10.19.09
Posted in Africa, America, Deception, Free/Libre Software, GNU/Linux, Microsoft, Steve Ballmer, Windows at 8:36 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz
Summary: In addition to shameless propaganda, Microsoft is dumping software and Microsoft training in places where GNU/Linux gains traction, such as Kenya; Maryland and Illinois receive ‘American EDGI’
IT HAS only been less than two weeks since we last wrote about Microsoft in Kenya. “We wrote about this region before,” as we put it at the time, “shortly after Microsoft had allegedly blackmailed the country using withdrawal of incentives. Microsoft actively fights GNU/Linux adoption in Kenya while Bill Gates creates agricultural monopolies over there.”
This week we are finding more Microsoft propaganda in the Kenyan press (the usual crocodile tears):
Microsoft decries high rate of piracy
Leading computer software manufacturer Microsoft has decried the high rate of piracy on its products and vowed to curb the vice at all costs.
[...]
He voiced his Board’s support for the campaign mounted by the Microsoft to crack down on the counterfeits and called on all Kenyans to participate.
Notice how the article uses propaganda words like “piracy” and never mentions Free software, which is crucially important here. This is how they fight GNU/Linux. To quote:
“It’s easier for our software to compete with Linux when there’s piracy than when there’s not.”
–Bill Gates
Yes, Bill Gates said this to the press just a couple of years ago, but as Microsoft captures Kenya’s business this month, why bother saying the truth rather than spin? Here is more information about what Microsoft does in Kenya at the moment, probably because the nation turned to GNU/Linux in some places.
Computer Technology Corporation Microsoft is set to partner with local firms to re-evaluate their business operations and identify areas for improvement.
In the following new article, more Microsoft propaganda from Kenya can be seen, fueled by exaggerated and made up numbers (usually from the BSA), daemonisation terms, and no mention at all of Free(dom) software.
It ought to be added that not only Kenyans are targeted by Microsoft at the moment. This Seattle Web site speaks about a similar scheme in Maryland, and one that the press covers very poorly.
Microsoft and the Maryland Department of Labor, Licensing and Regulation (DLLR) have joined forces to provide free technology training in the form of vouchers to 13,500 Maryland residents.
Will there be Free software training? Or just the preparation of more Windows/Office drones? As the following new article shows, this is all part of “Elevate America”, which is similar to EDGI [1, 2, 3, 4].
Microsoft is calling it the Elevate America Program. The training is available to any Marylander who wants to beef up their job skills, but it’s being targeted at workers who’ve been displaced in the economic downturn.
Marylanders are not the only victims in the United States, not in the past week even. We found the same type of thing in Illinois a few days ago — passing Windows indoctrination as “charity” or at least “goodwill”.
The East Central Illinois Community Action Agency, in collaboration with the “Elevate America” program, will distribute 20 Microsoft online training vouchers.
We have seen this in Illinois before [1, 2, 3], even with the endorsement of Governor Pat Quinn, who shook hands on this with Steve Ballmer. █
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Posted in Courtroom, GNU/Linux, Google, Microsoft, Samsung, Windows at 7:58 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz
Summary: Microsoft to face class action lawsuit over the Danger fiasco; Windows Mobile carries on losing to Linux
MICROSOFT gets sued quite a lot, and this latest lawsuit is by all means justified.
The short story is that Microsoft lost data (apparently due to negligence), so although some of it could be recovered a week later, great damage had already been done. The lawsuit that we mentioned some days ago (and correctly predicted) is not an isolated case; as pointed out the other day, class action was probably inevitable and indeed it is:
Class Action Suit Filed after T-Mobile and Microsoft Lose Data T-Mobile Sidekick Users Store on their Phones
A class action lawsuit places the spotlight on T-Mobile, subsidiary of Deutsche Telekom (NYSE:DT) and Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) for losing most all the contacts, appointments, photos and other data stored by as many as one million users of the popular T-Mobile Sidekick line of mobile phones.
The T-Mobile Sidekick data service went down in early October and then T-Mobile admitted that Microsoft’s Danger, Inc. subsidiary, which is responsible for the Sidekick data service, lost most all of the personal data it was entrusted with protecting, and that it was highly unlikely it would recover any data.
Microsoft Nick tries to downplay the lawsuits and CRN agrees that it may be the end of the Sidekick.
