Bonum Certa Men Certa

New Articles About Lobbying and AstroTurfing

Funny man



Summary: Four more reports/essays shed light on the quaky waters holding -- or breaking -- the system of commerce

Microsoft's perversion of the EU system as of late [1, 2, 3] (using hired guns) will not end until people stand up and demand change. On the face of it, rules that were proposed or introduced just over a year ago are not being obeyed because lobbyists are not interested in disclosing their activities, which they would rather conduct behind closed door with budgets and funding sources that they keep secret. As EurActiv has just put it:



Large numbers of businesses, consultancies and industry federations do not intend to sign up to the European Commission's lobbyists register, found a EurActiv survey presented at a conference last Wednesday (4 March).


It's not only Microsoft which does this. A lot of US-based companies are doing the same kind of thing in Europe, as detailed here:

Lobbying by U.S. businesses in Brussels is not unusual. More than 30 U.S. companies like Pfizer, Microsoft, McDonald's, Philip Morris, Westinghouse and Kraft Foods employ lobbyists in Brussels, according to the European Parliament. Foreign countries and businesses also hire lobbyists to work in Washington. But most of the time, lobbying by foreign entities tends to be discreet.


"The author has no idea what lobbying of US companies [such] as Microsoft in Europe is like, rather makes up his mind what it is supposed to be," says a person who sent this news to us. Also, according to him, Microsoft somehow managed to have the EU fund its own lobby group (formal evidence in europe.eu).

Visa, Microsoft join EU fight against Internet child

[...]

The European Commission will provide up to 427,000 euros (537,000 dollars) in funding for the new coalition which was officially launched by Barrot and others on Tuesday at the London headquarters of CEOP.


The amazing thing here is that Microsoft gets positive PR at the expense of European taxpayers. Microsoft did similar things in Australia not so long ago. It was only similar but not identical because it's akin to EDGI more than anything else. The core idea is to dump software so as to be anti-competitive and at the same time claim to be charitable (in this case, claim to protect children, as opposed to helping their education).

If that's not bad enough, on top of the lobbying there is AstroTurfing, of which we include many examples in the links at the bottom. There is a new essay about additional evidence because this receives a lot of media coverage at the moment.

Fresh off the presses, another asstroturfing site brags about how they game social bookmarking like it was Three-Card Monte. The story got posted on Reddit so Redditors can laugh and point at Digg, as if the exact same thing never happens on Reddit.

Of all the spam and advertising fraud out there, it is perhaps asstroturfing that is the meanest. Asstrturfers undermine the social web. The story you see that's voted up to the front page, even though it's a troll? People were paid to vote that up. Your social-network-site "friend" who recommends spams and scams to you non-stop? He's paid to pretend to be your friend. The comments that flood a story, flaming about one side of the issue, insulting and modding down everybody who objects, and make it sound like it's the world-against-you? They're paid actors. The troll who harassed you in a thread for numerous replies until you gave up in frustration? Paid to do that.


More hilarity can be found here:

Social media marketing is a tricky balance. If you can come up with a viral smash hit, there’s nothing better. But if you grossly underestimate the intelligence of the community you’re targeting- it can create devastating backlash


Unless the system reforms itself by expelling parasites, it will merely protect -- sometimes in highly abusive ways -- the minority of opulent from the large majority -- or as FFII tactfully puts it -- the digital majority.

Related posts:

Recent Techrights' Posts

Next Month 'New Techrights' Turns Two
Next month, on the fourth week, it'll be 2 years since the migration
Online Safety Act Tries to Accomplish the Impossible
All I can say is, "good luck with that!"
 
