Microsoft Terminating employee's to save on severance and press release "layoff"... CSS is evaluating Team Mgr's that have been in their level for 30 months to evaluate how to
trim Team Mgr. Human Resources is pulling reports to see anyone who has "violated policies" this will assist in a terminations rather than a lay off and severance.
I can't vouch for the veracity of the claim but it's about what you can expect from any Fortune 100 company these days and M$ escpially.
Reads Wikipedia, unless editing in M$ favor is job task: Fired
Uses Google: Fired
Owns an iPod, iPhone or Mac: Fired
Really but it won't help. The company has fired people for mentioning M$ Mac use in their personal blogs and Ballmer said he "brainwashed" his his kids away from Google and iPod. The company is serious about using their own products to the point of religious self destruction. The whole company is built on mind share for something that can be completely replaced with something better in five minutes. The sad fact for them is that every normal company is turning to free software for price and performance reasons.
Their graphics chip sets were released with 3D acceleration that worked with free software. For that, their chipsets had to die. From the present case, it is clear that Vista killed what was left of Intel's graphics initiative.
Government censorship of broadcast was a scary and unAmerican experiment justified by judicious use of scarce frequency space. Technology has removed that scarcity and the censorship can no longer be justified.
This is checkmate for traditional broadcast and telco by Google, M$ and other tech companies. Watch for all manner of new cellphones and free internet to flow from this decision. When those companies die, the rest of the spectrum will be liberated too.
Yes, M$ should be mentioned here. Given the federally approved success of their Slog against Yahoo, we should know who really carries influence in Washington. The result, this time, is good as long as everyone gets fair access to these newly unlicensed frequencies.
The size of the trap will be apparent when M$ starts selling "Vista light" and Windows 7 through MSI. Other, cheaper netbooks will arrive from China with GNU/Linux and that's where the bigger market will go. Windows Sheeple will be split between XP and the newer OS, leaving Asus high and dry but unable to fix things. XP netooks should already be clogging shelves everywhere. They won't sell better later.
M$ is already blaming the credit crunch for it's poor performance and hiring freeze as if the last 10 years of poor quality software had nothing to do with it.
Boycott Novell also has a good summary on M$'s attack on OSI. If Vista and Office 2007 were worth using, all of this sabotage could succeed. As things are, it is pointless vandalism.
M$ has about $20 billion of what was a $60 billion pile three years ago. They will go into debt to make the purchase. They are doing it to prop their stock price, perhaps for the benefit of employees who's savings will go to zero otherwise. Others have called it a pump and dump scam. Any way you look at it, $40 billion dollars vanishing is a bad thing.
Consistent profits at M$? Is that how they've turned $60 billion in cash into debt over the last three years? Ballmer's good for $6 billion in debt, honest, I swear on Vista's tarnished image.
Yes, if I were a M$ employee I'd be polishing my resume and looking for other predatory industries that would take someone with such compromised morals. Kraft is owned by a tobacco company, that might look good as your next job. You might also look into sub prime sales or insurance. Former employees of Netscape, Corel, SCO and countless other companies destroyed by M$ are still part of your world. Happy hunting.
Your ability to share with your neighbor is intimately linked to your free press and "legitimate" content. When you surrender your right to share and give control to some third party, you will lose your free press. The ability to censor you is what this is all about. Big publishers want all the control they have become accustom to with broadcast and then some. If you buy into the line, "these people are pirates who want nothing more than to steal" you have lost all faith in your neighbors and might as well disconnect your internet connection now. It always has been your neighbors who create your culture.
The ability to turn off trouble makers is right in line with the end of net neutrality. Look for it to be abused and directed against people who complain.
US laws are wrong and Canonical is not bound by them. Canonical should offer free software codecs instead of industry spyware. Every dollar given to the MPAA and other suppliers of that spyware is a dollar given to software slavery and censorship.
All the usual familiarity logic is gone. XP had a lot of UI changes, Vista has more than a move to either GNU/Linux or Mac does. After 7 years of waiting for something better, Windows users have been handed the same bare OS and buggy in an unrecognizable form. This moves the frame of comparison to features, ease of use and stability which both GNU/Linux and Mac win. Advertisers can't get around this.
The Zune example is instructive. Microsoft spent buckets of cash promoting the Zune but iPod still dominates. There's only so much you can do with advertising and anti-competitive practices to make up for a complete lack of quality. Ultimately, Vista costs more than all it's competitors but does less and does it poorly. There's no way to make that look sexy.
There's a public perception shift going on here. M$ marketing pigeon holed Mac into a "creative type" niche and GNU/Linux into a "geek" hole. With Vista trying to be both "cool" and "geeky" people are realizing that Windows was never "practical" either. With M$ itself hyping ISO standards, the file format wars are finally over and real standards like ODF are going to win. Mac and GNU/Linux will then be for people who just want to get their work done. Most Mac and GNU/Linux users have known this a long time, but M$'s failed marketing is making that opinion universal.
