The choice of having limited/no choice

Stephane Rodriguez has brought to our attention some more evidence that the Burton Group is indeed what we refer to as "a Microsoft puppet". We already have a lot of evidence [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23], so the Burton Group can run, but it can't hide. Just like many other so-called "analysts", it proves to be another stack of spokesmen which, just as the "evangelism is war" leaked document reveals, is part of Microsoft's long-established strategy for deception.

“In essence, Microsoft bought OOXML support from Novell in order to promote its own selfish interests.”The latest exhibit comes from this page which shows how close the Burton Group's research director, Peter O'Kelly, stays to Microsoft. We already knew this (see references above), but it's nice to have gathered another exhibit for an already large pile.

Also listed in this page (in many slots in fact) is Wouter Van Vugt. We held a short discussion about it here.

Further back in the past we also saw a Novell Vice President, Miguel de Icaza, batting for Microsoft's OOXML and presenting in favour of OOXML at a conference. It was expected given de Icaza's views and biases, not the mention the fact that Novell must implement OOXML. Microsoft handed a binding contract to Novell. In essence, Microsoft bought OOXML support from Novell in order to promote its own selfish interests. All these 'puppets' must have cost Microsoft billions of dollars, but there is a return on this investment. After all, as Microsoft's Doug Mahugh bluntly puts it:

"It’s a Simple Matter of [Microsoft’s] Commercial Interests!"

Steve Ballmer's puppet du jour. Which will it be next?