--Marquis de Sade
Microsoft Portugal has come under heavy fire by those in the country who understand what the company is up to. The Magalhães fiasco, for example, illustrates the company's shameless intent to 'addict' Portuguese children at the expense of taxpayers [1, 2, 3]. A little bit of investigation from this blog has uncovered Microsoft's PR efforts and slurring of GNU/Linux in the fight over the Magalhães (there is an English translation with some screenshots for good measure).
“The Magalhães fiasco, for example, illustrates the company's shameless intent to 'addict' Portuguese children at the expense of taxpayers.”Leaving Portugal aside for a moment, Microsoft-affiliated people love bragging about the company's non-existent operating system, whom they bribed influential bloggers to rave about. Some of the most familiar mouthpieces in the press have been peddling the perception that "Windows 7 will 'kill' Linux on netbooks'. By endless repetition in this Big Lie fashion, they hope to stifle adoption of GNU/Linux while hiding the realities behind a plan which is bound to fail.
Not many people are sufficiently aware of the fact that Microsoft will distribute a crippled version of Windows, which is limited to running just 3 processes (at most). Intel's own CEO (Steve Ballmer's partner in crime) has just admitted that this strategy is likely to fail. As reported yesterday by the Microsoft-influenced IDG [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]:
Otellini: Windows 7 Upgrade for Netbooks Will Be Tough
[...]
Microsoft has a challenge: Sell a Windows upgrade as a way to save money.
The company's fourth quarter Windows revenue declined 8 percent, as PC buyers opted for lower-priced netbooks that run either Windows XP or Linux, rather than the higher-priced Windows Vista operating system, which does not run on netbook hardware.
Reports: Microsoft Cripples Windows 7 Starter Edition in Hopes of Netbook Upgrades
With Windows 7 Microsoft is releasing cheap versions of its OS for netbooks, but faces the challenge of getting customers to buy pricier versions
Comments
Will
2009-03-11 15:06:13
I know. I know. The whole "evangelism" quote. You know, if the Duke Nukem Forever team could have hired Microsoft to handle their publicity, that might already have become the highest selling game in history due to pre-orders alone.
Renan
2009-03-11 19:52:47
However, it backfires, as most people replace it with a pirated copy of Windows XP Professional/Vista Ultimate. :)
Dave Stewart
2009-04-10 15:24:06
As far as they are concerned, those unauthorised windows installations are a loss leader for future lock-in, and by extension, future profit.
Roy Schestowitz
2009-03-11 20:00:50
GNU/Linux, not 'piracy'.
What Microsoft does in Brazil may be considered illegal in some places.
whatever
2009-03-11 23:34:44