Hmmm, I trust people who talk about "twitter sock puppets" about as much as I trust Mac users who make ads for Vista, but you raise an interesting point. You say:
Microsoft can weather several horrific OSes in a row without actually having to worry
but then remind us that has already happened. The people who said they would never leave 98 but were forced to XP are moving to GNU/Linux rather than XP. You have to remember that 98 itself was something people moved to because viruses overran 95, and that 98 was followed by ME and W2K in quick succession before M$ dug their heals in to force XP. It took four years for XP to capture half of 98's market share and it's slow acceptance was one of the reasons M$ held off Vista for 6 years. Windows users who have suffered nearly a decade of poor performance are looking for the exits. Newer users are going to cling to XP in the same way older users clung to 98, but time is not on M$'s side. They can't get back users trust without product and that's not something M$ is able to deliver.
No kidding - I've no need of organizations that exploit an ignorant public
I think you misspelled oppress above. People do not chose to live in China, inadequate state education, or to be the targets of RIAA attacks. Please do not insult people stripped of their homes and political prisoners with such trivializations. These thugs punish innocent people.
Attacks like this don't work outside of Winblows. The problem is that users have been conditioned to needing a never ending series of non free "upgrades" from untrusted sites to do what they want. I can download Gnash all day from Ubuntu and never find a trojan. Not even Apple users have the same problem. Users of other OS have been conditioned to get their software from a place they can trust. Free software users have learned not to trust non free software like Flash itself.
they actually describe things like being able to save your files and collaborate with others as features. I'm not sure any of them even mentioned a single real word processing feature anywhere on their list.
Writing only has value when people read it, aka sharing. Collaborative writing is the primary purpose of physical offices. Google and other online tools are providing the most valuable features any office and word processor could.
If you want things to look good on paper, use LaTex. If that sounds archaic, it's because it is.
You missed a blinking sarcasm tag. "da bomb", "Yeah, now your wallet is moving"? That can't be serious. Then they pointed to a journal article...
I can't recommend any of it. Having to pay $900 for a Windows/Office upgrade is bad. Spending $150 on top of $900 so you get to install and patch two versions of Windows verges on madness. What's best is to use free software. The interface change is only shocking for a month or two but you can get comfortable with anything, then you start to notice real productivity helpers like session management. The same thing can be said about Open Office and Google Docs. They do what you need, sometimes more and they are free.
Slashdot Mirror
Just spotted this.
I can't vouch for the veracity of the claim but it's about what you can expect from any Fortune 100 company these days and M$ escpially.
It's just an executive shuffle right now, Vista has been just given a name change to Windows 7.
Really but it won't help. The company has fired people for mentioning M$ Mac use in their personal blogs and Ballmer said he "brainwashed" his his kids away from Google and iPod. The company is serious about using their own products to the point of religious self destruction. The whole company is built on mind share for something that can be completely replaced with something better in five minutes. The sad fact for them is that every normal company is turning to free software for price and performance reasons.
M$ is for people who don't waste time typing "icrosoft."
Their graphics chip sets were released with 3D acceleration that worked with free software. For that, their chipsets had to die. From the present case, it is clear that Vista killed what was left of Intel's graphics initiative.
Government censorship of broadcast was a scary and unAmerican experiment justified by judicious use of scarce frequency space. Technology has removed that scarcity and the censorship can no longer be justified.
This is checkmate for traditional broadcast and telco by Google, M$ and other tech companies. Watch for all manner of new cellphones and free internet to flow from this decision. When those companies die, the rest of the spectrum will be liberated too.
Yes, M$ should be mentioned here. Given the federally approved success of their Slog against Yahoo, we should know who really carries influence in Washington. The result, this time, is good as long as everyone gets fair access to these newly unlicensed frequencies.
"They just want to mess with your minds, you know. Because, if you don't know how to open this box, you probably can't install Microsoft Vista"
Gotta love the music and detailed notes. Oh yeah, the shattered box is priceless. Customer hostile from the first layer of plastic.
The size of the trap will be apparent when M$ starts selling "Vista light" and Windows 7 through MSI. Other, cheaper netbooks will arrive from China with GNU/Linux and that's where the bigger market will go. Windows Sheeple will be split between XP and the newer OS, leaving Asus high and dry but unable to fix things. XP netooks should already be clogging shelves everywhere. They won't sell better later.
M$ is already blaming the credit crunch for it's poor performance and hiring freeze as if the last 10 years of poor quality software had nothing to do with it.
Boycott Novell also has a good summary on M$'s attack on OSI. If Vista and Office 2007 were worth using, all of this sabotage could succeed. As things are, it is pointless vandalism.
M$ has about $20 billion of what was a $60 billion pile three years ago. They will go into debt to make the purchase. They are doing it to prop their stock price, perhaps for the benefit of employees who's savings will go to zero otherwise. Others have called it a pump and dump scam. Any way you look at it, $40 billion dollars vanishing is a bad thing.
