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Microsoft Proxy Attack on GNU/Linux Continues With TurboHercules

TurboHercules



Summary: Microsoft partners continue to attack GNU/Linux (on IBM mainframes) for its dominance that poses a threat to Windows Server

LAST WEEK we showed that Microsoft was coordinating a proxy attack on IBM's mainframes, which run GNU/Linux (mostly SUSE but also Red Hat). The campaign is ironically called "OpenMainframe.org" as though Windows is open and non-profit. This proxy attack is not something new and we have already gathered evidence about it in posts such as:



Microsoft is just SCOing IBM like it's SCOing Google and even admits doing this.

According to the following new press release from France, some rather obscure company called TurboHercules pulls an antitrust motion against IBM. Watch TurboHercules' connections:

IBM said TurboHercules was a member of organisations funded by rivals such as Microsoft Corp (MSFT.O) "to attack the mainframe", which is IBM's main business.

TurboHercules, a privately-held company set up in 2009, is a member of a non-profit trade group called the Computer and Communications Industry Association (CCIA), which counts Microsoft and Oracle Corp (ORCL.O) as members, but not IBM.


But wait. Microsoft paid millions of dollars to CCIA. We explained this before (see the posts above). Here it is again:

"Having yet another complaint in Europe -- by an open-source company, no less -- points to a systemic pattern of behavior by IBM directed at anyone who threatens its mainframe monopoly," said Erika Mann, CCIA's executive vice president and head of its European office in Brussels.


Who paid your agency, Erika? Remember that company from Redmond?

Either way, a lot of press coverage omitted these crucial details [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8], which are so simple to conveniently ignore. Mainframes continue to replace Wintel servers (Windows on x86) in some places, so Microsoft needs to do to IBM what it openly admitted doing to Google. It requires tremendous discipline to be unable to see it.

"On the same day that CA blasted SCO, Open Source evangelist Eric Raymond revealed a leaked email from SCO's strategic consultant Mike Anderer to their management. The email details how, surprise surprise, Microsoft has arranged virtually all of SCO's financing, hiding behind intermediaries like Baystar Capital."

--Bruce Perens

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