. It would never be worth the bother for a business that probably employs no one who has ever seen a line of code in his/her life, and has no desire to contract someone who has.
Look at the tomato! Isn't it sad? He can't dance! Poor tomato!
It looks as though Microsoft has been looking into how other special interest groups, in the US, conduct politics. These organisations are probably more accuratly described as "PACs" than "Think Tanks". Even down to their choosing names which imply some sort of independence.
It's just that a paper from the "Tocqueville Business Lobby" doesn't sound as impressive...
In other breaking news:
New research reveals that Democrats will vote for Kerry, and Republicans for Bush.
Study reveals Slashdot readers more likely to donate to EFF than than to send a check to Darl McBride along with a note that says "Good luck"
According to new research, Catholics are more likely to marry other Catholics than they are to marry Islamic fundamentalists.
Here's a Very cool site which uncovers the connection between corporate donations and think tanks. It would be really interesting to see a similar graphical map of Microsoft's influence. The designer of this site came up with an innovative way to visualize special interest connections.
I've read the article called "Is open source a threat to the future of intellectual property rights".
Although the article itself it pretty biased (mostly based on extreme circumstances), I wanted to comment on a paragraph where the article talks about the NSA and selinux.
The first part of the paragraph says that by open-sourcing the DoD and FAA would make a big mistake because the code would be there for anyone to examine and look for weaknesses.
It would probably not be a good idea to open source certain kinds of software, but the security of those software systems should not be compromised by the availability of the source code, like the key/lock analogy used when reviewing commercial crypto.
Another thing they are saying in that paragraph is that the NSA was forced to release their selinux code. That is complete false. The idea was that they wanted to show an example of mandatory access controls, because they think that current discretionary access control systems are not secure enough. They deliberately chose linux because its code was widely available, and because of its popularity (after all, a closed source SE-NT would be of no help because nobody would be able to use it as an example on making a MAC enabled system). There are even some BSD variants that are using ideas from selinux related papers (I think trusted BSD wanted to implement the FLASK architecture, the one used in selinux).
Anyone that decided to check would be able to dismiss these two points as soon as they checked the documentation on the website (you can 'log on the NSA's website and print out the blueprints' if you want!). Check the FAQ, questions 9 and 10.
The sad thing is that most of the readers of this crap will just jump to the conclusions instead of checking the source (no pun intended).
GPG 0x1B479C78
And the loopholes work both ways, like the now-gone "marriage penalty" (where a married couple pay more in taxes than they would filing separately).
Um, not quite. I married a single mom and she (we) lost her several-thousand-dollar single mom credit. It literally costs us about $4-5,000/year to be married.
Nutra-Sweet or Aspartame.
Coke C2 is absolutely disgusting.
Try Coke from Japan or Mexico - it's not as sweet and doesn't have that "bite" to it.
They strong armed box vendors, and released apps that on purpose broke other peoples apps. This is true, correct? Part of a pattern of generic skunky behavior leading to establishment of a monopoly they couldn't have completely gotten based on actual true productivity and pricing and being ethical. I mean they did get convicted of a few things, and there's some good evidence of other unethical behavior as well.
I also think they probably used a lot of under the table cash in the right hands, but I can't prove it, I'm just guessing, but I'll keep repeating it anyway, because I think I'm right..and I think there's people out there who know that too, buit don't want to get caught up in any federal lawsuits over it, but eventually they'll get busted just like enron or worldcom. I bet it happens, someone is gonna spill the beans one day, and a lot of folks who know about it probably got the records squirreled away in case they have to use them for plea bargaining. Insurance.
Just a guess though, but I hope they are getting nervous about it, especially ole bill hisself.
I know not everyone at any corporation, including microsoft, is evil or a criminal, and I know they have some talented people who've worked hard over the years. I am also of the opinion that at upper management level they are predators and skunks, and sought to maximise profits rather than spend the money on making more stable and more secure products. I think they maximised profits to the detriment of their own workers and employees, let alone other people affected by the use and "trying to use" their stuff.
Plus they been milking that no warranty deal for a long time. Let's see em compete if they have to offer a normal suitability for purpose warranty, same as any other product has to have. Software in general been getting a skate on that juicy plum for a long time now, either it's a brand new industry that needs cuddling and handholding and their teddy bears when there's loud noises outside,and they admit they are incompetent to offer a warranty on their products they have made hundreds of billions on, or they can step up to the plate like any other company/industry,and accept adult responsibility for their work. I think it's way past time to require warranties for professional for-profit software. If you take money for it, I think you should have to back it up with a warranty of some kind.
