Slashdot Mirror
Hungary Officials Raid Microsoft Office
Steve writes "Hungarian government officers raided the offices of a Microsoft subsidiary this week, as part of a probe into the company's relationship with large software distributors. From the article: 'According to the statement, Microsoft used sales conditions and offered software distributors incentives - described as loyalty discounts - so they wouldn't offer clients anything but Microsoft Office products. Such behavior could lead to the exclusion of competitive products from the market and violate European Union rules, according to the authority known as the GVH.'"
What, did they think Microsoft had something tasty in there?
Kwisatz Haderach
Sell the spice to CHOAM
This Mahdi took Shaddam's Throne
Now, tell me where your mother****in cookies are!! I'm Hungary!
Sorry, couldn't resist..
which is totally what she said
Read about this on my Wii last night. What I found odd is they said MS "hadn't done anything illegal" just they were investigating anticompetitive practices, which I dont see how a raid can help that kind of investigation. Think they'd more likely to suponea emails and such.
First read as "Hungry Officials Raid Microsoft Office". Well, buy them a pizza.
That's our life, the big wheel of shit. - The Fat Man, Blue Tango Salvage
Microsoft uses its monopoly to block others? What is going on here?
...for anti-anti-competitive practices. According to a Microsoft spokesperson, "We are troubled by evidence of direct resistance to Microsoft corporate directives."
In other news, Microsoft is merging with the RIAA and MPAA to reform the Dutch East India Company. Pirates beware!
"If still these truths be held to be
Self evident."
-Edna St. Vincent Millay
Let's wait a while.. the officials will be hungry; soon as Microsoft makes a revised 'Fact-rich' campaign to fatten these officials, everything will be back to normal again!
If you keep throwing chairs, one day you'll break windows....
Doing their best to eliminate all competition with their monopolistic practices.
It's no different than their blood deals with SuSe and such. Tie everyone up with obligations to not use other products or make them pay royalties with Microsoft's threats of lawsuits for crap patents.
I bought my last Microsoft product years ago. No way in hell will I support a company like them.
And for those that talk about Microsoft's "innovation", I'd like to counter with their outright thefts of code (Stacker), their sabotaging other company's products when they detect them running in Windows (Word Perfect), their screwing customers so they could pretend that IE was a critical component of the OS (Win98), and all the other dirty tricks they constantly pull.
Doesn't Bill Gates have enough money? When will they actually produce a quality product instead of pushing junk on people? When will they let the market actually support innovation?
Yeah, yeah - I know I am no Microsoft fan boy and this may get labelled as flame bait or a troll, but seriously - this is just another example of Microsoft's dirty tricks and using their weight to screw everyone else - including their very own fan boys.
"Microsoft used sales conditions and offered software distributors incentives - described as loyalty discounts - so they wouldn't offer clients anything but Microsoft Office products. "
And if that didn't work, then they brought out the chairs.
This is my opinion. To make sure you don't steal it, it's covered by the DMCA.
Or that stupid search dog.
That's what I first imagined when I saw the headline.
Wahh!!! Only a handful of comments and still all the good jokes are already taken!
I want a new quote. One that won't spill. One that don't cost too much. Or come in a pill.
it's fun getting into trouble!
Other governments are not going to allow their pet companies to be squashed by the current US pet company. Eliminating M$ will not usher in freedom on it's own, but diversity of software makes free software much easier.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
So much for Hungarian notation.
How does it feel when you didn't do anything illegal and suddenly your office is raided, productivity grinds to a halt and all because someone somehow felt that you might have done something illegal?
Think 'bout that next time your BSA guys believe a disgruntled ex-employee who just wants to give his ex-company a piece of mind as a revenge bit. Unlike some other companies, you'll brush this loss of productivity off. Other companies ain't so lucky, and a day of ZERO productivity (lacking any other offices abroad that could compensate) is quite hard on companies that have to meet tight deadlines.
(sorry for the venting, but it really, really felt good)
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
First Germany sorting out Intel, and now Hungary....?
It looks like we're being given a 'government for the people' lesson by Europe.
Where have the US constitutional virtues which I was told were the best in the world gone now?
How soon will it be before we find US citizens emigrating to Europe?
What Raid congifration were they using? :P
That's my guess.
"Loyalty Discounts" is a great propaganda phrase. I wonder if they had some World War II styled posters in their office. Something along the lines of "Good software helps everyone! Show your TRUE COLORS with Microsoft Loyalty Discounts!"
