Bonum Certa Men Certa

University of Arizona Enters Microsoft Fog; Steve Ballmer Lobbies Malaysian Prime Minister to Enter Microsoft's Proprietary Fog Computing Too

Foggy city



Summary: Arizona University descends into Microsoft's Fog Computing trap ('cloud') and Ballmer travels to Malaysia, hoping to derail this government's migration to Free software by offering Fog Computing

Students in Australia and Arizona will both be receiving similar type of treatment:

The University of Arizona in Tucson will be moving 18,000 staff members to cloud-based e-mail and calendar applications from Microsoft that will include a larger inbox quota, instant messaging, and tools for holding online meetings. This will be the first major change to employee e-mail in about seven years, the university said.


Microsoft boosters are cheering and posts that are sponsored by Microsoft seemingly just add to the newly-issued a press release, titled "University Of Arizona Selects Microsoft Corp.'s Business Productivity Online Suite For E-Mail, Calendaring and Collaboration Tools" (other Windows sites are spreading spin/lies for a wage, not caring about the consequences).

“Microsoft seems to have just made another trip to fight their adoption of Free software in the government and replace that with so-called 'clouds' from Microsoft.”This is not about Google versus Microsoft in mail, never mind the fact that it's wrong to let a company which is abusive spy on everyone's activities. So-called 'clouds' are plainly wrong and are a big mistake for public services. The "private" cloud lie which Microsoft is using is merely a decoy. It's not private because it's proprietary. It's private to Microsoft, not to the user.

This whole 'cloud' charade is going overseas.

We recently wrote about what Microsoft was doing in Malaysia. Microsoft seems to have just made another trip to fight their adoption of Free software in the government and replace that with so-called 'clouds' from Microsoft. Watch Steve Ballmer lobbying the prime minister some days ago:

This was relayed during a meeting between Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak and Steve Ballmer, Chief Executive Officer of Microsoft Corporation at the Prime Minister's Office here Tuesday.


The prime minister is not a technology person. They try to politicise this.

There is some other coverage from Malaysia which we'll remark on later today. Choosing those 'clouds' is even worse than relying on proprietary software on one's own machine because there's increased helplessness and lock-in when it's on someone else's machine.

“The prime minister is not a technology person. They try to politicise this.”In a recent private summit, Microsoft marketed those 'clouds' which it uses to control the users' data, not just application code [1, 2]. They will hopefully not entice people to become prisoners rather than deploy Free software (to run everything possible locally for control, which is especially important for business autonomy).

No business deserves to put its financial operation at a company with a history of financial fraud [1, 2], but that never bothers financial sites that emit more deception and spin while masquerading as "news". Richard Stallman wrote an essay about those so-called 'clouds'. Why would anyone be naïve enough to still go for these options? It's clear why Microsoft lobbies for it.

Recent Techrights' Posts

Slopwatch: Fake Articles About "Linux", Slop Images in VentureBeat, Linux Foundation Spam Made With LLM Slop and Slop Images
The only relief or upside - if any exists - is that the pace of slop was down a bit this week
Richard Stallman (RMS) Talk in Ethereum Cypherpunk Congress Will be Remote
This past week RMS received lots of accolades online
Links 28/08/2025: Chatbots Distorting/Fabricating History and Also Driving Suicide
Links for the day
 
In Many Places in the World Vista 11 "Market Share" is Going Down, Not Up
In some countries Windows is already down to third place or lower
More Microsoft-Connected Layoffs, at Least Third Time This Month! (Also Another Death on Campus)
Microsoft as a "gaming" company is where studios, projects, games, and even developers come to die
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Thursday, August 28, 2025
IRC logs for Thursday, August 28, 2025
Gemini Links 29/08/2025: Poems, Games, and Java 25 Performance
Links for the day
Links 28/08/2025: Greenland 'Interferences' by US and Skinnerboxes to Get Banned in Korean Schools
Links for the day
The Register MS (Run by Microsoft Operatives): Free Software is Putin, Hence Evil and Dangerous
The current editor in chief is an American Microsofter, the previous one went to work for Google (US)
Gemini Links 28/08/2025: Back in Japan and Why "Hacker News" Sucks
Links for the day
A Much-Needed Wake-up Call to Users of Wordpress.com, Blogspot, Substack and All Those Other Outsourced (and Centralised) Platforms
There are several lessons in there
The UEFI 9/11 - Part II - Campaign of Censorship and Defamation Against Critics
In dictatorships, humour serves an important role. It's tragic.
Open Source Initiative (OSI) Resists Software Freedom, Even by Attacking Its Own
The OSI is compromised
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Wednesday, August 27, 2025
IRC logs for Wednesday, August 27, 2025
Slopwatch: linuxsecurity.com, Slopfarms in Google News, and More
Some readers of ours end up sending us links that are from slopfarms, not realising those are slopfarms
Gemini Links 27/08/2025: Katrina Memories and Google Versus Software Freedom
Links for the day
Links 27/08/2025: Police Against Media Freedom in the UK, Energy-Hungry Countries Targeted by China
Links for the day
Microsoft Windows Fell to All-Time Lows in Egypt This Summer, Vista 11 Adoption Decreases While GNU/Linux Increases
Vista 11 is going down rather than up
Links 27/08/2025: Microsoft Demoralises Staff With Slop Demands, Leaving Mastodon Explained
Links for the day
12 Hours Ago The Register MS Published a Fake (Paid-for) Article, But This One for a Change Did Not Promote a Ponzi Scheme
There are also Free software alternatives, but they don't pay The Register MS for "synthetic" so-called 'journalism'
More People Need to Call Out and Put a Stop to Serial Sloppers
Unless slopfarms are stopped, people will read and share Microsoft propaganda made by chatbots
Gemini Links 27/08/2025: Headphones and Tartarus
Links for the day
Morale at Microsoft is Terrible (Proprietary Plagiarism Machines Have No Future, LLM Slop is a Bubble)
The slop sceptics/critics are going to have lots of "told you so" moments
GNOME "governance issues, staff reduction, etc." amidst Albanian whistleblowing and women trafficking
Notice the connection to Software Freedom Conservancy (SFC) and GNOME
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Tuesday, August 26, 2025
IRC logs for Tuesday, August 26, 2025