Many T-Mobile customers saw Microsoft’s February 2008 acquisition of Danger as a death knell for their beloved Sidekick.
As one source put it a while ago, “T-Mobile halts Sidekick sales after data loss” (that’s the headline which percolates through the wires).
In another article from CRN, the following point is raised:
Lobel said that going forward, responsibility would have to be determined on a legal front as cloud services gain more traction with customers. And ultimately, he said, the company trusted to directly manage customer data should be held responsible for its loss, whether it’s outsourced or not.
“Customers look to (companies) for protection of their information. Customer look to the companies they do business with,” Lobel said. “At the end of the day, you can outsource a function, but you cannot outsource responsibility.”
Seth Weintraub from IDG goes with the headline “Microsoft kills the Sidekick. The first smart phone is dead.” The same message reaches PCWorld (IDG) whilst InfoWorld (also IDG) states in the headline that “Microsoft learns the hard way: Back up our data!”
The Seattle press and The Register look at some other issues while the Wall Street Journal generalises this to Windows Mobile. GigaOM calls it “Microsoft Mobile’s Worst Week Ever” and one of our readers writes about the highly disappointing Windows Mobile 6.5.
To say I was a dissatisfied customer would be an understatement, however thats in the past. I’ve learnt my lesson and won’t consider a Microsoft solution in a phone ever again. I will not though dwell on that and after previous bad experiences with other Microsoft technologies I only have myself to blame for the decision to purchase it.
What does that all mean to Linux? Well, apart from two predictions this month (from analysts) that Linux would ultimately dominate the space, we have found this interesting article about the demise of Windows Mobile and rise of Android:
Microsoft smartphone OS is a hard sell
Amid all the talk last week of a “groundbreaking” partnership between Verizon Wireless and Google, word of Microsoft launching its revamped operating system, Windows Mobile 6.5, and Verizon introducing one of the first smartphones to run it, the HTC Imagio, largely fell on deaf ears.
Not that I’m surprised.
The Verizon-Google partnership is a big deal. It not only ensures Google’s touch-screen Android operating system will make it onto cell phones nationwide, it finally will give consumers a worthy alternative to the Apple iPhone and AT&T.
A week ago we wrote about Samsung's bad impact on Android and now we find Microsoft’s friend Samsung ganging up to advance Windows Mobile [1, 2, 3, 4, 5].
In summary, Microsoft fails badly in mobile phones, whereas Linux is gaining, sometimes at Windows’ expense. Our reader Will concludes by pointing to this post about Pink/Danger, adding that “it doesn’t inspire confidence in Microsoft as a cloud vendor. Especially if that is really how the problem happened.” █
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Posted in Europe, Intellectual Monopoly, Microsoft, Open XML, Patents, Steve Ballmer at 7:12 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz
Summary: Microsoft’s CEO meets Prince Jean in what seems like a continued affair between Microsoft and France’s leadership
FRENCH PRESIDENT Nicolas Sarkozy has just made headlines internationally for his sheer hypocrisy. Suffice to say, Sarkozy is a big promoter of the causes of the RIAA and MPAA. He protects some oligarchs whose impact on culture is more negative than positive and in the process he is harming the Internet, which represents a democratic force. Despite all this, the population of France has managed to spread Free software rather successfully. Not bad for the origin of the great historical revolution.
We are particularly interested in Sarkozy’s personal agenda because more often than not, Sarkozy serves Microsoft’s agenda. He is a threat when it comes to intellectual monopolies (including patents) and he received support from Microsoft. He was actually caught on camera when he spent a vacation at the luxury home of a Microsoft executive and last year Sarkozy lobbied for OOXML. The list goes on and on.
What is actually new is the following article from The Times:
WHEN Steve Ballmer, the head of Microsoft, visited Paris earlier this month to open a new French headquarters, he agreed to hold only three private meetings.
Two of them were with cabinet ministers. The third, to the dismay of distinguished politicians and businessmen who had put in bids for a word with the executive titan, was with a 23-year-old undergraduate known in the French press as “Prince Jean”.
The meteoric rise of Nicolas Sarkozy’s son Jean — about to take charge of one of the biggest business districts in Europe — has prompted comparisons to a banana republic, fuelling outrage at the French president’s increasingly high-handed ways.