Were they hungry Hungary officials? Were white marbles somehow involved?
It's Microsoft that introduced the (in)famous Hungary notation.
;)
;)
Hungary officials obviously weren't pleased
And I can't resist to link to How to write unmaintainable code, a must read if you didn't read it already
I have discovered a truly marvelous proof of killer sig, which this margin is too narrow to contain.
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=256583&cid=200 10655
I guess the Hungarian office didn't do a good enough job of hiding the illegal with the legal.
Got Trader Joe's? friendwich.com RSS feeds work now!
Not directly related, but Hungary is very much into open source. Also, according to google analytics for my open source project, I get quite a few hits from Hungary. And remember European Firefox usage from a few weeks ago? Hungary is one of the leading adopters of Firefox in the world. I wonder if this kind of IT culture has any bearing on how hard they will go after M$.
EXCELLENT!
Hungry officials raid Microsoft office? no wait...
While reading the Slashdot arcticle yesterday about how BusinessWeek is advocating Microsoft piracy, it made me think about how Microsoft may be passively supporting piracy in countries like China and India. They wouldn't have much to lose, since consumers there wouldn't pay for it anyway, and it increases their market share. In essence, it's like they're dumping cheap (ie free) goods on the market and other companies and products can't compete.
Now, Europeans will actually pay for their product so they wouldn't allow piracy there. But it's easy to believe that they're offering discounts instead, simply to get market share.
It all makes perfectly good business sense, but its still monopolistic and distasteful.
How many times have people here expressed doing the exact same thing (forcing people and companies to only use FOSS)? In fact, that's the entire reason for creating the GPLv3.
So not to give anyone a free pass on any shading dealings which may or may not have been going on, but realistically speaking, what's the difference? Either MS or the FOSSies are trying to remove the choices either comsumers or businesses can make. At least with MS you can still use FOSS- but if you use Lunix, you give up any way to practically use commercial software (WINE is not a practical... or even reasonable... solution): Lunix locks you in to FOSS with no way out and no practical alternatives.
We see this time and again, with businesses who have the audacity to design their pages for IE, or who choose to go with Windows Media Player. FOSSies don't advocate the right to choose, they are advocating the choices THEY want.
In a strange way, I actually trust MS more than the FOSS community: at least MS isn't forwarding a hidden agenda.
Ooops, i hate it when that happends ;-)
From: sb@microsft.com
To: All staff
All staff are reminded that all agreements encouraging distributors to distribute Microsoft products are illegal and should not be offered to partners. Specifically the practices and strategies listed here: "Extra_Legal_Expenses_for_Beginners" should not be used, and staff are specifically not to offer inducements based on the scales listed here "Hospitality_and_Discounts", and absolutely should not use the codes listed here "Expense_Codes_666" when submitting their expense claims.
Thank you for you co-operation, and remember the motto of the week : "Service them with a Smile"
SB
(sorry for the venting, but it really, really felt good)
I know what you mean. I had a skinfull and a kebab last night. I've been venting all day.
Much to the chagrin of my colleagues.
This is all probably because of a misunderstanding caused by a bad Hungarian-English dictionary.
"Prefiero morir de pie que vivir siempre arrodillado!"
If you really want to obfuscate code don't just use hunNotation... Write comments in hungarian!
Ha nem értik meg a mit irsz bisztos nem fognak tudni rugni kí.
[If they don't understand what you write surely they can't kick you out]
Not to mention I can barely write properly, so hiring a translator won't save them either...
by offering a strOfBribes to nVendors to successfully fnDominateMarket.
The police pFinger at MS for performing an illegal operation, however MS contends that bAllegations == False.
Yeah, yeah - I know I am no Microsoft fan boy and this may get labelled as flame bait or a troll, but seriously - this is just another example of Microsoft's dirty tricks and using their weight to screw everyone else - including their very own fan boys.
Now, I'm not going to come out and say that I will rape you, but, if I was going to pay you for this post, it would be in rape dollars.
Hungary Officials Raid Fridge
No, Hungarian Notation was invented by Charles Simonyi when he worked at PARC. When he took a job at Microsoft and tried to introduce it there, it was completely misunderstood, and that bastardized version is what most untrained programmers came to know (no thanks to Microsoft's developer training). Since they seemingly couldn't even be bothered to pronounce his name, it became known as Hungarian Notation.
The real thing is incredibly useful, and I encourage all unfamiliar with it to read through Joel's article.
