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Microsoft to Fight Crime With Spammer's Millions
daria42 writes "It looks as if the $7 million Microsoft won from spam king Scott Richter won't go into a Swiss bank account and never be seen again after all. The company plans to dedicate a cool $5 mil to helping law enforcement agencies address computer-related crimes. Another $1 million will go to New York State to "expand computer-related skills training for youths and adults", with the rest being flagged to pay Microsoft's legal costs."
When you have billions you can be really generous with millions. The price of good advertising is probably higher. Giving the paltry five million away buys a lot of good will from New York state.
Crimes like piracy of Windows ?. Patent policing ?. More SCO like allegations on newer projects that imitate or duplicate Microsoft products ?.
Another $1 million will go to New York State to "expand computer-related skills training for youths and adults"Train them to use Outlook, Word and Excel or do they mean .NET,C# and Monad ?. Sort of catch them young approach ?.
I've seen a lot of Microsoft charity - it's often just building a new market for themselves, locking in an expanding market or blatant tax evasionary steps . They sent 250 XP Cds to a school and mark the cost as donations. I went on TV to help FSF guys call foul on that in Kerala - apparently it seems to have made some impact there (they teach about using OpenOffice and FireFox now).Essentially the money is in Microsoft's pockets and they are trying for Maximum ROI, rather than paying it out as dividends to their shareholders right now.
Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum videtur
No surprise the the article and comments have taken the sarcastic and cynical route. You guys here seem to never be satisfied with anything Microsoft does.
The fact is Microsoft has no obligation to use this money to do anything. But they make a nice gesture, and nobody here can say one positive word? There's not one good outcome out of this?
The bitterness with Microsoft got old and stale 10 years ago. It's past time you people gave up this hatred and obsession with the 'Borg'.
We have probably all done it at some stage (piracy that is), and flame wars aside about ethics and monopolies, it's really time for people to pull their heads out of their collective butts and accept that it is stealing (and no I don't want an argument about definitions. I know nothing physical was taken, but under current law it's still stealing. Don't like it? Get the laws changed).
This doesn't mean I'm against pushing for change in the software industry, and moving to OpenSource (where it makes sense) but people have got to accept that it's not right, no matter what your politics, views or anything else are.
There's a whole lot of back and forth going on here. The only thing everyone can agree on is that the spammer deserved the fine. Now everyone wants to know why Microsoft is entitled to that fine? I personally believe they are entitled to it. First and most obvious they are the ones that created the law suit and did the actual suing. Microsoft isn't a government agency, what they win shouldn't be stripped from them. In all honesty if Microsoft didn't sue this guy, he would probably still be spamming. In which case no one is better off. Secondly anyone and everyone can sue. I know I'm going to get shit about how the American legal system sucks and blah blah blah. But that's a perk/pitfall of living in this country. As far as Microsoft donating the money, it's a brilliant move from a business standpoint. As mentioned earlier the cost of an advertising campaign would far exceed that of the $5m donation. The donation created goodwill and great PR. It's almost impossible to put a price on goodwill. People need to stop looking at Microsoft (and other corporations) as a public service. These companies exist to make money. Period. Microsoft did a good thing, they are the heroes here. They are the only ones who stood up against this guy and dished out the cash to do it. Yes the Million bucks in legal fees is pocket change to them. But I don't see anyone else willing to anti up. Plus if you really wanted an argument to show they are directly affected. They own an email service. I'm sure millions of this guys email has gone through there servers at some point, costing them money and inconveniencing clients. Congratulations Microsoft on your victory!
Everyone who thinks that Gates is going to dress up in a batman costume is very wrong. The costume would be more like Howard Sterns fart man!
The bitterness with Microsoft got old and stale 10 years ago.
Oh ... and there I was under the impression that the anti-MS sentiment was about the fact that the company actually continues to behave unethically to this day, not about whether or not it was "fashionable" or "not fashionable" to be anti-MS ... silly me. I didn't realise bashing Microsoft "was, like, so yesterday!"
Your post reminds me of how Nike successfully turned around rising negative sentiment against the company over their sweatshop labour practices by creating a clever youth-targeted ad campaign that manipulated young people into simply thinking it was no longer "cool" to whine about the sweatshop labour because the topic was, well, 'so yesterday'. Of course they never stopped the sweatshop labour practices.
Are we so divorced from reality that our opinions about serious, real-life problems are now mostly based on how "hot", "current" or "fashionable" a topic is, rather than on, you know, facts?