Sarkozy and Microsoft are no strangers and accusations of “banana republic” (as above) are not new, either. The phrase was previously brought up when the OOXML debate in France reportedly became akin to a “bar brawl”. We alluded to the AFNOR incident in [1, 2, 3] for example. It seems like a fight between the rich elites and the vast majority of the people, whose needs differ tremendously.
Speaking of the rich, here is the latest from Paul Allen:
St. Louis-based Charter is controlled by Microsoft Corp. co-founder Paul Allen. It filed for bankruptcy protection in March, struggling under $21.7 billion in debt accumulated as it made a string of acquisitions. The tight credit market prevented it from refinancing its loans or getting new ones.
Paul Allen’s funding of things is relevant for reasons and causes that indirectly affect Free software and Microsoft [1, 2, 3, 4]. █
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Posted in America, Antitrust, Asia, Deception, Europe, Microsoft at 6:32 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz
Summary: A pay-to-say agency assists Microsoft’s lobbying campaign not only in the United States but in Europe and Asia also
LAST week we warned that Microsoft was using the services of IDC (IDG) to lobby government. This week we see the consequence, which surfaced pretty quickly. Here is a report from India about Microsoft looking for greater stakes.
Commissioned by Microsoft, the study conducted by IDC, investigated the contribution of IT to GDP, job creation in the IT industry, employment in the software sector, formation of new companies and local IT spending in 52 countries. This represents 98 per cent of the total worldwide IT spend.
In the Portuguese press we find this:
Microsoft to invest €526 million in Portugal
The IT market in Portugal is set to create 7,500 new jobs along with 400 new IT companies over the next four years largely thanks to a €526 million investment from Microsoft, a study by consultancy company International Data Corporation has revealed.
[...]
Microsoft’s ecosystem integrates local companies that develop and/or commercialise products that are run in collaboration with or using Microsoft’s software as well as companies that carry out services on or distribute Microsoft’s software.
Microsoft just cannot leave Portugal alone, can it? For examples of Microsoft’s deeds in Portugal, see:
In other related news, it seems possible that Microsoft gets away very cheaply in Mississippi [1, 2, 3]. A deadline has just passed for people to file for compensation, but if California is anything to judge by (settlement of over a billion dollars not redeemed), then this is hardly an appropriate response.
Mississippi residents have until Friday to file a claim in the state’s settlement with software giant Microsoft.
And life goes on. Regarding the impact of “junk science” (IDC) and lobbying, see the following good video from Larry Lessig. █
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Posted in Africa, Asia, Bill Gates, Deception, Microsoft, Patents at 6:06 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz
“They’ll get sort of addicted, and then we’ll somehow figure out how to collect sometime in the next decade.”
–Bill Gates
Summary: Not only Africa but India too is now on the radar of Gates’ for-profit crusade with GMO (and Monsanto’s patents)
SOME things are not as good as they appear on the surface. We gradually gather more external links about the subject of the Gates Foundation (more in this Microsoft index) and just the other day we showed how Bill Gates protects his monetary investments in GMO. We have just found a batch of new articles about the subject, but they totally miss the point while Bill Gates dismisses his opponents as “environmentalists”.
We add highlights to the portions below.
Microsoft founder Bill Gates said on October 15 that environmentalists who are adamantly opposed to using genetically modified crops in Africa are hindering efforts to end hunger on that continent.
[...]
The Gates Foundation is also partnering with researchers who are using both conventional crop-breeding and biotechnology to produce drought-tolerant corn. And other work is being conducted on flood-tolerant rice and wheat that is resistant to a virulent form of rust disease.
“The technologies will be licensed royalty free to seed distributors so that the new seeds can be sold to African farmers without extra charge,” Gates declared.
It will be “licensed”. It means patents that are external to Africa. For how long will they be “licensed”?
The article above also does not say that Gates invests in those commercial companies with their precious patents, whose dissemination he promotes under the guise of “charity” (which is always immune to criticism).
Looking at feedback on this article, we mostly find ignorant comments that fall victim to the PR presented in the post’s body. However, one enlightened commenter says:
GMO Dangerous!
Genetically modified plants are extremely dangerous and DO NOT provide higher yields. Read about the Indian farmers who commit suicide by drinking their own pesticides after their GMO crops continue to fail while driving them further into debt and dependency.
Monsanto’s business model is criminal: the genes spread to unwitting farmers’ fields, a which point private investigators obtain DNA samples and then sue the poor farmer. It would be like throwing a rock through my window and suing me for my house because you’re rock is in it.
