Bonum Certa Men Certa

Wikileaks/Cablegate Shows Microsoft Trying to Take Over Brazilian Schools

Brazilian flag



Summary: Leaked diplomatic cables from Brazil show what Microsoft is up to around the school system which embraces GNU/Linux, affecting over 50 million children

ONE of the latest cables to be redacted and released is from Consulate of Sao Paulo and further down it states ("Microsoft" capitalised for emphasis):



ۦ21. Secretary Gutierrez next visited a branch of the National Commercial Apprenticeship Service (SENAC). SENAC is a University system begun in 1946 with the support of different Federations of Industry, including FIESP, which wanted to begin a system of schools that would increase the country's stock of technically trained students. SENAC has 56 units in Sao Paulo State alone. The Secretary, Consul General, and Senior Commercial Officer were SIPDIS greeted by Joao Kulcsar, Director of the U.S. Study Center; Abram Szajman, President of SENAC and of the Federation of Commerce for Sco Paulo; and Emelio Umeoka, President of MICROSOFT. The group toured SENAC's library, where they were given an overview of SENAC's activities and resources, and then went across campus to MICROSOFT's Center of Innovation learning center. Umeoka provided an overview of MICROSOFT's investment in youth education and the goals of the Innovation Center, as well as a summary of other MICROSOFT corporate responsibility programs in Brazil. Following a photo with some of the Center's students, the Secretary and others were escorted to a classroom, where they spent 30 minutes speaking to twelve students in a roundtable format about their different classes, incubator businesses, and hopes for future employment. A brief interview with SENAC's internal television station followed, and Szajman and Umeoka and other SENAC representatives took their leave of the Secretary and his delegation.


This is very relevant to us because on many occasions before we have shown that Microsoft is trying to take schools in Brazil away from GNU/Linux and free/libre software. See for example:



Also see this wiki page about Brazil and Microsoft's high estimation of GNU/Linux market share in Brazil.

Do not let Microsoft hijack the minds of Brazilian children, who are tomorrow's generation of leaders. Regarding Microsoft's destructive hijack of Yahoo!, for example, Groklaw wrote some days ago: "So what are you trying to say? That partnering with Microsoft doesn't pay off or something?"

Pay attention to it to avoid repeating the mistakes of others, including OLPC. The expert when it comes to abducting national education systems is the Gates Foundation.

As a side note, Microsoft has used Brazil to sell the impression that GNU/Linux is only for the poor, but according to these new numbers, GNU/Linux users spend the most money.

The Humble Indie Bundle #2 just came out three days ago with the Braid, Cortex Command, Mechanarium, Osmos, and Revenge of the Titans games for Linux, Windows, and Mac OS X operating systems. Like the original Humble Indie Bundle, you pay what you want. While this unique game offering has just been going on for three days, the developers have already raked in more than $900,000 USD. At the time of writing they have banked away $911,134.35 and it looks like over the weekend they should exceed $1 million USD.


Just like in last year's Humble Bundle, GNU/Linux users are the most generous (or maybe richest). This also shows that money can be made by sharing.

Comments

Recent Techrights' Posts

Gemini Links 09/03/2025: Lagrange 1.18.5 and Writing Mannerisms
Links for the day
Links 08/03/2025: International Women's Day, Software Patents Being Squashed
Links for the day
Hiding Problems Doesn't Work
transparent organisations will be more stable and sustainable
Under the Pen Name "John O'Donnell" (LLM Slop, Not Real Article or Author) LinuxLinks Pushes Spammy Page
it happened some hours ago.
 
