Bonum Certa Men Certa

Microsoft Lays Off Staff, Cheapens Labour as More Companies Are Dumping Microsoft's Lock-in, NSA-Friendly Services, and Windows



Summary: A look at some of Microsoft's latest woes, including an appeal for cheaper labour amid decrease in business

MICROSOFT HAS not been having a good year, irrespective of what its shareholders wish to believe. The NSA leaks have not done this monopolistic informant any good and Ballmer was pushed out. So was a lot of the workforce, as Microsoft had announced massive layoffs, even bigger than in prior years. It's a company that is shrinking, based on several parameters.



Putting aside the publicity stunt 'lawsuit' from Microsoft (over data in Ireland, not just a tax haven to Microsoft), the company is fading away. Microsoft fails to make the news as much as it used to (we used to observe the company very closely) and when it makes the news it's not often rosy. Microsoft is a proprietary software company that uses software to spy on the entire world. If information (or knowledge is power), then a lot of information facilitates domination of one group over another. That's what NSA is about. Microsoft is basically an apparatus of imperialism and a lot of nations, including China and Russia, seem to be getting it, whereupon they migrate to GNU/Linux. Microsoft is now paying the price of sucking up to its government.

On the subject of Microsoft layoffs, their true extent has been impacted by a strategy from around 5 years ago. Microsoft hides the scale of layoffs by hiring cheap/temporary staff without worker protections/privileges (pension, compensation etc.) and sometimes by recruiting overseas (countries with lower salaries) while laying off 'expensive' -- albeit usually more skilled -- staff. Here is a new report's summary: "The federal government has granted an exemption to Microsoft Canada that will allow the company to bring in an unspecified number of temporary foreign workers to British Columbia as trainees without first looking for Canadians to fill the jobs.

"A notice posted on the Citizenship and Immigration Canada website says foreign workers will receive specialized training in a new human resources development centre in the province. The tech giant will not have to perform a labour market impact assessment (LMIA) — a rigorous process that would include a search for Canadians who could fill the positions."

As we showed here several years ago, Microsoft uses British Columbia to bypass visa restrictions in the United States (where Gates does plenty of lobbying on visa issues so as to enrich himself further at the expense of the middle class). People who will be working in British Columbia will be mostly immigrants if history is anything to judge by. Also notice that the report says "foreign workers" and "foreign trainees". It's a race to the bottom. It's a race game – a game of globalists who deprive workers and take away their rights.

"Perhaps Canadian citizens are too smart or honest to qualify," wrote one of our readers.

Regarding Microsoft's influence, it is rapidly diminishing. Binstock's site will finally stop advertising Microsoft under the guise of 'news'. "Killed by sucking up to Microsoft" said a reader of ours about this news regarding the death of Dr. Dobb's, whose Web site is not to be confused with the paper publication. The Web site basically became a Microsoft mouthpiece in recent years, after a Microsoft booster, Andrew Binstock (editor), drove it to the ground along with its credibility (we gave many examples), just like Elop did at Nokia. The death of the site was mourned by a Microsoft booster, Tim Anderson, who labelled it "specialist programming site" although in recent years it was run almost single-handedly by a Microsoft booster. It is actually not too shocking that Dr. Dobb's put a Microsoft booster in charge; its new owner, a partner of Microsoft (UBM), put a Microsoft advertiser in charge perhaps in order to attract more advertising money. UBM merely committed suicide or shot the site at the back of the head when it chose bias over news, but either way, it's all over now.

What happened at Dr. Dobb's is not the exception. Many pro-Microsoft sites died or went silent. Remember Microsoft Watch, which was Microsoft advertising disguised as "watching"? Not only the sites died; their authors too went away or turned to other areas. Quite a few Microsoft boosters, including major ones like Joe Wilcox and Ian Fried (no typo), have left the scene or turned to other areas. Microsoft media proxy is quickly eroding. Other memorable examples include Microsoft Emil, Microsoft Nick, and Microsoft Jack, who is not very active anymore and sometimes covers Google or Linux these days (not necessarily bashing them, either).

This does not mean that Microsoft has run out of moles in the media. Here for instance we have Microsoft .NET advertisements and openwashing. This was published a few days ago in a Microsoft-funded British news site and it was authored by the Microsoft-bribed Tim Anderson (the same guy who mourns the loss of yet another Microsoft propaganda site, as noted above). This "Exclusive Interview" from Anderson is basically giving Microsoft a platform and dubbing it 'news'. Complete nonsense. Please also note that Microsoft's proxy in the UK (Accenture) wants to keep bamboozling managers under the guise of "advice" because it's a very lucrative market in financial terms. One of Microsoft's many moles at CBS reminded us that it's all about Microsoft. The timing seems right because a lot of the British public sector and exploring and even moving to Free software, more standards (such as ODF), and greater technological autonomy.