Lies about crimes
When I saw the title, I thought, if they Raided (http://www.killsbugsdead.com/) Microsoft Office, that Office would stop working completely. Can't kill all the bugs, some of them might be features!
Agent K: A *person* is smart. People are dumb, stupid, panicky animals, and you know it.
The officials were also hungry, so after breaking down the door of the local Microsoft branch, they accepted some contract work backing up Microsoft Word, etc. onto a redundant array of independent disks.
The ironic thing is that here in Hungary NO ONE buys MS software -- it's ALL pirated. Even at netcafes.
I am in Hungary now where the wage for a qualified programmer is only $500-$800 a month. But I'm an American. Wouldnt anyone like to hire me at $1200-$1500 ?
If it's not that, then it is the sales people who can win golf equipment / trips for selling most licenses. Made me very disappointed when I first started working as a consultant.
:) Well, and made me hate Microsoft even more :) (but really they were just the ones giving the biggest gifts of them all)
The customers always got the latest product which happened to be what the seller profited from the most directly or in gifts.
It was never about what they actually needed or were the best solution for them.
It learned me a valuable lesson for when I returned to doing internal IT.
...that looks like a refridgerator.
Badabing!
I am very small, utmostly microscopic.
"Hungry Officials Raid Microsoft Office"
I was looking for a version number after "Office".
First thing that came to mind was the M$ employees cowarding down while offering Ballmer in front of them for the cops which each have a Tony Robbins face ready to devour the over weight CEO while covered in Office XP CDs in an attempt to make him look more like a chocolate chip, IE cookie, and the cops have ads all over their kevlar jackets.
Yea, I know it is stupid.
When government fears the people, there is liberty. When the people fear the government, there is tyranny. - Jefferson
40man or 25man raid ? I hope they have enough of all the required classes. I would have loved to bring my druid to the raid.
With any luck they have a couple mages with them to conjur enough bread to help fix that hunger problem.
http://interserver.net/
Hungarian for we love Windows
Hope is the currency of fools
they ate the database.
It's jackholes like the poster and the Mods that supported him that that make it so people like me aren't taken seriously when they propose open source solutions.
People who think they know everything really piss off those of us that actually do.
First, please stop the hungry-Hungarian jokes. It is not funny. It never was. .doc format is the (un)official standard at lots of places. And the government does not want to change that: for example, the Ministry of Education pays a huge amount each year to MS, for licensing MS operating systems and office apps for every Hungarian schools and universities.
:(
Someone mentioned that open source software is widely used here. Unfortunately, it is not the case. Windows XP and MS Office
On the other hand, lots of pirated MS software was used previously, so now the Ministry pays this yearly "protection money" so the BSA does not go after the teachers and students.
This "attack" on MS could be a simple mistake, an attempt to lower the prices for the government, or perhaps MS.hu forgot about the bribe for the GVH... we will never know the truth.
This whole story might seem incoherent for anyone living in a sane country... but Hungary is FUBAR now
András
All they found was a paper clip :-(
Opus: the Swiss army knife of audio codec
...full HAZMAT gear, the cooties in there would have been....well.....WMD doesn't cover it really, it would have been better to just admit reality and nuke the site from orbit, just to be sure.
Naaah. Microsoft wasn't trying to maintain an abusive monopoly.
They were just trying to protect the consumer from a confusing array of choices. Consumers are bewildered by all that computer stuff, and Microsoft just wants to help them.
All quite altruistic really. Nothing wrong at all. Nup.
I am anarch of all I survey.
They could have raided Open Office instead and it wouldn't have cost them a dime!
Hungarian competition commission in 2004 fined major highway constructors for EUR 28.5 million (over USD 35 million) when found evidences of cartel creation in a bidding process. If i remember correctly one of the key evidence they found was a forgotten note on paper in a manager's office. Thats why the raid was needed in the case of MS Hungary. Anticompetitive and illegal activities are rarely well documented by companies.
c =3758&m5_lang=en
http://www.gvh.hu/gvh/alpha?do=2&pg=11&st=1&m5_do
Is it right? Not?
Can we get enough facts please? What RAID was used? RAID0, RAID1, RAID5...? Which version of Office did they run on the RAID?
Then somebody brings a timely reminder about the kind of company we are dealing with in the thread, and that somehow is off topic.
Enough said frankly....
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
It seems other civilized countries have established beacons of freedom on the beautiful island. Hungary should follow the lead of such enlightened nations and lease Varadero bay.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.