[Video] Richard Stallman on Understanding the Misconception of So-called 'Artificial Intelligence'
to "know and understand"
FSF's Defective by Design (DBD): Amazon Tightens the Digital Handcuffs
Reproduced verbatim
The Fall of the Open Source Initiative (OSI): Plenty of Issues, Plenty of Censorship
The OSI is abusive on many levels!
EPO Staff Appraisals Apparently Benefit Kakistocracy, Including Cheaters Who Grant Illegal Patents and Punish Good Patent Examiners (Who Find Valid Reasons for Denials)
In prior reports the staff representatives said that rewards typically went to people who granted many patents, i.e. didn't do proper examination and instead just allowed many fake patents get enshrined as EPs, causing fiasco (from which some patent attorneys could profit)
As The Web Gets Drowned Out, Sinking in a Pool of LLM Slop, Real News Sites With Real News Become Increasingly Rare If Not Extinct
This is a real problem
Links 09/03/2025: Moderna Patents Thrown Out, Climate United Sues E.P.A.
Links for the day
Links 09/03/2025: FiveThirtyEight Killed by Disney, Nature (Journal) Chooses Suicide by Slop
Links for the day
The Harder They Try to Censor, the Bigger the Scandal (and the Impact) Will Be
We don't plan to self-censor our coverage; sometimes we just delay publication a little
Gemini Links 09/03/2025: Leasehold Derangement Syndrome, Raspberry Pi, and More
Links for the day
All-Time Low for Microsoft in Africa
it helps show how irrelevant Microsoft is becoming
French woman (frontaliere) trafficked to promote unauthorised cross border Swiss insurance
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
New York Times & Guardian reporting on Modern Slavery Act prosecution of Glodi Wabelua
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
Diana & Adrian von Bidder-Senn, EVP, Palm Sunday & Debian death on wedding day
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
The RTO (Return-to-office) Layoffs or 'Soft' Layoffs at IBM and Red Hat
There are certainly many layoffs going on there, but many are described as "resignations" or "retirements" after RTO or some other form of relocation
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Saturday, March 08, 2025
IRC logs for Saturday, March 08, 2025
Graveyard of Mastodons: A Vast Number of Inactive Accounts
More than 80% of users in mastodon.social (the "big one") are no longer active
Gemini Links 08/03/2025: Reading Cory Doctorow's 'Little Brother', Abandoning GAFAM Forever
Links for the day
No, We Don't Want to Go "Viral" (and You Probably Don't, Either)
"Viral" junk gets forgotten quickly
Windows is Being Eradicated
On the Web, in Africa in particular, user strings or UAs that say "Windows" are becoming more rare
For International Women's Rights Day (Today) Staff Representatives at the European Patent Office (EPO) Opened Up on Gender Discrimination at the Office
Office discrimination against women is widely known; unless you sleep with men in management
Links 08/03/2025: Tariff Self Harm and Mostly Solved Diseases Making a Comeback
Links for the day
Links 08/03/2025: Climate Change Causing Food Shortages, Selling Off Chrome Still in the Cards
Links for the day
Gemini Links 08/03/2025: Driving in Japan, GrapheneOS, Tariffs Silver Lining
Links for the day
Working Like a Pack of Hyenas, the Microsofters Try Hard to Hide the Truth and Actively Censor Critics
They even target women
The Fall of the Open Source Initiative (OSI): Bylaws of the OSI a Shocking Oversight
That's what the OSI is right now: a salesperson
Thinking About Abandoning 'Google News' Altogether Due to Easy Poisoning by LLM Slop
As long as Google News keeps sending traffic to these leeches, it'll be very hard to justify relying on Google News for anything at all
Links 08/03/2025: Microsoft Failures, Further Attacks on Speech in Hong Kong
Links for the day
Gemini Links 08/03/2025: Physical Albums, Analog Computing, Deleting All Social Control Media
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Friday, March 07, 2025
IRC logs for Friday, March 07, 2025
OpenAI, Deep in Debt With Growing Losses, Sees Web Traffic Falling Fourfold in a Year
Microsoft's shares have fallen over 10% since the last report and OpenAI is trying to con people via Wall Street, offloading the debt to some gullible fools
Microsoft's Social Control Media Efforts Cratering (GitHub and LinkedIn)
Expect more layoffs
Microsoft Office is a Dying Cash Cow and Now It's Just Dying/Starving
Most people use Android and they don't need some bloated office suite because many processes involve Web forms
Links 07/03/2025: Radio’s Death Knells and US Abandoning Ukraine
Links for the day
Gemini Links 07/03/2025: Replacing Firefox with LibreWolf, Visiting Churches
Links for the day
Links 07/03/2025: Oracle Layoffs, HPE Eliminates 3,000 Jobs, Massive Price Hikes at Microsoft, More Surveillance in Microsoft's Stuff
Links for the day
Manslaughter: Haverfordwest convictions, Abraham Raji & Debian DebConf drowning
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
Open Source Initiative's (OSI) Latest IRS Files: Only 2.9% (2.90046827447%) of Its Income is From Members
So almost all the money is corporate
Open Source Initiative (OSI) Reported to the California Privacy Protection Agency (Formal Complaint)
Time will tell if a Cheeto-controlled California will take this seriously or just brush it aside like a head of state from Ukraine
Half a Decade Without Social Control Media
Not all audience is desirable
IBM Laid Off Almost 2,000 Staff Last Friday and No Western Publication (Newspaper, Web Site) Even Mentioned That
Only some Asian sites mentioned it
Under IBM, After Killing OpenSource.com, the Next Casualty May be "Community Blog" of the Fedora Project
It sounds like they already made the decision/s
Social Control Media as a Rapid Race to the Bottom - Part IV - Physical Health, Mental Health, and Debilitating Anxiety
One is better off feeding stray pigeons (rather than scrolling and clicking on "timelines" like a dumb pigeon)
Links 07/03/2025: WSL Breakage (as Usual), Abandoning WordPress for Hugo
Links for the day
LLM Slop Versus Richard Stallman
"Compilation Of Corruption: Jeffrey Epstein And The Halls Of Academia"
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Thursday, March 06, 2025
IRC logs for Thursday, March 06, 2025