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FTC Attorney Joins Microsoft
inode_buddha writes "Randall Long, a senior attorney who led several antitrust investigations against Google, has been hired by Microsoft. From the article: 'The software giant told the Wall Street Journal yesterday that it hired Randall Long, an official at the FTC's Bureau of Competition. When he joins the software giant at the end of the month, Long will head up Microsoft's regulatory affairs division in Washington.
Long was involved in FTC reviews of Google's acquisitions of both DoubleClick and AdMob. According to the Journal's unnamed sources, Long was especially outspoken about Google's AdMob acquisition, saying that the FTC should challenge the deal. His reservations were eventually set aside and the deal was approved in 2010.'"
There are places in the world where this would be illegal.
"I've got more toys than Teruhisa Kitahara."
M$ still sucks ass!
Just another reason for the separation of Corporation and State.
The mind conceives, the body achieves, the spirit manifests.
RE:"Just another reason for the separation of Corporation and State." yup, crony capitalism = friendly fascism
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Fascism/Classic_Friendly_Fascism.html
Politics is Treachery, Religion is Brainwashing
Perhaps he wanted an employer who would agree with his distrust of Google.
IANAL, so I have no idea how likely this is, but -- is it possible that he's seen sealed testimony or other privileged information that could be damaging to Google, and would otherwise not be directly accessible to Microsoft?
I suspect he's been working for M$ for a while now.
it's just official now.
Perhaps he had a prior arrangement with Google's competitor to develop distrust, in exchange for a well-paid sinecure once he was done.
"I've got more toys than Teruhisa Kitahara."
I wonder if it ever occurred to Microsoft that one solution would be to not abuse its market position. You know, at least pretend that they're incurable evil sociopaths.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
Perhaps he had a prior arrangement with Google's competitor to develop distrust, in exchange for a well-paid sinecure once he was done.
"Never write if you can speak; never speak if you can nod; never nod if you can wink." - Martin Lomasney
If Slashdot were chemistry it would look like this:Cadaverine
It's another case of revolving door - where a senior government officer getting a high ranking position in the private sector the minute he quit his government job
I'm afraid that in a civil society like what we have, we can't do nothing to this form of corruption
Muchas Gracias, Señor Edward Snowden !
Little mystery indeed,
We have been joking here on Slashdot about a famous outburst of chair throwing, and about Steve Ballmer yelling that he was fucking going to kill Google. He, however, was not joking.
Microsoft has been beaten up over anti-competitive / anti-trust practices many times in many jurisdictions.
And when he uttered that famous sentence, in what way do you think Ballmer was dreaming of killing a company having earned respect among web users and having as a motto "Don't be evil", if not in pulling Google down in the dirty pool of consumer hate Microsoft was drowning itself? Has anyone not noticed the intense PR campaign-war that has been waged against Google since then, even on Slashdot, and the intense sock-puppeting and shilling each time a Google story comes up?
From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Revolving_door_(politics) :
In politics, the "revolving door" is the movement of personnel between roles as legislators and regulators and the industries affected by the legislation and regulation. In some cases the roles are performed in sequence but in certain circumstances may be performed at the same time. Political analysts claim that an unhealthy relationship can develop between the private sector and government, based on the granting of reciprocated privileges to the detriment of the nation and can lead to regulatory capture.
Ronald Reagan insists that US markets stay open to Japan, while Japanese markets are closed to the US. US loses massive market share to Japan. Reagan gets out of office, and immediately flies to Japan to pick up a $2 million "speakers fee."
Absolutely no "proof" of corruption. But what does it look like?
If the corruption could be actually proven, it would never had happened.
Same idea here. A government official mysteriously takes an extremely strong stance against a rival of a company that has been caught red-handed bribing officials. Now that official is suddenly working for the company the official helped. It stinks to high heaven, and we both know it.
Microsoft internal document
“Working behind the scenes to orchestrate “independent” praise of our technology, and damnation of the enemy’s, is a key evangelism function during the Slog. “Independent” analyst’s report should be issued, praising your technology and damning the competitors (or ignoring them). “Independent” consultants should write columns and articles, give conference presentations and moderate stacked panels, all on our behalf (and setting them up as experts in the new technology, available for just $200/hour). “Independent” academic sources should be cultivated and quoted (and research money granted). “Independent” courseware providers should start profiting from their early involvement in our technology. Every possible source of leverage should be sought and turned to our advantage.”
http://techrights.org/wp-content/uploads/2008/08/comes-3096.pdf
How not to win friends and influence people
Mar 2nd 2012
The bland-sounding ICOMP [ Initiative for a Competitive Online Marketplace] is openly funded by Microsoft (among others), whose search engine, Bing, competes with Google's. ICOMP’s homepage is littered with attacks on the search giant: “Google’s new privacy policy: unlawful and unfair”; “Google caught with its hands in the cookie jar”; “‘Unfair and unwise’: Google implements new privacy policy despite calls to delay”. Burson-Marsteller acts as the secretariat for ICOMP. Readers may remember the outfit from past flops such as the campaign against Google on behalf of Facebook.
http://www.economist.com/blogs/babbage/2012/03/microsoft-v-google
The sad part to me is they don't even try to be subtle about it anymore, a corp will hire some elected official to shill and then give them a cushy job when they manage to get what they wanted. this is why my two boys refuse to even vote as they see no point in participating what is now obviously a completely corrupted system and with crap like this occurring daily frankly there isn't a single thing I can think of to use as a counterargument. From the local to the national its all nepotism and cronyism and bribery, revolving doors and backroom deals.
