08.27.13
Posted in Bill Gates, Fraud, Microsoft, Steve Ballmer at 2:32 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz
And prison sentences, too
Summary: What really would have happened if there was justice in this world; bankrupt Microsoft, executives with long jail sentences, rapid restoration of fair competition
Microsoft is pretty much forced to ‘cooperate” with a probe over its bribery tactics, which Microsoft is seemingly trying to hide by distraction. To quote The Register, “Microsoft says it will cooperate with US investigators probing alleged bribery of foreign officials. It’s claimed Redmond’s resellers bunged cash to apparatchiks in Russia and Pakistan in return for contracts with state-backed businesses.”
As Pogson put it:
Ever wondered why M$ manages to sell licences to all kinds of folks even when GNU/Linux is a better option, with a lower price, better performance and fewer problems? It just may be that big businesses, governments, schools, and organizations that have large numbers of system, are being manipulated by a few well-placed bribes.
Remember EDGI and remember what Microsoft did to government and schools in Russia. It is a serious case of corruption, even by Chinese and Russian standards.
As put by Nokia observer Tomi Ahonen the othe day, “I have tried to be ‘fair’ and ‘open-minded’ about Microsoft in my writing and on this blog. However, this is the tech company with the nickname ‘The Evil Empire’. That term comes with plenty of cause – over the past three decades Microsoft has been fined countless times huge sums for crushing competitors with illegal methods, using its monopolistic position like a bully. I personally have been a user, supporter, registered developer, and/or authorized trainer for many of the various victims of Microsoft from WordPerfect and Lotus 1-2-3 to Novell Netware, Mosaic and Netscape.”
Here is part 2. Microsoft apologists may say that “Ballmer Successor Must Apologize to Partners”, but we don’t agree. Microsoft should apologise and also compensate its rivals which it bribed against, even if that means the immediate bankruptcy of Microsoft (they should pull out more money — earned by criminal activities — from bank accounts of Microsoft executives past and present, including Gates and Ballmer).
Sadly, given false (or mutually similar) choices offered by the corporate media, this perfectly legitimate option is rendered “not worth entertaining”; big banks show this to be the norm. Those who commit crime, even if caught, are made the richest and most powerful people, hence they can continue to harm society and whitewash their reputation. █
Permalink
Send this to a friend
08.23.13
Posted in Microsoft, Steve Ballmer at 8:16 pm by Dr. Roy Schestowitz
So the Mafia don leaves without jail time as Mafia tactics are exposed even further
Summary: Interesting timing for Microsoft to announce the future departure of Ballmer, contributing to burial of massive news about Microsoft bribery in many countries around the world
FOLLOWING overwhelming unrest over Ballmer's decisions as CEO (including fraudulent financial reporting) this CEO — quite expectedly — is leaving, but the timing is interesting. As Simon Phipps, the head of the OSI, put it:
Ballmer to leave Microsoft
Honestly it’s about time and exactly what the company needs if it’s to get fixed. Let’s hope they get someone who will truly embrace open source rather than firewalling it and paying lip-service to it while secretly attacking it. That’s the change I have long said is needed to move beyond stage four of the journey.
The timing makes it sound like a potential decoy. Not only may Microsoft be facing multi-billion-dollar fines, but Ballmer himself may face jail time unless he flees and generates press buzz that hides the real news. What’s the real news? Microsoft’s sheer corruption again.
Ballmer is unlikely to be put in jail for racketeering and bribery because there is no justice, it’s a system that’s friendly to criminals who are allowed to get rich and never face consequences when caught (at worst a slap on their wrist). For a super-corrupt company like Microsoft (with track record to show it) that started its corruption under the leadership of Bill Gates it just makes sense to eliminate the old faces right now. And why? Well, some months ago we wrote about allegations of Microsoft bribery in China (a no-brainer, but this became a formal investigation, perhaps indicating the same is being done in the UK and elsewhere). There are bribes and gentle bribes and they are not unique to the Chinese market. Over the years we have covered many instances of Microsoft bribes, some of which qualify as “soft” or “gentle” bribes (like exchange of favours or deferred payments). Based on this explosive report, Microsoft is in the middle of a massive scandal that could land Ballmer in a jail cell. As one site put it:
Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) bribe probe has now been linked to Russia and Pakistan, which indicates that the matter is actually not confined to just a few contracts but has a wider reach than was previously anticipated, according to a report from The Wall Street Journal.