Also, the idea of patenting LIFE is preposterous. Consumers should avoid GMO food at all costs. These people our playing God with our lives and the planet.
We wrote about GMO (including Monsanto) in [1, 2]. Based on this new article from AFP, Gates is passing/spreading this patent scheme to India as well, where literally hundreds of thousands of farmers (and their peers) publicly protested against those patents whose impact and real purpose they understand (it’s usually people in the West who don’t understand this because it hardly affects them and actually facilitates cross-border exploitation that benefits them).
In all the articles presented above, it is almost shocking that they never give a voice to the opposition; they only hail and echo the spokespeople from Gates’ team which profits from “licensing”. The bottom line is that it’s not giving, it’s licensing, i.e. getting people addicted to (dependent on) the foreign technology until they need to pay for patents (or give away their natural resources). Has Western society no humility left? How about basic morality? █
“Any scientist who tells you they know that GMOs are safe and not to worry about it, is either ignorant of the history of science or is deliberately lying. Nobody knows what the long-term effect will be.”
–Geneticist, David Suzuki, giving the 2008 Commonwealth Lecture in London
“As far as genetic engineering for food, that is the great experiment that has failed. They literally have the entire world market against them. All those dreams… the blind will see, the lame will walk… has turned out to be science fiction. They are basically chemical companies selling more chemicals. They’ve been able to spread these herbicide-promoting plants around because it is more convenient for farmers who can just mass-spray their crops. But they’ve given absolutely nothing to the consumer while causing more chemical pollution and contamination.”
–Lawyer, Andrew Kimbrell, executive director of the Center for Food Safety (USA)
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Posted in Free/Libre Software, GNU/Linux, Microsoft, Security, Windows at 5:34 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz
Summary: Microsoft has exposed Firefox users to attacks for many months; Mozilla blocks Microsoft’s Firefox “leech”
MOZILLA has perhaps had enough of Microsoft's intrusion and regardless of reactions from the Microsoft crowd, it is finally disabling Microsoft software that was not supposed to enter Firefox in the first place [1, 2, 3].
Mozilla is disabling a pair of components stealthily installed by Microsoft earlier this year for Windows users of the Firefox Web browser, warning that the software suffers from a serious security vulnerability.
It comes after this:
An add-on that Microsoft silently slipped into Mozilla’s Firefox last February leaves the browser open to attack, Microsoft’s security engineers acknowledged earlier this week.
That’s nine months of constant vulnerability due to Microsoft’s injection (without users’ permission) of software into Firefox. Some suggest that Mozilla should have taken legal action rather than take the gentle route. “Mozilla says Microsoft browser malware can Firefox off,” says one headline.
In other news, Microsoft Outlook Web Access comes under phishing attacks, which raise even more questions. These attacks mostly come from Windows zombies, which are ruining the E-mail system for everyone.
Given the high malware ratio in Windows, what gives?
Ars Technica shows that even Microsoft can’t offer a solution.
Simple script trips up Microsoft Security Essentials
A VBS script written by an Ars forum member is detected by Microsoft Security Essentials as a threat. Ars investigates.
GNU/Linux users haven't the same situation to cope with. █
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Posted in DRM, GNU/Linux, Hardware, Microsoft at 5:04 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz
Summary: Nice new proof that Microsoft merchandise like Xbox 360 is rented, not owned; Microsoft disables hardware enhancements
AS MOST PEOPLE may know, there is a lot of DRM in Xbox 360. One of our readers refers to the product as “Microsoft’s experiment with DRM on commodity hardware.” It ought to be added that Apple is not much better in that regard.
Now, Microsoft may be right in banning people who obtain its games illegally. That’s a service for games to be played over the network. service is one thing, however, but hardware is another. And Microsoft not only blocks GNU/Linux installations on hardware that it sells people.
A few months ago we wrote about Xbox 360 kill switches. Regardless of whether these exist or not, more proof is now provided that Microsoft uses firmware updates to block improvement to one’s own hardware, which in turn shows who’s in control.
An upcoming update for Microsoft’s Xbox 360 will prevent “unauthorized” memory units from working with the console, according to a post late yesterday by Xbox Live’s Larry Hryb, a.k.a. Major Nelson.
Many of the problems with Xbox 360 also include an extremely high defect rate, to which new and exceptional remedies are now being proposed. █
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