Bonum Certa Men Certa

Microsoft's Violation of the Law Costing Fines in Wisconsin, But Fines Paid Back to Microsoft

Milwaukee, Wisconsin



Summary: Schools in Milwaukee and other cities will receive money after Microsoft broke the law, but whether this compensates for a monopoly earned through crime remains to be debated

Microsoft's settlement is a bit of an embarrassment in Wisconsin. We previously wrote about it in:



The latest news speaks a great deal about those Microsoft vouchers, which are supposed to reach schools.

The vouchers are part of a second phase of the settlement. The initial 2006 settlement gave vouchers to anyone that bought specific Microsoft products or a computer and had those products installed for use in Wisconsin between Dec. 7, 1993, and April 30, 2003.

The second phase distributes money not claimed in the first phase. A Milwaukee County judge ruled that once all the original plaintiffs were paid, the remaining money should be split between Microsoft and Wisconsin public schools, according to news reports.


Some sources call this "Computer Vouchers", but we previously saw evidence that such vouchers are useless for Free software because they only encourage more spendings on Microsoft software that costs nothing to produce and further increases dependence on Microsoft.

Having looked at some more newer reports [1, 2] we found that "equipment, software and training" are covered.

A drawn-out legal settlement with Microsoft will reap more than $3.4 million in high-tech funding for Madison public schools, officials said Monday.

It’s welcome news in a district facing an $18.1 million budget hole, even though the windfall comes with restrictions on how the money can be spent, based on what the district’s current technology programs include.

[...]

The funds come from the antitrust class action lawsuit Spence et al. v. Microsoft, which was filed on behalf of Wisconsin government entities, business and consumers, and settled in 2007 for $224 million. Schools and school districts that filed claims will receive nearly $80 million of that in vouchers for equipment, software and training, which are to be directed to schools in which at least a third of students in 2005 came from low-income households.

[...]

The district’s chief information officer, Kurt Kiefer, said priorities include making schools wireless, purchasing mobile technologies for schools, and buying basic display technologies for teachers such as data projectors.


Also new:



These schools ought to move to Free software (snubbing the company which committed the crimes in the first place, rather than buying more from it). According to this, one school district will not use the coupons; rather, it will just cross out something on a piece of paper and allow Microsoft to perpetuate its monopoly with intangible goods:

The School District of Beloit will be receiving about $2 million in vouchers to buy software from Microsoft as the result of a lawsuit settlement.


Milwaukee gets about a third of that sum and hopefully it won't spend a dime on Microsoft software.

The influx of funds is substantial - low-income schools in Milwaukee Public Schools will share about $25 million, while the public school districts in Madison, Kenosha and Green Bay will each receive vouchers of more than $3 million to split among their low-income schools.


More here and here

The Unified School District of Antigo has more than $700,000 to spend on technology. The vouchers came Monday as the result of a class-action lawsuit settlement the state had with Microsoft Corp.


This makes it a week old. Some schools will foolishly reward Microsoft using those very same compensation vouchers that were supposed to be Microsoft's punishment. Why can't anybody in newspapers/press point out the absurdity of this?

Surely, the likes of IDG just continue to whitewash Microsoft's history of criminal activity (with federal convictions that cannot be denied, despite Microsoft's attempts).

Ten years after losing a bitterly contested antitrust browser battle to the U.S. Department of Justice, debate continues as to whether Microsoft was tamed by the legal rebuke or freed to treat it like a speed bump.


The whole article seems to insinuate that Google is the problem (but it should not be about Google) and it even links to Microsoft-sponsored statistics. Typical IDG. So who is left to actually report in an investigative fashion? And what about those absurd vouchers?