Notice a trend among the Microsoft boosters (or staff), who try to use the groomed villain, Bill Gates, to somehow paint a gentle picture of Microsoft in light of the news, trying to focus on Ballmer leaving. Phipps posted the video to show what a monster this man can be, whereas Slashdot‘s Microsoft Nick (Nick Kolakowski) already did some whitewashing for this criminal, as usual [1, 2, 3, 4].
“The controversial executive will step down within the next 12 months,” says the booster, but where is his coverage of the latest crimes of Microsoft? None at all. Slashdot gave up on news coverage when it hired a Microsoft mole like this. Watch how he adds nonsense like “During Ballmer’s tenure, Microsoft also launched the highly successful Windows 7″ while adding the obligatory grooming of Bill Gates, which Microsoft Nick habitually does.
These boosters are like hyenas hanging around a bigger predator, hoping to get a bite of some prey leftovers (the predators are Gates and Microsoft, the hyenas smell money and stick close to it). Too bad they miss the real news, which is massive criminal activity. One wonders if Ballmer’s mere announcement of prospective departure was timed to distract the press from other, far more massive news. As we wrote 4 years ago, "Steve Ballmer Should Not be Fired, He Should be Arrested".█
Permalink
Send this to a friend
08.09.13
Posted in GNU/Linux, Google, Steve Ballmer, Windows at 12:15 pm by Dr. Roy Schestowitz
Worn out and defeated
Summary: Acer is the latest large company to officially move away from Microsoft Windows because no OEM — not even Microsoft with its “Surface” disaster — can sell hardware with shoddy software preinstalled
Some new numbers suggest stagnation in the target market of Microsoft, which led Acer, one of the largest OEMs Microsoft works with (see this old Microsoft OEM agreement with Acer), to losses and subsequent exploration of Linux-based alternatives. As Microsoft booster Nancy Gohring put it, citing he employer’s numbers (IDG citing IDC without disclosure again), “Acer the latest to turn to Google after poor Windows sales”:
Acer, the electronics maker that once seemed to be a big Windows 8 booster, is turning its back on Microsoft.
After posting a second quarter loss this week, it said it’s going to aggressively work on selling more Chromebooks and Android devices. According to the Wall Street Journal, Acer’s chairman said he hopes to grow revenue from Google smartphones, tablets and Chromebooks to 10 percent to 12 percent of revenue by the end of this year and to as much as 30 percent next year. He apparently didn’t say exactly how much revenue comes from Google software today, but said Chromebooks made up nearly 3 percent of shipments in the second quarter, according to the Wall Street Journal.
Acer is the latest vendor to shift its weight toward Google products and away from Microsoft. HP and Lenovo, long-time hardware partners of Microsoft, have also started making Chromebooks.
Mr. Pogson says that Acer had been squeezed by Microsoft and it is not the first. As he notes in this earlier post:
When a monopolist pushes an OS at a price above the market on OEMs, they suffer. While the monopolist gets a huge cash-flow, the OEM works for nothing, just a tiny margin. While OEMs take a commission on the price of that other OS, they sell their hardware for next to nothing. OEMs are manufacturers, not salesmen for M$. Do framers work for $0 per hour plus a penny per nail? No.
Christine Hall, another GNU/Linux proponent, says that “The consensus on [Windows] RT is that it’s something of a toy operating system. Some say it’s done nothing but weaken the Windows on tablet brand–as if that’s possible. The smart money crowd is expecting Microsoft to give-up on RT sooner rather than later. Almost everybody says RT isn’t long for this world.”
Microsoft has got nothing that can truly challenge Linux-based operating systems and one GNU/Linux proponent proclaims that “Microsoft Surface is Doomed, Steve Ballmer Should Be Fired” (others say the same after the Surface oversupply fiasco [1, 2, 3]).