They Tell Us That "Cloud Storage" is Safe and Robust to Incidents Like Fires
Do you have backups? Where are they and who controls them?
"Allowing SDL to default to Wayland caused a number of customer issues so keep the default at X11 for now"
2025 is another year of Wayland ambitions. It's also a year of self-fulfilling prophecies.
In The United Kingdom (UK), Microsoft Search (Bing) Falls to All-Time Low
Grow? What grow??? It's collapsing.
GNU/Linux Reaches 5% in Oman
Some GNU/Linux distros are made in Oman
Google's "AI Mode" is a Pathetic Joke Prematurely Introduced in the UK (Like "Bard", Which Sank the Company's Shares)
what Google "thinks" about PCLinuxOS
What the Free Software Foundation Started Four Decades Ago is Becoming Mainstream
"Four decades; Four freedoms; For all users"
Doing a Better Job at Labelling Slop Images
we'll label screenshots that contain slop, typically with red-coloured text overlay
Social Control Media is Out of Style
What's your excuse for wasting time on (or in) it?
Maldives: GNU/Linux at All-Time High, Windows at New Lows
data from statCounter shows a reassuring trend
Efficiency is Good, So Why Won't Governments Cull LLM Companies Using Stronger, Stringent Policies?
Like every bubble that ever existed, including some recent ones, an end will come
The Defunct Site LinuxConfig Has Published a Fake Article About Richard Stallman Using LLM Slop, Which Stallman Calls "Bullshit Generator"
Worse yet, it is writing using a "Bullshit Generator" (the term used by Stallman) about Stallman's health
Microsoft Windows Falls to All-Time Lows in Morocco and Algeria
About 70% or even less
StopGenAI in the Cyber Show (C|S)
covering a theme that we too covered a lot lately
Gemini Links 03/08/2025: Once-a-Decade Couch Shopping and Blessings in Disguise
Links for the day
Links 03/08/2025: Political Catch-up, Global Warming, and Hunger
Links for the day
Brittany Day Entered LLM Slop Into LinuxSecurity.com and Something Hilarious Happened: The Site is "Exploited"
The brainless, effortless copypasta of "slop artists" shows its limits
Links 03/08/2025: Microsoft Exchange 0-day Exploited and Avoidable Nuclear Escalation
Links for the day
Definitely Not a Ponzi Scheme
Bitcoin v Microsoft
The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) is a Billionaires' Lobby
Billionaires that control tech companies
Microsoft Borrows 3 Billion Dollars Per Month, a Company Truly Worth Trillions Would Not Do This
if Windows (and Office) "market share" fell from about 90% to barely 30%, how come Microsoft is now "valued" at 20 times more?
It's Even Worse Than Microsoft Lunduke Puts It; GNOME is SLAPPing Journalists
In our experience, GNOME is so malicious - some elements of it in particular - that it would launch multiple simultaneous SLAPP campaigns not only against journalists but also their spouses
GNU/Linux Adoption Reaches All-Time Highs in Chile, statCounter Indicates
This month marks 4 years since Vista 11 came out (as a fake "leak") and some surveys still measure its adoption at less than 40%
Slop Will Not Change the World
Some of us grow up sooner and leave that nonsense behind (or altogether avoid/skip it)
Gemini Links 03/08/2025: Nostalgia and TOFU
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Saturday, August 02, 2025
IRC logs for Saturday, August 02, 2025
Google Throwing Out the Search Engine With the Bathwater is a Complete and Utter 'Shi---ow' as the Company Drowns in Debt, Layoffs, and Worse
The mainstream media almost never mentions GAFAM debt
Operating Systems' Statistics in New Zealand: GNU/Linux Up, Windows Down to All-Time Lows
Remember all this when the media says that Microsoft became like 10 times more valuable in those 15 years (from 400 billion to 4,000 billion in alleged "worth")
Microsoft Windows "Market Share" Measured Around 2.7% in Iraq, Plunges to 6.5% in Saudi Arabia
Microsoft isn't on the agenda in Iraq
GNU/Linux Share in Sweden Has Doubled Since PewDiePie, A Swede, Recommended It
months ago he moved to GNU/Linux, then told others to consider doing the same
GNU/Linux Hits Record High in Portugal
GNU/Linux picking up in Portugal
Gemini Protocol is Not Dying, It's Growing
When people say things like "Gemini Protocol is dying" the data does not support them
GNU/Linux is Thriving This Summer
It is meanwhile acknowledged, even by Microsoft pushers, that many GNU/Linux PCs will get sabotaged next month
The End of Microsoft's Reign in Spain: Windows Falls to All-Time Lows in Spanish Web Traffic
Windows sank to new lows in Spain
The Bots Never Sleep: In The Weekends, Slopfarms Dominate Google News, Majority of Entries in Google Are Fake Articles About 'Linux'
Google is fast becoming an ocean of plagiarism; the same goes for Google News, which was supposed to have extra quality control
Russia's Yandex Has Caught Up With Bing in Terms of "Market Share"
Microsoft has been firing loads of Bing workers for over 2 years already
Canada: GNU/Linux Up to Records Highs, Windows Down to Record Lows