I have to wonder if this is how it ends, just one slimy roll downhill as the corps and politicians steal as much as they can before bailing when it all falls down like the fall of Saigon.
ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
No one said he was a on a personal cruisade against google just because he worked on that. he's a laywer and an expert in that domain.
Not a personal crusade, but surely he has inside knowledge the acquired while working for the FTC that Microsoft (and others) don't have access to. Well, Microsoft does now.
this is why my two boys refuse to even vote
Your two boys are very misguided.
Haven't your heard the whole "when good men do nothing, evil flourishes" bit? How about getting politically active with someone who's not an outright scumbag? Even if it's just on the local level - county government, city council, hell - school board even, they can effect a change. If they sit on their asses and decide not to vote because the "system is rigged", then they're just as responsible for the state of our country as the people who are voting for these idiots in the first place (if not more).
And yes, I vote. Yes I'm politically active. I spend a few days researching the candidates coming up for election and choose the one that I think will do what I believe to be best for my city, state, county, or country. Sometimes I don't see a good options and just put down a write-in of someone I could trust to be competent. It's not ideal, but I think I am doing far better than the average voter myself who just checks off the ballot down party lines.
If we keep squabbling over insignificant shit, which party is better, etc. we're going to go absolutely fucking nowhere but down as a country.
Random Thoughts From A Diseased Mind (Not For Dummies)
perhaps he was never really working for the FTC to begin with, in fact, I dont even believe that this man exists!
It's easy to dismiss a lot of concerns as paranoia. That's an easy, cheap-shot retort around here. But sometimes suspecting conspiracy is more logical than believing governments/corporations/lawyers at face value.
If I said, "I suspect the Russian elections were unfair," would you shoot back with that same old tin-foil retort?
This hire looks like a duck, it waddles like a duck, and it quacks like a duck. As far as I'm concerned, it's a duck unless someone can prove to me it's an ugly swan. This guy has used his position in government to help Microsoft - whether it was agreed upon or coordinated or whathaveyou is irrelevant because accepting money from them looks shady and is ethically questionable. It looks like graft, the money moves hands like graft, and if money could talk then it would sound like graft, too. I don't consider myself paranoid, just cynical. Especially when Microsoft and the government are involved.
"From the depths of my skeptical and rationalist soul, I ask the Lord to protect me from California touchie-feeliedom."
Haven't your heard the whole "when good men do nothing, evil flourishes" bit?
I agree with his boys, actually. Everyone's heard that, but a simple application of logic points out the flaw in your reasoning.
"If good men do nothing, evil triumphs" does NOT imply "If good men do not do nothing[0], evil does not triumph." Instead, it's become empirically clear that "good men doing something" is pretty much "pissing into the wind."
I think I am doing far better than the average voter myself who just checks off the ballot down party lines.
You're not. Simply because you are in the tiny minority, so whatever your doing is basically statistical 'noise.'
[0]Double negatives are valid in symbolic logic. :P
It implies "evil does not triumph if good men do not do nothing". That is, "evil does not triumph if good men do something".
Not so.
p: "Good men do nothing"
q: "Evil triumps"
"IF p THEN q" :
Truth table
p q "p -> q"
T T T
T F F
F T T
F F T
As you can see from the truth table, if good men do something, then it's pretty much up in the air. And as you pointed out, the self-feeding system is already pretty well armored against interference by the "good men."
The battle's lost. Just live with it and keep your head down until you die and it's not your problem anymore. That's my philosophy these days. All these idiots don't really deserve any noble sacrifices to save them from the fruits of their own complacency, anyway.
Ah, Slashdot. Where people can go from talking about the subject of the post to delving into the grammatical minutiae of a particular sentence for hours.
Random Thoughts From A Diseased Mind (Not For Dummies)
Microsoft has been beaten up over anti-competitive / anti-trust practices many times in many jurisdictions.
Not "beaten up", convicted. The only people who have been beaten up are all the competition that were manhandled over the years. Microsoft is still has an applications barrier to entry and is still changing file formats to try to keep it's monopoly intact.
The findings of fact in the USA anti-trust trial really detail things nicely, if you want an education on why they were convicted and why people hold such hard feelings towards them.