Firing Ballmer would not save Microsoft. But it would be a face-saving move, that’s for sure. █
Permalink
Send this to a friend
07.30.13
Posted in Microsoft, Steve Ballmer, Vista 8 at 12:16 pm by Dr. Roy Schestowitz
Summary: The man behind strategic flukes, including racketeering and oversupply, is asked to go (by shareholders and the press)
Ballmer has turned Microsoft into a company of patent terrorism and after the Surface oversupply fiasco [1, 2, 3] (and more financial damage) one news site calls for elimination of Ballmer:
Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer has revealed a sweeping corporate reorganization of the company which scraps its longtime business model of pitting each of its internal units against each other for competitive purposes, in favor of an all-for-one model which has everyone at Microsoft working toward the same larger goals. The mere fact that it’s taken Ballmer thirteen years to figure this out is enough to cast doubt on his ability to lead Microsoft in this century. But a look at the near total lack of successes under his tenure is enough to make the case for his outright ouster.
Other sites and some shareholders agree.
Ballmer has already admitted blame and took responsibility. To quote this second source: “Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer has admitted that the company built too many Surface tablets, and it’s not selling as many Windows devices as it wants. During an internal town hall event earlier this week, Ballmer and COO Kevin Turner both addressed the recent $900 million hit for Surface RT and the sales pace of Windows across various devices.”
Ballmer needs to go. He is a fierce enemy of Free software and nobody really trusts him. █
“We believe every Linux customer basically has an undisclosed balance-sheet liability.”
–Steve Ballmer
Permalink
Send this to a friend
05.07.13
Posted in Bill Gates, Microsoft, Steve Ballmer at 5:34 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz
Gates, Zuckerberg Meet for Wired Cover Shoot (fair use)
Summary: Mark Zuckerberg gets closer to Microsoft not just on the technical/corporate front but also on lobbying, including non-technical and non-corporate lobbying
Bill Gates has been trying to acquire cheaper labour with fewer workers’ protections. He recruited lobbyists such as the criminal Abramoff, who had also worked for Bill’s father.
Recently, the partly Microsoft-owned Facebook, which lobbies against Google with Microsoft-favoured AstroTurfers, has been doing the same type of visa lobbying and “it’s stocked with softers and thus only serves to forward their agenda using mark’s money,” reminds us a reader. Mark Zuckerberg is a Gates wannabe and he recently confessed he would have joined Microsoft if Facebook had not succeeded.
Facebook is showing yet more signs of aligning with Microsoft, as Gates and Ballmer both align with Zuckerberg:
Mark Zuckerberg adds Bill Gates and Steve Ballmer to his FWD.us lobbying group
Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg launched an immigration reform group, FWD.us, earlier this month, designed to promote innovation and investment in the US jobs market. After teaming up with some high-profile technology executives and venture capitalists to form the group, Zuckerberg is adding some more household names today: Bill Gates and Steve Ballmer.
Zuckerberg has also been lobbying schools, just like his role model, bribing them for change while pretending to help children and marketing it as such.
The Gates Foundation is again being criticised for what it does to schools. Teachers are catching on, but can they teach the wider population about it in spite of media ownership or bribery by the likes of Gates? Here is what the veteran educator writes:
Bill Gates’s School Panopticon
The latest effort by Bill Gates to reform schools involves spending $5 billion on video cameras in every classroom (“Bill Gates Wants America to Spend $5B for Video Cameras in Every Classroom,” Education News, Apr. 24). Reformers like the idea because they say it will prevent teachers from offering excuses for the failure of their students to learn. Of course, the cameras will also provide evidence of student misbehavior, which reformers ignore in their criticism of teachers.
For people in education to confront Gates it takes some guts because some face retaliatory firings/suspensions for merely saying the truth.
In India, where corruption levels are notorious, education officials recently sold out to Microsoft. A blogger of Indian descent says they betrayed more than just software freedom, fair tendering, and national sovereignty:
AICTE is putting Indian students under US surveillance
The All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) may be an education body, but it needs quite some education itself. It’s recent decision to ‘force’ it’s students to use Microsoft’s proprietary and vendor locked Online Productivity suite raises many serious questions.
[...]