Microsoft already announcing some plans to shut down Vista 11
Gemini Links 02/08/2025: Transducers in Typed Racket and American ISPs
Links for the day
Links 02/08/2025: Microsoft Already Kills Vista 11 SE, Smartphone Sales Down, Truth Gets "You're Fired!" in the US
Links for the day
Video: The Rise of GNU/Linux and Free Software as Seen by RMS in 2004
DTP's founder argued that when Windows goes below 85% "market share", it'll lose its grip in the monopoly sense
Russia: GNU/Linux Rises to Highest Adoption Level Since Invasion of Ukraine
Moving up in the north
Microsoft's Latest Financial Report: We "Gained" 300 Million Dollars in "Goodwill" and Liabilities Grew by 32 Billion Dollars
Microsoft's debt has reached an all-time high
The Register US = The Register MS
Formerly The Register UK
Weeks After Microsoft Shut Down Its Operations in Pakistan Windows Falls to All-Time Lows
Only less than a month ago it was quietly revealed, based on laid-off staff, that Microsoft shut down in Pakistan
Criminal Behaviour is the Standard Operating Procedure at Microsoft
In the future I'll be able to tell how, when dealing with SLAPPs from Microsofters, their Microsoft services failed me and sometimes even blocked my contacts
GNU/Linux Rises to All-Time Highs in Europe
many people will get fired for buying Microsoft
All-Time Highs for GNU/Linux on the Client Desktop/Laptop, Based on Steam Survey
GNU/Linux rose to 2.89% in Steam
Links 02/08/2025: Blaugust 2025 and "Russia Declares Navalny Memoir ‘Extremist’"
Links for the day
Free Software is Not a Business Model
Go ahead, ask your friend, "how do you plan to monetise your children?"
When (Almost) One-Man Operations Are Disguised as Medium-Sized Companies
the CEO hides in the US (hiding from his ex-wives, 4 daughters from those wives, and Sirius staff that he defrauded)
LLM Slop Harms Real Literature, Real Web Sites, Real Journalism
LLM slop is a parasite and it'll run out of legitimate outputs
Upcoming OSI Scandal Series
The OSI is a rogue actor because it serves Microsoft in exchange for money
Slopwatch: The Issue Persists, But the Consensus in the Media Changes as Google Enrages It With LLM Plagiarism
We've meanwhile assessed the latest output from Linuxiac
Microsoft Actually in Trouble, Microsofters Unable to Obey Judges' Orders
For the second time in a week, Microsofters are unable to obey orders
IRC Proceedings: Friday, August 01, 2025
IRC logs for Friday, August 01, 2025
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
Links 02/08/2025: İstanbul Retail Inflation Reaches 42.48%, US FBI Opens Office in New Zealand
Links for the day
Gemini Links 02/08/2025: ZFS, LLM Hype, and Fake Modules
Links for the day
Links 01/08/2025: Health, Conflict, and Attacks on Freedom of the Press
Links for the day
Microsoft's Debt Exploded by 15.4 Billion Dollars in the Past 9 Months Alone (Despite All the Layoffs)
As of minutes ago, at 6PM on a Friday, the numbers are made public
Meeting (Webchat) With Maria Arranz Gomez, Florian Grundies, Jürgen Janda and Konstantinos Kortsaris Confronts EPO Management About Breaking Promises and Crushing Workers
The lack of consistent messages suggests plans other than what's advertised and the lack of consultation (secrecy) likewise
Links 01/08/2025: "The Great British Firewall" and U.S. Army Sponsors Palantir
Links for the day
For Second Day in a Row, Top Story in The Register MS is "Microsoft Says"
The editor in chief exercises control over everybody else
LLMs as Attack Method Against Free Software and Programming
DDoS in "hey hi" (slop) clothing
Stability and Reliability, Backward Compatibility
I don't fancy relying on social control media as "sources"
What "the News" Looks Like in 2025
The "says" (or "sez") phenomenon
History Will Be Distorted, Sometimes Intentionally, Under the Guise of Intelligence (Manipulated/Curated Slop)
Militarised misinformation or military-grade chaff is a national security threat, even domestically
Financial Engineering Companies: A Company Worth 4 Trillion Dollars Would Not Borrow 100+ Billion Dollars at Interest Rates Like Today's
Many headlines perpetuate the lie Microsoft had just 2 waves of layoffs
Microsoft is Googlebombing "Linux" While Paying Former News Sites to Publish SPAM
How much lower will IDG sink?
Google as a 'Bullshit Generator' Disguised as Intelligence
It'll probably cause Google to get sued a lot, both by individuals and companies
As Expected, Google in the UK Now Experiments With Slop Instead of Web Search
At this point more people ought to stop and think: Does Google's search engine deserve trust?
The Data You Don't Give Away is Your Advantage
stop sharing data that does not need to be shared
Being Obedient or Doing the Right Thing
The world always changes for the better because of people who think "Outside the Box", not the cogs
Gemini Links 01/08/2025: Happy Hacking Keyboards and New Gemini Arrivals
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Thursday, July 31, 2025
IRC logs for Thursday, July 31, 2025