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Obama Looking To Symantec CEO For Commerce

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the fear-monger-your-way-to-the-top dept.

patentpundit writes "Word has started to circulate that President Barack Obama may be close to appointing John W. Thompson, the outgoing chief executive of network security firm Symantec Corp., to be the next Secretary of Commerce. According to the LA Times, over the last several days Thompson has spoken on the telephone and met with key senators, and Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.), a member of the commerce committee that would hold confirmation hearings for any appointed Secretary of Commerce, is 'extremely supportive and hopeful he'll be the nominee.' The appointment of Thompson to head the Department of Commerce would be an exceptionally interesting choice given that only days ago President Obama asked Scott McNealy, a co-founder of Sun Microsystems, to lead his open source charge and conduct a study and report back regarding the feasibility of the US government forgoing proprietary software and moving toward open source software solutions."

11 of 168 comments (clear)

  1. Any explanation? by nine-times · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I don't know about John W. Thompson, but my gut response to this was, "Could he look for someone who runs a company that doesn't suck?" Thompson might not be responsible, but *someone* has been running Symantec into the ground for several years now-- at least as far as product quality is concerned.

    As far as technology goes, I'd be much more pleased if I felt like the administration were looking for people with pro-freedom and pro-consumer tendencies.

    1. Re:Any explanation? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

      Agreed, this guy fails on all counts.

      He profiteered on scare scaremongering.

      He ran a company that turns out crap (doing more harm than good to many computers).

      The software is anti-consumer in it's behavior (e.g. deceptive un-install)?

      He's the only available Black CEO from a "high tech" company. I really hope that isn't why.

  2. Mixed Blessing? by Cowmonaut · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I suppose he knows the "tech industry" or what have you better than other possible choices. I just have this feeling that having the former CEO of a proprietary software company in charge of looking into the feasibility of going open source might not be as good an idea.

    I mean, the guy is capable but is he willing? Several nations are going nuts with open source now since it puts them in control of their own systems and even fits their philosophical ideas (power to the people, etc) better than going Windows. So we know its possible and seems to be working out okay where it has been done. Why do I have a feeling whomever we do get for Secretary of Commerce is going to say we should stick with Windows for the OS, Symantec for the AV, and MS Office for our primary apps?

  3. One of the worst proprietary vendors... by MikeRT · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I couldn't help but notice that he picked the CEO of a company that makes the worst, most bloated, least valuable proprietary products I've ever used. Say what you will about the bloat in Microsoft products, but at least the bloat is there because they are trying their damnedest to create a robust platform and maintain compatibility. I've never seen a single benefit to the bloat that Symantec products have, and have often found myself wondering how you would even notice malware and viruses on a system that has their antivirus products on it.

    1. Re:One of the worst proprietary vendors... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Interesting

      His company makes a shitty product and have made a huge profit from it. He should be excellent as Secretary of Commerce. Hell, selling a good product ain't that hard.

    2. Re:One of the worst proprietary vendors... by nvrrobx · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Having been an engineer at Symantec for 5 1/2 years, I can tell you that what they suffer from is the inability to build new products themselves, or a management team that refuses to try (you choose).

      It's a company of "buy everything you can see, who cares if you can integrate it". Very little in the way of shared components, every product looks and works different, very little interoperability, etc.

      It seemed like we always bought the worst codebases we could find, then tried to fix it. It's not due to a lack of good engineering talent - there is plenty at the company.

      While I think JWT is a nice guy, one only needs to look at the purchase of Veritas to find a completely failed business model, and a CEO who doesn't seem to "get it". Even after that, they continued (and still continue) to snatch up other companies with little regard to how it will really affect shareholders. Nice guys don't make CEOs.

      When John Schwarz left to take the CEO spot at Business Objects and we kept Gary Bloom (CEO, Veritas) - I knew we were in trouble.

  4. Wow by unity100 · · Score: 2, Interesting

    open source initiatives through sun ceo, ex yahoo exec for admn. post, symantec exec for ceo .... totally investing in the upcoming tech age.

    u.s. is going to shake up and lead again after all. just at the time we thought it was going down the drain. amazing.

    --
    Read radical news here
  5. ha by unity100 · · Score: 1, Interesting

    what did ANY senior post appointee in the administrations of the last 30 years do to get to their post ? APART from being regulars of smoke filled rooms ?

    please wake up. this person, is of our age and times. he doesnt belong to an age in which life was decided in smoke filled rooms on leather armchairs.

    its not what he has done. its that he is of OUR generations, the tech affiliated generations, and he is of our rising internet/tech culture. thats what's important.

    it would be utterly stupid, STUPID to assign a person to such posts, just because they have pulled some ceo stunts in some monolithic dinosaur companies. considering the fact that we are well into the tech age and the only thing we havent started automating&integrating being the way we shit in our wcs, and the fact that how badly the 'executive' understanding of the past 'hey its high finance & executive times !' era screwed up our global economy, doing as such would be even more stupid.

    --
    Read radical news here
  6. open source by DoofusOfDeath · · Score: 3, Interesting

    The appointment of Thompson to head the Department of Commerce would be an exceptionally interesting choice given that only days ago President Obama asked Scott McNealy, a co-founder of Sun Microsystems, to lead his open source charge and conduct a study and report back regarding the feasibility of the US government forgoing proprietary software and moving toward open source software solutions

    The Navy-Marine Corp. Intranet (NMCI) project has been seen as a huge, overpriced failure. It's also due for re-bidding in 2010, I believe, because EDS decided it wasn't a profitable contract.

    I wonder if a general push towards OSS in the federal government will even lead to an eviction of the unholy Exchange servers that are part of the current NMCI.

  7. Has anyone actually seen him by lyz · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Most of the comments here are quite negative towards Mr. Thompson. He is actually a very impressive person. I suggest people who have decided to base their judgment of him on the company he ran watch the episode of CEO Exchange with him in it. http://www.pbs.org/wttw/ceoexchange/episodes/ceo_jthompson.html

    1. Re:Has anyone actually seen him by tniermann · · Score: 2, Interesting

      He is a great choice. He was on the advisory committee of a previous company of mine. He was always insightful, and he has a magnetic personality. He is someone who is impressive in both small private sessions as well as the big forums. At the end of the day he is a sales person through and through. Having someone in Commerce who can facilitate big deals and trade structures with class will be very good for the country.