Indian students under US surveillance
AICTE is also putting it’s students data under the eyes of Microsoft where the company will know everything that these students do using its online suite. The US government will also have access to this user-data. Unlike Google Microsoft doesn’t stand for user’s rights. The company very closely works with the US government to support bills like SOPA and CISPA. Since Microsoft is a US company, and by using its cloud service the US government will have direct access to the data of these students and AICTE is making a huge mistake by doing so.
A former FBI official has just publicly admitted that the US collects call recordings and digital communications from all over the world. It’s not only illegal but also expensive, counter-productive, and bound to lead more people to face-to-face conversations, especially those who plot to commit acts of violence (so those under surveillance will be law-abiding citizens or dissidents).
Facebook too is US surveillance. Tying all of this together, what we have here is a bunch of globalists seeking to control and brainwash young people while also devaluing workers and leaving college graduates out of a job. It’s all about power. All that lobbying has got nothing to do with education, opportunity, or public good; it is about the private profit of very few billionaires like Gates and Zuckerberg. Sociopaths should never be given so much power. █
“i’m going to fuck them, probably in the ear.. . I have over 4000 emails, pictures, addresses, sns, people just submitted it, i don’t know why, they “trust me”, dumb fucks” –Mark Zuckerberg
Permalink
Send this to a friend
11.13.11
Posted in Bill Gates, Microsoft, Steve Ballmer at 10:53 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz
Summary: News suggests that more people from Microsoft (not just Raikes and Gates) are occupying the obligatory system which shapes the next generation at taxpayers’ expense
INJUSTICE is prevalent when the legal system is operated directly or indirectly by those who are affluent. Such status quo would be prejudiced against those who are unable to pay. Tax law is similarly dependent on the influence of money, which means that those who are very rich will make up ways to pay little or no tax. This is a famous problem in the United States of America and increasingly in the UK too. People pay more tax the richer they are but once they get to a certain level they can become almost tax-exempt, using loophole which they lobbied to create and call “legal”.
“Additionally, Gates uses the publicly-funded education system to do what it tells everyone to do.”So-called foundations make the situation ever more outrageous because they glorify those who do not pay tax and sometimes help rob the public, too. Citing this article, Gates Keepers alleges that “The public subsidises the Gates Foundation” — a subject that we covered here before. To repeat the crux of the argument, what the Gates Foundation is doing is lobbying politicians to funnel taxpayers’ money into companies that the foundation invests in for profit. It is about monopolies, patents, and public subsidies. We gave many examples and showed how this is done.
Additionally, Gates uses the publicly-funded education system to do what it tells everyone to do. These acts are an injury and an insult to future generations, which Gates believes he is responsible for along with fellow plutocrats, shaping the minds of children not for critical thinking but for obedience and admiration of those in power (like himself).
There is a new article titled “The Money Behind the School Board Incumbents”. It is one among many recent articles that portray Bill Gates as the villain in the education scene. They know he is up to no good, a self-servitude of sorts that also buys the media to hide those real interests. To quote:
All the School Board incumbents are supported by zillionaire donors who don’t have children in our schools. Most live on the Eastside. They generously funded The Seattle Foundation to bring Teach for America into Seattle Public Schools. Most also backed the defeat of Initiative 1098. The anti-1098 donors include Steve and Connie Ballmer, Matt Griffin, Evelyne Rozner, John Stanton, and James Faulstich. In addition to backing TFA and the incumbents, Connie Ballmer sits on the WA advisory board of Stand For Children, a national lobbying organization that aggressively promotes charter schools. Jeff Raikes, CEO of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, and his wife Patricia did not donate to defeat I-1098, but they support TFA, charter schools and the incumbents. The same holds true for John Faulstich.
What if any connection is there between defeating Initiative 1098, supporting Teach for America, Stand for Children and the incumbent School Board Directors?
First– why the opposition to I-1098 from anyone who supports public education? Initiative 1098 would have provided $2 billion a year as a trust fund dedicated to public education, health services and middle class tax relief. The year I-1098 was filed, Seattle Public Schools had a budget shortfall of $34 million. It’s safe to assume these people don’t want a miniscule portion of their ginormous incomes to support public education as it is now. They must have another plan.