Consistent profits at M$? Is that how they've turned $60 billion in cash into debt over the last three years? Ballmer's good for $6 billion in debt, honest, I swear on Vista's tarnished image.
Yes, if I were a M$ employee I'd be polishing my resume and looking for other predatory industries that would take someone with such compromised morals. Kraft is owned by a tobacco company, that might look good as your next job. You might also look into sub prime sales or insurance. Former employees of Netscape, Corel, SCO and countless other companies destroyed by M$ are still part of your world. Happy hunting.
Your ability to share with your neighbor is intimately linked to your free press and "legitimate" content. When you surrender your right to share and give control to some third party, you will lose your free press. The ability to censor you is what this is all about. Big publishers want all the control they have become accustom to with broadcast and then some. If you buy into the line, "these people are pirates who want nothing more than to steal" you have lost all faith in your neighbors and might as well disconnect your internet connection now. It always has been your neighbors who create your culture.
The ability to turn off trouble makers is right in line with the end of net neutrality. Look for it to be abused and directed against people who complain.
US laws are wrong and Canonical is not bound by them. Canonical should offer free software codecs instead of industry spyware. Every dollar given to the MPAA and other suppliers of that spyware is a dollar given to software slavery and censorship.
Well put. Too bad you are at -1.
All the usual familiarity logic is gone. XP had a lot of UI changes, Vista has more than a move to either GNU/Linux or Mac does. After 7 years of waiting for something better, Windows users have been handed the same bare OS and buggy in an unrecognizable form. This moves the frame of comparison to features, ease of use and stability which both GNU/Linux and Mac win. Advertisers can't get around this.
The Zune example is instructive. Microsoft spent buckets of cash promoting the Zune but iPod still dominates. There's only so much you can do with advertising and anti-competitive practices to make up for a complete lack of quality. Ultimately, Vista costs more than all it's competitors but does less and does it poorly. There's no way to make that look sexy.
There's a public perception shift going on here. M$ marketing pigeon holed Mac into a "creative type" niche and GNU/Linux into a "geek" hole. With Vista trying to be both "cool" and "geeky" people are realizing that Windows was never "practical" either. With M$ itself hyping ISO standards, the file format wars are finally over and real standards like ODF are going to win. Mac and GNU/Linux will then be for people who just want to get their work done. Most Mac and GNU/Linux users have known this a long time, but M$'s failed marketing is making that opinion universal.
Hmmm, I trust people who talk about "twitter sock puppets" about as much as I trust Mac users who make ads for Vista, but you raise an interesting point. You say:
but then remind us that has already happened. The people who said they would never leave 98 but were forced to XP are moving to GNU/Linux rather than XP. You have to remember that 98 itself was something people moved to because viruses overran 95, and that 98 was followed by ME and W2K in quick succession before M$ dug their heals in to force XP. It took four years for XP to capture half of 98's market share and it's slow acceptance was one of the reasons M$ held off Vista for 6 years. Windows users who have suffered nearly a decade of poor performance are looking for the exits. Newer users are going to cling to XP in the same way older users clung to 98, but time is not on M$'s side. They can't get back users trust without product and that's not something M$ is able to deliver.
No kidding - I've no need of organizations that exploit an ignorant public
I think you misspelled oppress above. People do not chose to live in China, inadequate state education, or to be the targets of RIAA attacks. Please do not insult people stripped of their homes and political prisoners with such trivializations. These thugs punish innocent people.
Attacks like this don't work outside of Winblows. The problem is that users have been conditioned to needing a never ending series of non free "upgrades" from untrusted sites to do what they want. I can download Gnash all day from Ubuntu and never find a trojan. Not even Apple users have the same problem. Users of other OS have been conditioned to get their software from a place they can trust. Free software users have learned not to trust non free software like Flash itself.
Uplifting humanity with entertainment and cooperation with the totalitarian oppresion with the worlds most populous state. Remember, the great firewall of China was designed and built by US Firms and it is being implemented everywhere else too. 2012 is the year all major ISPs will strangle the internet by making it look like a calbe TV subscription.
Writing only has value when people read it, aka sharing. Collaborative writing is the primary purpose of physical offices. Google and other online tools are providing the most valuable features any office and word processor could.
If you want things to look good on paper, use LaTex. If that sounds archaic, it's because it is.
You missed a blinking sarcasm tag. "da bomb", "Yeah, now your wallet is moving"? That can't be serious. Then they pointed to a journal article ...
I can't recommend any of it. Having to pay $900 for a Windows/Office upgrade is bad. Spending $150 on top of $900 so you get to install and patch two versions of Windows verges on madness. What's best is to use free software. The interface change is only shocking for a month or two but you can get comfortable with anything, then you start to notice real productivity helpers like session management. The same thing can be said about Open Office and Google Docs. They do what you need, sometimes more and they are free.