As to courting developers-ehh, people will go work where they get the best experience and get to do the job they want to do. Part of that is money, but money isn't everything.
And for people who think it is, I feel sorry for them.
Nowadays, it seems, it seems more appropriate to Microsoft to invest several millions in propaganda, than in software improvement. Their recent move in resurrecting the MSIE development team made about .0015% of the available cash.
So, if I start my own astroturfing bullshit think tank ("stink tank"?), how much Microsoft funding can I get? I'll just take "Linux is bad, mmmkay" and expand it into a vaporware book.
This statement is misleading, and not really a viable argument for tax cuts. See this analysis. There are plenty others with similar statements from Google.
Plus, you can't really evaluate the net effect of the tax cuts on the economy unless you also simultaneously evaluate the effect of the resultant debt that Reagan & Bush's "borrow & spend" policies have imposed on the U.S.
That doesn't mean that I disagree with you about being more careful about where that money is spent - I just think that "tax cuts = more revenue" is far too simplistic a mantra for national policy decisions, and tends to be used more as a means to trick people into going along with corrupt agendas.
You heard me. N/T
cheers
Look at it this way: This is just further proof that in a free and open capitalistic society, even "the truth" has economic value, and control over it can be purchased. Of course, that price can be prohibitively large, but once your economy starts going Pareto (and it inevitably will), you get things like this. The solution is either bloody revolution every 20 years, or fascism. At least in our current model, the upper and middle classes get to experience the metaphoric convenience of the trains arriving on time.
-Hentai [in vita non pacem est]
"Stupid" is a bit too reactionary. "Ignorant" is certainly accurate, but calls for the reason behind the ignorance.
I think in this case, both "Dupe" and "Conned" would describe the poster well, but fail to describe the actual post itself, which is the prime objective of moderation labels.
You almost need to drop into compound descriptives. Like, "Willfully Ignorant" or even whole sentences such as; "This Dupe has been Successfully Programmed by the Dark Side into believing that Greed is Not A Disease."
In any case, I don't envy the task of the Slashdot programming staff!
-FL
It's called sarcasm, ya n00b.
The sierra club is concerned that linux will polute our rivers.
Everybody knows, Conspiracies Do Not Exist! After all, it is "Impossible to Keep a Secret". And anyway, "They Just Wouldn't Do That."
And, of course, everybody knows that only wackos believe in conspiracies!
You're not a wacko, are you? If you are suspected of such, we'll all laugh at you. We'll try to make you feel small and ashamed! Your self-esteem must hurt! --Because despite the obvious, nobody at all has any desire to control your behavior through such basic and easily manipulated emotions! Drink more! Watch more TV! You want to be cool and get laid? Take Ecstasy. Quit worrying so much. Take Anti-Depressants. ALL the cool kids are doing it. You want to be cool, don't you?
Despite all logic and evidence you may have to share, you will be condemned to a thorough pestering by thousands of Taco Bell-loving citizens auto-reacting with 'Tin-Foil' jokes and lead walls made of all the clever 'knowledge' they have accumulated from watching 'documentaries' on their televisions.
Get with the times, man! Thinking and pointing out discrepancies between reality and the sham being projected by Big Money, Big Government and Big Military is simply not cool! It clearly says so in all their literature.
--Ask any Think Tank, and they'll tell you.
-FL
For instance, can YOU (British even so) park your assets offshore while parking your expenses onshore, escaping taxation while also piling deductions under your tax system? Can YOU pay a relative 1% fee to a tax accountant to draft an opinion letter outlining how all that asset movement is legal? Can YOU move compensation from tax-deferred instrument to tax-free account, eventually escaping all taxation on it? Can YOU escape taxation by being so diversely embodied that you simply end up paying yourself?
In short, yes.
====
Crudely Drawn Games
That's certainly not what they represent, and they actually go out of their way not to seem biased or bought.
Incidentally, if you look at other large sponsors of these agencies, you'll see other funding sources they have in common besides Microsoft. It's not like MS is the sole, driving force behind these organizations.
No one's claiming that MS is the sole client of these companies. The main point is just that 1) These think tanks are shills, and 2) The groups saying nice things about MS are paid by MS.
They're kind of like hookers - they'll "satisfy" whoever pays them enough.
-Looking for a job as a materials chemist or multivariat
wget -S http://www.techcentralstation.com
--15:42:54-- http://www.techcentralstation.com/
=> `index.html'
Resolving www.techcentralstation.com... done.
Connecting to www.techcentralstation.com[64.225.154.226]:80... connected.