Teach for America provides public and charter schools with conditionally certified teachers who have received a total of five weeks of training during the summer. Charter schools hire many of their teachers through Teach for America. Wendy Kopp, founder, CEO and relentless marketer of TFA draws an annual salary of $660,000, paid for by funds presumably raised for public education. TFA also received $50mil from the Obama administration last year. TFA is very much a part of a national movement to privatize and profit from public education through charter schools.
[...]
The challengers in this race are trying to move us beyond this phase of Ed Reform to the next. Our vision of effective Ed Reform is about meeting the individual needs of our students, rather than imposing a one-size-fits-all standardized education. We must increase pathways to success by offering compelling programs that engage students all the way through high school, and help them prepare for the futures they want. We must improve our curricula and give struggling students more support. We must open up our district to far greater community input and control. We need to restore more choice to our student assignment plan. And we can do it all without diverting public funds into the pockets of people like Wendy Kopp and others who profit from charter schools.
We found it most interesting that even the Ballmers are in it now. Ballmer’s wife is a PR person (professionally), which says a lot on its own. These couples also sponsored Obama's PR campaign, which got him elected. Ballmer routinely visits the White House now. We gave examples in the past.
Here is another new article critical of Gates, despite his sponsorship of education news sites (with aim of influencing coverage). The headline says Bill Gates’ Big Play: How Much Can Money Buy in Education?
What would happen if one of the wealthiest men in the world decided to remake the institution of public education in America? What if that man believed he understood the secrets to success, and sought to align the nation’s schools to his vision and methods? What if he decided to devote all his time and considerable money to this objective? Could he succeed? We are in the process of finding out just how far money and a sharply defined agenda can take you.
Why is Gates deciding on educational policy in public education? This is a person who went to prestigious private schools and sends his kids to these. There is a poor article titled “Bill Gates: Poverty not excuse for no education”. So says the man who was born rich and didn’t finish college. Here is a copy of it (the original expired):
Bill Gates: Poverty not excuse for no education
Microsoft founder Bill Gates told the National Urban League on Thursday that a child’s success should not depend on the race or income of parents and that poverty cannot be an excuse for a poor education.
This is just the usual shallow coverage from AP, but what’s troubling here is different; who is he to talk for the poor? Or to demand better education/results from these people? Just because he is wealthy and employs lobbying groups to run a lot of things (for profit) does not make him a figure of legitimate authority. The AP not only parrots or promotes his so-called ‘studies’ (sponsored propaganda, as we showed before in AP). In this case it also lends to the man’s status by quoting him as though he is an education expert. This is truly troubling. But the BBC is worse. We’ll deal with that next. █
Permalink
Send this to a friend
06.23.11
Posted in Bill Gates, FUD, GPL, Microsoft, Steve Ballmer at 3:33 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz
(ODF | PDF | English/original)
Resumen: ex y actuales funcionarios de Microsoft se reunen a su alrededor y difunden propaganda.
CUANDO MUCHOS altos directivos abandonan Microsoft[http://techrights.org/wiki/index.php/Microsoft_-_Major_Departure], hay más y más topos para su uso de Microsoft (Elop, por ejemplo). Es algo muy preocupante. Bill Gates ha estado haciendo mucho más daño[http://techrights.org/wiki/index.php/Gates_Foundation_Critique] desde que salió de Microsoft y en la actualidad, uno de sus movimientos más preocupantes es su cabildeo de patentes. Es lo que se necesita para Microsoft para sobrevivir unos cuantos años más, a expensas de su competencia, literalmente. Hemos hecho un recuento no oficial en torno a Microsoft y llegamos a la conclusión de que las únicas dos personas principales que quedan dentro de Microsoft, serían Mundie (convoy de Microsoft a las congregaciones del gobierno [1[http://techrights.org/2009/04/28/quotes-craig-mundie/], 2[http://techrights.org/2009/05/02/craig-mundie-lobbies-big-eu-guns/]] y Bilderberg[http://techrights.org/2010/06/06/electionmall-and-lobbying/]) y Ballmer, cuya presencia en Microsoft podría terminar pronto debido a una mayor presión.