"The timing seems right because a lot of the British public sector and exploring and even moving to Free software, more standards (such as ODF), and greater technological autonomy."Not just the public sector moves away from Microsoft. Some of the biggest companies in the private sector are increasingly doing the same thing. Earlier this year we wrote about Ford dumping Microsoft after Ford had been Microsoft's close ally for years. "Good news," called it a reader, "except for the fact that it is inflicting "infotainment" systems on buyers."

As asked: "Is QNX still hybrid?" Well, it is not Free software like Linux, but alas, the main problem is that BlackBerry is becoming a patent troll and this is where Ford is heading. As Simon Sharwood put it the other day:

As foreshadowed in February, Ford has announced a new in-car entertainment and communications system that will run on BlackBerry's QNX real-time operating system, not Windows as is the case for the company's current efforts.

Ford Sync 3 will offer touch-screen and voice recognition controls. The latter will allow drivers to command both their vehicle and apps on their phone. Siri control is another feature.

The auto-maker's offered a touch-screen system for some time now, but it's widely regarded as one of its weak points. A complete refresh on a new operating system therefore looks like a good move.

It's certainly one BlackBerry will appreciate, as broader uptake of QNX is one of its hoped-for exit routes from the mucky world of smartphones. A few million highly-visible QNX machines shipped each year will therefore be most appreciated.


Just because Ford left Microsoft doesn't mean it made the right choice. It just chose a lesser evil.

We were gratified to learn that Facebook, which uses GNU/Linux in its servers, rid itself of Microsoft as well. Microsoft is so yesterday that even Facebook dumps it. As the media in California put it, "Facebook confirmed that it's no longer including search results from Bing on its site. The Bing deal began around the time Microsoft bought its Facebook stake, and was renewed in 2010.

"The move will hurt Bing's search market share, which was already ailing after a recent redesign of Microsoft's consumer web site, MSN."

Will Microsoft shares in Facebook also be returned (forcibly)? They cannot be turned into private ownership, sadly enough, which harms self determination at Facebook. Microsoft has held Facebook hostage for many years. Either way, traffic in Facebook very rapidly declines these days (that's a story for another day), so we don't expect the company to be around for much longer. Incidentally, Mac Asay, writing in the Microsoft-centric media, calls Facebook "largest open-source company", which is utter nonsense. Mac Asay also dubs people he does not agree with "jerks", but that's quite typical of him (he is the only person in Twitter whom I know blocked me). Mr. Asay -- it is worth reminding readers -- had applied for a job at Microsoft before he worked for Novell.

The bottom line is, Microsoft is rotting and we are hoping that it will go down the same path in years to come. Its once-large empire is now just a fort begging for survival and sacrificing its own staff.

Recent Techrights' Posts

Open Source Initiative (OSI) Resists Software Freedom, Even by Attacking Its Own
The OSI is compromised
 
Links 28/08/2025: Chatbots Distorting/Fabricating History and Also Driving Suicide
Links for the day
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.
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
Richard Stallman (RMS) Was Right About "Sideloading" in 1996
We now have computers that treat booting GNU/Linux like an act of "Sideloading"
Panama: Windows Down From 97% "Market Share" to Less Than 30%
In 2009, Windows was measured at 97.24% (compared to 62.32% right now or less than 30% if one also counts Android)
The UEFI 9/11 - Part I - Introduction to Impending Catastrophe (Microsoft Preventing People From Booting Non-Windows Systems)
eight-part series
Why Techrights is Slow Today (Bot Floods)
We don't know if those bots are connected to LLMs (we have not checked), but that is a possibility
Slopwatch: DDoS Slop, LinuxBSDos.com Spam, and Slopfarms in Google News, Including webpronews.com
Among the news we also found fakes, albeit not so much today
Links 26/08/2025: "Ballooning Debt" in France and "Transnational Repression in the UK"
Links for the day
Gemini Links 26/08/2025: Listening to Alcest and Google Doing Evil (Users Installing Software is "Sideloading" and Prohibited)
Links for the day
Links 26/08/2025: DNS Tampering and TikTok Layoffs
Links for the day
Microsoft's Windows "Market Share" Overestimated
Microsoft's income sources are shrinking
We Shall See...
My wife and I are hardly the first victims of Brett Wilson LLP
This New Determination on a Case Echoes the Modus Operandi of Microsoft's Serial Strangler vs Techrights (Its Online Decision/Judgment Says Truth and Public Interest Defend the Publisher)
Noel Anthony Clarke hopefully has enough money left to pay his victims, which include the publishers
Going Offline
There was life before the Net
The Register MS Has Apparently Shut Down Its Office
It is basically a fake address on the face of it
There Are Also Expectations of IBM Layoffs Very Soon With "Narrative Control."
Some of them mention Red Hat and how IBM failed to achieve anything substantial with that acquisition
After at Least Two Rounds of Mass Layoffs in August Microsoft Said to Have "September Layoff Confirmed - Performance Based"
Those "M5 level meetings" sound plausible
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Monday, August 25, 2025
IRC logs for Monday, August 25, 2025