HTTP request sent, awaiting response...
1 HTTP/1.1 200 OK
2 Date: Wed, 23 Jun 2004 19:44:32 GMT
3 Server: Apache/1.3.27 (Unix) (Red-Hat/Linux) mod_python/2.7.8 Python/1.5.2 mod_ssl/2.8.12 OpenSSL/0.9.6b DAV/1.0.3 PHP/4.1.2 mod_perl/1.26 mod_throttle/3.1.2
4 Last-Modified: Wed, 23 Jun 2004 12:40:56 GMT
5 ETag: "241bc3-166b7-40d97a58"
6 Accept-Ranges: bytes
7 Content-Length: 91831
8 Connection: close
9 Content-Type: text/html
And the ability for them to even do this points out the legal system is, at least in some way, broken.
Revenues most emphatically did not double, unless you count the economic expansion that followed the tax INCREASE in the first two years of the Clinton administration.
Where in the world do you get the notion that revenues doubled? In fact, federal spending as a percentage of GDP peaked during the Bush I administration.
During the eight years of the Reagan presidency, revenue went from 517.1 billion dollars to 769.2 billion dollars (quite an expansion in absolute dollars, but hardly double the revenue). In the meantime, the public debt went from 711.9 billion dollars to 1.74 TRILLION dollars, more than doubling. (Source is the CBO).
Also, if you look at tax revenue as a percentage of GDP (the total economic output of the nation), during the Reagan years you see that taxes were indeed cut, from 18.9% of GDP to 17.5% of GDP. But if the intention was for that to reduce the debt, that failed. In percent of GDP terms, from 26.1% of GDP to 39.6% of GDP.
If we look at on whom the tax burden fell, individual income taxes were 244.1 billion in 1980 and 349.0 billion in 1986. Corporate income tax went from 64.6 billion to 63.1 billion over the same period. How corporate America suffers!
Social security and Medicare over this time went from 157.8 billion to 283.9 billion.
And the evil "Death Tax" the Republicans love to attack? 6.4 billion to 7.0 billion.
Oh, and while you are blaming Congress for the "spending" side, *All* of the expansion in entitlements were offset by increased payroll taxation. The increase? The defense budget.
Now, understand, I'm not saying this was a bad thing. I think the cold war is over because of this massive increase in Federal spending, but put the blame for the deficits and the debt where it lies: In the budget proposed and pushed by the adminstration.
Again, you can't get the facts from the press on the right or the left. You have to go look at the data.
Nobody in the mass media is telling the story truthfully and completely. Not the traditional news media, and certainly not the right-wing talk radio world.
You will hear the CBO bashed, but remember the Congressional Budget Office is currently run by the Republicans and there sits the data.
Go look at it.
Oh, BTW, from 1992 to 2000, revenue DID double (from 1.091 trillion to 2.025 trillion, and the debt went down from its 1997 peak of 3.772 trillion to 3.409 trillion). However, the budget has gone back into deficit in 2002 and 2003 and the debt is increasing again. We can argue about the cause, but the big new item in the budget is running two major military operations.
- An opinion letter from a tax accountancy has a going rate of about $50000.
- The minimum offshore account costs about $8000 just to setup.
- An offshore mailing address is about $20000 per year.
How many of those have you paid for, so far?[You have a stable society when some nut guns down a schoolyard and the law doesn't change.]
While reading the article I got to the part where it says:
Several leaked Microsoft memos (known as the Halloween documents) provide some insight into Microsoft's plans to combat Open Source. Comparing their research, into the best messages to use against Open Source with the arguments used by the think tanks is rather interesting.
And I had to stop and think for a moment. The holiday mentioned (ie: Halloween) is a time when children dress up as someone else and go door to door for tricks or treats. It seems to me that that is what Microsoft is doing. They are creating companies which are nothing more than a cover to help cover up their tricks and the treat is to get rid of Open Source.
Rather obvious I know but no one else has put the two together before this and it makes me wonder what other letters might have more than one meaning. Eh?
Someone put a black hole in my pocket and now I'm broke.
I went to ``Citizens Against Government Waste'' and found nothing about open source. Please link to whatever it is you're talking about.
In other words the term "Think Tank" is synonomous with Brothel
Someone (nnnp), who works for a major global telecoms firm (nnnp), recently told me that as long as MS supplies them with all the software they need (os & apps), for a "couple of dollars a seat" they have no reason to change.
It would cost millions in manhours to deploy & maintain a different system, even if the os was "free". The workstations they buy have all the software they need preinstalled, locked down to their specs, & the licencing fees are peanuts!
