Summary: Microsoft goes lobbying around the world using 'studies' that it paid to manufacture

SOME months ago we used classified documents and messages to show that IDC is just a mouthpiece for hire. Microsoft is one of the bigger clients [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6] and as Microsoft grows closer to bankers it is also producing all sort of financial 'studies', usually for reasons of profit that are less than obvious at first sight. According to this report, Microsoft has just paid IDC to produce some lobbying ammunition.

Microsoft hired research firm IDC to do a study on the economic impact of information, software and the Microsoft ecosystem worldwide, which it released late Sunday night. The company uses the study for government lobbying.

More information -- however vague -- appears in the obedient sources of the media (those that rarely question spin and deception).

It's not just the United States where Microsoft is doing this. We have just found 'fluff pieces' (intended for self promotion) also in Europe:

Microsoft sees ICT investment as crisis-beater

[...]

At a time when Europe's economies find themselves walled in by high budget deficits and unemployment, a recent Microsoft-sponsored study claims that investments in information and communication technologies could make all the difference.

"Microsoft-sponsored study," eh? Recall what the FTC wrote last week (already covered here):

[I]f a company refers in an advertisement to the findings of a research organization that conducted research sponsored by the company, the advertisement must disclose the connection between the advertiser and the research organization. And a paid endorsement – like any other advertisement – is deceptive if it makes false or misleading claims.

At Groklaw, Pamela Jones refers to the above and remarks: "I guess this means The End for Microsoft's "independent" Get the Facts-style reports, huh?" ⬆