Comments

Recent Techrights' Posts

The Free Software Foundation (FSF) Has Un-cancelled the Best People, Just in Time for the Big 4-0
Mr. Oliva should have been there all along (since 2019)
Most "Modern" Technology Makes You Slower and Dumber
Because proprietary software makes you worse off
"What Comes After Free Software?" Wrongly Insinuates We've Reached the Goal (Prison is Not the Goal)
The oil tycoons use similar tactics against environmentalists, giving them fake "wins"
Making More Work Space
I learned the hard way that less is more in circumstances where more means distraction
MAHA is a Lie, Public Officials Never Valued Citizens' Health (They Still Value Private Businesses, Their Sponsors)
Reject demagogues
New Techrights Turns 2
Today starts the third year of the SSG-based Techrights
What Scares Them the Most is Independent News Sites That They Cannot Control and Censor
Wikileaks was a good example of this
If You Don't Control Your Online Platform, Then Someone Else is Controlling You
be (or become) independent
The Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) Has a Policy on Racism and Sexism
In then future we'll show the misogyny and racial slurs
Links 22/09/2025: Murdochs Might Join Fentanylware (TikTok) 'Investors' (Masters), United Kingdom Recognises Palestinian Statehood
Links for the day
 
The Complaint About Brett Wilson LLP - Part II - UK SLAPPs for Americans, SLAPPs for Profit
Brett Wilson LLP has a track record of this kind
Mayday: Optus emergency calling crisis
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
Links 23/09/2025: Massive Data Breach, Slop Versus Productivity, and Vista 11 Update Breaks Things Again
Links for the day
Code of Censorship
Extortion is peace
Free Software Foundation (FSF) Has a New Press Kit for the Weekend After Next Weekend (40th Anniversary)
miles better than social [sic] media [sic] quips, moderated by narcissists and oil tycoons.
Microsoft Had Two Waves of Mass Layoffs This Month (That We Know of) and It'll Get Worse for Microsoft Soon
Will the axe fall again by month's end?
Gemini Links 23/09/2025: Happy Equinox, Photronic Arts, and Perception Cognition
Links for the day
Lessons We've Learned After 17 Years of American Hosting
GAFAM is "all-in" with the "Trump agenda"
Back to Normal Now, We Plan to Do More In-Depth Series (or Multi-part Stories)
Articles (or series thereof) that contain philosophy are important to us
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Monday, September 22, 2025
IRC logs for Monday, September 22, 2025
Microsoft Media is Panicking Amid Mass Layoffs Every Month, H-1B Fees, and "Seattle’s Tech Scene in Trouble"
In "late stage Microsoft", copyleft becomes proprietary
The Next Wave of IBM/Red Hat Layoffs Being Discussed Already
Red Hat is sort of disappearing the way Tivoli did
Oracle Started This Year With Slop. Then It Stopped.
Passing fads are like this
Distros That Run on PCs Made 20 Years Ago and Don't Use Systemd
Betas for now
The Complaint About Brett Wilson LLP - Part I - Abusing British Women on Behalf of American Men Who Abuse American Women
Transparency is important to us, so we've decided to make this series
Slopwatch: Google News and the Evident Slopfarm Infestation
This is what people get about Linux when they query Google for Linux
Gemini Links 22/09/2025: Esperanto Music History and Apps For Android
Links for the day
Links 22/09/2025: More American 'Censorship' (Retaliation for Journalism), Cheeto "Might Be Losing His Race Against Time"
Links for the day
The Blob Slop
Give me more words, give me some text
The 50-Pound Note Experiment and the "War on Cash"
Britain is actually seeing a rebound in cash payments, and it's not a temporary phenomenon
Slopwatch: Blaming the Victims for Microsoft's Failures and Plagiarising Phoronix
That's what Google has been reduced to: slop and slopfarms
Links 22/09/2025: Breaches, Windows TCO, and Arrests
Links for the day
Gemini Links 22/09/2025: Rabbit Hole and DeGoogling Fairphone
Links for the day
Links 22/09/2025: Russian War Planes Invade NATO Airspace While Dihydroxyacetone Man Escalates Attack on Free Speech Because of Critics
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Sunday, September 21, 2025
IRC logs for Sunday, September 21, 2025
Links 21/09/2025: "Hey Hi" (Hype) Under Fire, Fakes Identified; Tesla Burns Family
Links for the day
Google's Software is Malware and Malware in Mobile Devices
Originally posted by Rob Musial
Links 20/09/2025: Hegemony Coming to a Close, Luigi Mangione Ruled Not Terrorist
Links for the day
Gemini Links 21/09/2025: "Charlie Kirk Was a Hateful Piece of Shit" and Slop Code Attempted by Microsofter
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Saturday, September 20, 2025
IRC logs for Saturday, September 20, 2025