So why change, kickbacks or no?
Dr Fred.
...one being that the no-calorie replacements can cause some severe health problems, another being that they're displacing even healthier drinks, like water, for example, or fresh juice (no, not dead stuff in bottles, cans or cartons).
Got time? Spend some of it coding or testing
I'm not suprised that they are funded by microsoft...
Not because they are anti open source, but because they probably bought microsoft products because they don't like open source. This, in turn, led to them getting discounts and other perks because they purchased lots of licenses from Microsoft.
Call it funding... but I call it bulk discount.
If you're anti open source, why wouldn't you seek funding in some sort from an alternative company if you agree to exclusively use their software? It's just good business sense.
Not to be a flame, but why don't you just try to listen to their arguments instead of saying "Look! They use microsoft products! They must be biased! Ha ha ha ha. Open Source wins again."
... no reason to change, unless they suffer chronic security or useability issues that they could reasonably extrapolate to being severe into the future. Just run the odds with past performance is all you can do then.. If it's working "good enough" for them, and they can handle any downtime or borken-ness that isn't excessive, and they are happy enough with it, sure, a couple bucks a seat you can't beat with two sticks, it's a deal. I think that's an *incredible* price based on what I have read though. They ought to see if they can get it carved in stone for like 10 years, with an escape clause in it, no harm nor foul if they choose different down the pike.
Now ME, and not being a CEO of bigco,but if I was, I wouldn't care, I would get on the intercom and tell the CTO/CIO to go get with the CFO and for them to go get something else, just "because" I wouldn't do business with them. I'm just cranky that way. I quit one job once when I got into medium management when I found out it was medium corrupt, took a pretty snazzy payloss, too....
Probably the main reason I am not CEO of some bigco.....
We need a more accurate, descriptive phrase than "think tank". How about "rent-a-shill"?
That would be: go for the ball, not the man. Fuckwit.
However, I have yet to speak to anyone who *likes* Microsoft the company, apart from a few people I've crossed paths with who "used to work there".
"There are people who don't like capitalism, and people who don't like PCs. But there's no one who likes the PC who doesn't like Microsoft."
I love C++
Don't be so quick to blame Microsoft...blame the think tanks. Think about this scenario.
I'm a company that does research. I can only do research if I get funding for said research. Microsoft has lots of money, so chances are they'd sponsor my research. So, I'll go ahead and pitch an operating system comparison between windows and linux to them.
Microsoft, as any smart company, figures they might find out some good ammunition against their competitor...so they sponsor the research. They don't necessarily tell the think tank to lie, they just sponsor the research as stated above.
Now...said think tank could be completely objective...and start finding out the advantages and disadvantages of linux, the same for windows. They have to give progress reports to Microsoft. If it turns out that their research is favoring Linux a lot, Microsoft wouldn't be making a very good business decision to continue funding them. That's not evil, there's just no sense if funding ammunition for your competitor.
The think tank knows this however. If they're ethical, they'll do this in an unbiased fashion, and losing funding merely means they publish what they have. If they're not ethical, and just want more money, they'll bury the advantages of linux and the disadvantes of windows. Microsoft looks at the progress report, and like any good business, figure that this is worth their money, and continues funding.
Unless you know for sure that Microsoft told these guys to fudge their data, you should be blaming the "dozen institutions" you mention, not Microsoft. As a grad student in an university of all things, I've seen this sponsor pleasing situation in action...not to the point where we lie about our data, but to the point where we actively don't pursue things that we suspect will result in unfavorable data to the sponsors.
Hmm...given my last comment, I think I'm hitting the "post anonymously" checkmark.
"Is a misleading name... they're just lobby groups that are trying to give themselves some credibility."
Oh, they're Think Tanks. Haven't you noticed how much they leak?
" The fact is that some oss projects (see the recent article linked on /. about why users are 'wrong' in not likeing the new Nautilus 'spatial' design) *don't* think this way, and more's the pity."
All that so you can take a cheap shot at GNOME. In case you have forgotten, all those days ago. That last article was NOT done by a member of the GNOME team. It was an "opinion" piece done by an individual, like yourself. Also the GNOME developers put a button into the CVS version of GNOME so people could easily switch back and forth. But of course anyone reading your "think tank" expose on GNOME wouldn't know any of that.
A double - talk : Microsoft Corp. says it is looking to turn over more of its programs to open-source software developers, playing a greater role (then why open source bashing?)in a process that the Redmond company has criticized strongly at times in the past.