“Tal vez su continua calumnia de la GPL es un intento de una profecía por auto-cumplirse.”Se debe hacer hincapié una vez más que para que los administradores de Microsoft salgan verdaderamente de la compañía por lo general tienen que retirarse. Si no lo hacen, entonces se limitan a difundir la cultura de Microsoft para otra compañía como un tipo de contaminación. Hemos visto lo que ocurrio dentro de Amazon, que ahora está pagando a Microsoft por Linux[http://techrights.org/wiki/index.php/Amazon] (después de haber absorbido a muchos altos ejecutivos de Microsoft). Un director de marketing de Microsoft fundó una compañía llamada Black Duck[http://techrights.org/wiki/index.php/Black_Duck], que actualmente es la única fuente que clama que la GPL está en declive. Seguimos viendo los artículos que repiten acríticamente esas alegaciones que se basan en métodos propios con datos de propiedad de una sola dudosa fuente. Tal vez su continua calumnia de la GPL es un intento de una profecía por auto-cumplirse. Mira las publicaciones de Microsoft simpátizando con Black Duck[http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/black-duck-software-named-to-sd-times-100-for-fourth-consecutive-year-124277339.html]. Muy peligroso. Otra de estas empresas, que está dirigido por un veterano de Microsoft quien ha creado un blog de software “libre” con el fin de atraer tráfico. Pocos de los visitantes conocen la hostilidad contra la GPL de esa empresa. Debemos estar al tanto de la agenda-setting por ex funcionarios de Microsoft, no sólo su personal existente. Ah, y por cierto, este año también Craig Mundie de Microsoft, el jefe de investigación y estrategia para el monopolista, asistirá a la secreta reunión de Bilderberg[http://bilderberg2011.com/bilderberg-members/bilderberg-2010-images-exposed/attachment/009/]. Tal vez él va allí cada vez sólo porque hacen un buen café. █
Translation produced by Eduardo Landaveri, the administrator of the Spanish portal of Techrights.
Permalink
Send this to a friend
06.22.11
Posted in Bill Gates, Deception, FUD, GPL, Microsoft, Steve Ballmer at 7:20 pm by Dr. Roy Schestowitz
Summary: Microsoft’s former and existing staff gets around and gets its propaganda spreading
AS MANY top managers leave Microsoft, there are more and more moles for Microsoft to use (Elop for example). It is a very troubling thing. Bill Gates has been doing a lot more damage since he left Microsoft and currently, one of his more troubling moves is patent lobbying. It’s what it takes for Microsoft to survive a few more years, at the expense of its competition, literally. We have done an unofficial headcount around Microsoft and came to the conclusion that the only two core people are left inside Microsoft; those would be Mundie (Microsoft’s convoy to government congregations [1, 2] and to Bilderberg) and Ballmer, whose presence at Microsoft might end soon due to increased pressure.
“Maybe its long-going GPL smear is an attempt at a self-fulfilling prophecy.”It ought to be emphasised once again that for Microsoft managers to truly leave the company they usually must retire. If they don’t, then they merely spread the Microsoft culture to yet another company which they sort of contaminate. We saw that happen inside Amazon, which is now paying Microsoft for Linux (after it had absorbed many top managers from Microsoft). A marketing manager from Microsoft founded a company called Black Duck, which is currently almost the exclusive source claiming the GPL to be on the decline. We keep seeing articles that uncritically repeat those claims that are based on proprietary methods with proprietary data from a single dubious source. Maybe its long-going GPL smear is an attempt at a self-fulfilling prophecy. Watch the Microsoft-sympathetic publications groom Black Duck. Very dangerous. Another such firm which is led by a Microsoft veteran has just created a FOSS blog in order to attract traffic. Little do the visitors know about the GPL hostility from that firm. Be aware of agenda-setting by former Microsoft staff, not just existing personnel. Oh, and by the way, this year too Microsoft’s Craig Mundie, the chief research and strategy officer for the monopolist, will attend the secretive Bilderberg meeting. Maybe he goes there every time just because they make good coffee. █
Permalink
Send this to a friend
« Previous entries Next Page » Next Page »
Content is available under CC-BY-SA