Earlier Microsoft had a policy : If you cannot convince, confuse. Now they are following : if you cannot beat them, join them.
I know what I meant. I meant what I wrote.
No need to take it so badly. Geez, lighten up.
The majority of world governments are already pushing a giant unmossed stone onto the verg of a large grassy bank, I don't think microsoft are going to stop it.
l
Internet == collaboration, power to create in groups.
Open sourec == collaboration, create software in groups.
Internet == open source as far as I am concerned.
Stick that in your pipe and smoke it Bill.
Microsoft
---------------
Outlook
Word
Exce
PowerPoint
Access
IE
Better
--------------
Thunderboard / Mozilla
OpenOffice Writer
OpenOffice Calc
OpenOffice Impress
StarOffice has an access doobie, or
mysql
mckoi
and stick a form wizard on them
Firefox / Mozilla!
Microsoft are welcome to spend money on these 'thinktanks' who I have never heard of before.
As long as no euro money goes into the SOAB's
Who cares even if they get their funding from the devil. Open Source does destroy jobs, helps intellectual property theft and generally damages the US software industry. The irony is that many of the software developers standing in unemployment lines are proponents of Open Source. No other industry in history has successfully survived giving away products for free. (The problem has recently dawned on Red Hat. That is why they are trying to charge for their new product.) By 2015 when the US software industry is completely destroyed Open Source will be remembered - less than warmly - for being a major contributor to the collapse of the industry. If you are software developer under 35 get another profession. And by the way I am not funded by Microsoft or anybody. Simply a software manager with 30 years experience who is tickled by the naivety of geeks when it comes to business reality. As I said - if you are under under 35 get out of software now before it is too late.
The middle classes
You must be thinking of the middle class that nets more than $100k/year.
I'm thinking of the middle class that grosses $50k/year and has spent the last 10 years trying to figure out how to get ahead of the bills still left over from college. I'm eight years out of college with a degree in chemistry and experience with molecular synthesis and design and I still have four pieces of furniture: a bed, a used pressboard entertainment center, a computer desk, and a bean bag chair.
over-priced real estate
Spoken like one of those "middle-class" people that can afford to even think about real estate.
ooooh oooh another SUV
I'm still taking the bus.
+++ATHZ 99:5:80
Links to other Tanks dirty biz...h tml/ /www.ecosyn.us/adti/Singer-1993-1994.html/ www.ecosyn.us/adti/Singer-Seitz.htmle cosyn.us/adti/Singer-Nightline.htmlc osyn.us/adti/Stohrer-Singer.htmly n.us/adti/Hazeltine-Singer.htmln .us/adti/Heidelberg-Appeal.htmln .us/adti/Confronting_AdTI.html
http://www.ecosyn.us/adti/ADTI_Frauds_01.
http://www.ecosyn.us/adti/Pelosi.html
http:
http:/
http://www.
http://www.e
http://www.ecos
http://www.ecosy
http://www.ecosy
Tanks attack free-software, freedom, and nature.
h ttp://www.ecosyn.us/adti/AdTI_Villians.htm/ /www.ecosyn.us/adti/Pelosi.htmln .us/adti/Singer-1993-1994.html. us/adti/Singer-Seitz.htmld ti/Singer-Nightline.htmlt i/Stohrer-Singer.htmlH azeltine-Singer.htmle idelberg-Appeal.htmlo nfronting_AdTI.htmli tz_Tobacco_Crimes.htm l
The soldiers of these think tanks serve villianous masters. No one single report will ever fully explain the damage they do. The "junior brownshirts" will respond to exposures of villiany by trying to smokescreen it. It is not needed that everybody get a full education -- some people are just getting the beginning of their wake-up call.
Google Results 1 - 10 of about 5,760 for
"When Think Tanks Attack" -- not bad 5,760 links in a week.
Keep up the good work...
http://www.ecosyn.us/adti/ADTI_Frauds_01.html
http:
http://www.ecosy
http://www.ecosyn
http://www.ecosyn.us/a
http://www.ecosyn.us/ad
http://www.ecosyn.us/adti/
http://www.ecosyn.us/adti/H
http://www.ecosyn.us/adti/C
http://www.ecosyn.us/adti/Se
Oh, great idea! Let's pay those fucking whores who want to destroy the free software movement because Bill Gates told them so. I'm sure they will be good then and Bill Gates will never pay them more than us. God damn it! Are you out of your mind?! It's equally smart as IBM buying SCO!
Sincerely,
Pan Tarhei Hosé, PhD.
"Homo sum et cogito ergo odi profanum vulgus et libido."