Bonum Certa Men Certa

Fear and Loathing at INTEROP, Anti-Linux FUD Peaking

Wow! Just wow. Watch this breaking news story.

Interop : Open Source Panel Heckled and Walked Out On



[...]

About 15 minutes into the session an attendee shouted out,

"When are you going to talk about risk instead of just going back and forth talking about risks and benefits of open source?" the attendee shouted. "We're not here for the benefits, I don't want to insult you but that's not why I'm in here and if you're not going to take my question I'm going to walk out."

[...]

I've personally never seen anything like this. To be fair though the panel did seem to be all 'open source is great' but they did (Doug Levin in particular) talk about the risks that may exist.

Also to be fair though, all the panelists were in the open source business. That's how the program was listed in the program guide. If Interop really wanted a more robust/competitive session they could/should have added Microsoft to the panel.


Need anything more be said? More and more people have become fed up with the art of selling fear.

“More and more people have become fed up with the art of selling fear.”Fear mongering, such as yesterday's write-up from Paul at Disinformation Week (no direct link, as intended), is also far too shallow. We could go further by highlighting some of the iffy business that we bring up every now and then. No need for names to be called because we then get E-mails from unhappy companies that perceive it as bad publicity... well, talk about hypocrisy.

Anyway, in addition to this, as already mentioned earlier today, the level of AstroTurfing seems to have increased significantly in the past month. Remember our dear old 'friend' Jeff Gould? He is back for another cheap & quick stab at GNU/Linux (no direct link to the article in question).

Speaking about it to a familiar friend, we hear: "That is an example of the increase of astroturfing I'm seeing. Several (all?) forums are getting hit hard and often. I guess the upside is that the Microsoft movement is on the ropes and if everyone presses on, business can be rid of the Microsoft menace."

There are two spots or auditors that systematically pick up Gould's FUD pieces: Slashdot editors (whom we don't trust so much anymore) and LinuxToday. I pointed this out to the managing editor of the latter before, but the response was mixed.

With regards to the former, namely Slashdot, an anonymous reader says in private: "At least metamoderate so as to mitigate the damage. It takes 5 minutes twice a day."

For some more information about Gould's piece you can see this rebuttal. The opening says it all.

I don’t want to say that Jeff Gould is an idiot, but I may be forced to. By his idiocy. Before posting this or commenting on it, I thought I’d better find out who he is.


There is some other cheeky stuff in the 'press' at the moment. This includes some fluff from Erwin and Inquirer.net, which we complained about in the past. A commenter had it sort of confirmed that they probably just serve corporate agenda and in this case deliver lies from Oracle and Microsoft (promotion of their posturing, for benefits of non-standards). Consider this just a headsup and a warning. Very inaccurate articles appear in the press and they seem more like advertisements than informative pieces.

"Working behind the scenes to orchestrate "independent" praise of our technology, and damnation of the enemy's, is a key evangelism function during the Slog. "Independent" analyst's report should be issued, praising your technology and damning the competitors (or ignoring them). "Independent" consultants should write columns and articles, give conference presentations and moderate stacked panels, all on our behalf (and setting them up as experts in the new technology, available for just $200/hour). "Independent" academic sources should be cultivated and quoted (and research money granted). "Independent" courseware providers should start profiting from their early involvement in our technology. Every possible source of leverage should be sought and turned to our advantage."

--Microsoft, internal document [PDF]

Recent Techrights' Posts

Links 06/07/2025: Climate Change and "The Right to Criticise"
Links for the day
The Mainstream Media Took 4 Days to Realise Microsoft Shut Down Its Operations in Pakistan and Fired Everybody
We estimate that Microsoft has had about 29,000 layoffs since January
“Twibel” Actions Against Comedians (and Why It's a Truly Low Blow)
they try to make up in quantities for a lack of merit or quality
 
Gemini Links 06/07/2025: Tinylog and Certification Rotation
Links for the day
PCLinuxOS Sites Coming Back, Gradually
let's just be patient
Social Control Media, Even If Based on Free Software, Still Has Many Problems
a distraction from what actually mattered and still matters
IBM is Not Your Master
IBM makes friends with people who exclude the majority of the population: women
Help Fund the Free Software Foundation (FSF)
If you have some dollars to spare, go support the FSF
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Saturday, July 05, 2025
IRC logs for Saturday, July 05, 2025
A Short History of Attacks on Techrights (and Boycott Novell Before That)
good opportunity to tell again the story of several (not all) attempts to silence us
Leadership in Free Software
Don't let IBM lead. It's a terrible flag bearer.
Linux Foundation Apparently Flirting With Slop (Marketing by LLM-Generated SPAM)
The Web is in a really bad state!
COVID-19 Sped Up Site Improvements in Techrights
A few months later we created our very own IRC network
Gemini Links 05/07/2025: Negative Questions and 'Touching Grass' (Going Outside)
Links for the day
Links 05/07/2025: Dalai Lama Succession as 90th Birthday Approaches, 40 deg C in China
Links for the day
Links 05/07/2025: Hungary and US Defecting to Russia, "Google's Hotseat Hypocrisy"
Links for the day
Gemini Links 05/07/2025: 4th of July 2025 and "Zig Roadmap 2026"
Links for the day
How to Combat the Exploitation and Abuse by Microsoft GitHub
Not to mention corruption and crimes against women
Bryan Lunduke is Actually Sending His Audience to Attack People
"[Lunduke] is actually sending his audience to attack people."
Even The Right Wing is Rejecting Bryan Lunduke
no wonder he became so irrelevant and marginal
Microsoft's MSN Helps Microsoft Spread Lies About the Layoffs' Scale (Well Over 25,000 People Laid Off This Year)
There seem to be monopolies on lies and on truth
The Death of X Has Been Greatly Exaggerated (by Compromised Media)
X.Org Server is alive and well
Rewriting Things in Rust
How far would you go?
In 2025 Everything is "AI". Remember Blockchains?
Talk about what companies and things (services, products, software) actually do, not the labels they use
Julian Assange Has Been Free for a Year
Julian Assange and I disagreed on some things
Monopolies and Scalping
Monopolies gravitate towards price hikes
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Friday, July 04, 2025
IRC logs for Friday, July 04, 2025
Microsoft's August Layoffs Wave: "August is Confirmed for Additional Performance Based Cuts"
"August is confirmed for additional performance based cuts from the recent connects along with additional organizational cuts."
What Microsoft Reputation Laundering (With a Weaponised Law Degree) Looks Like in a Foreign Continent
You would expect this in uncivilised and primitive countries
Slopwatch: LLMs 'Write' Fake or Distorted 'News' About "Linux"
LLM slop disguised as news
Links 04/07/2025: Google Replaces the Web With Slop, "AI Might Kill Us All"
Links for the day
Gemini Links 04/07/2025: Mindfulness and F1
Links for the day
Weeks After Microsoft Bankruptcy in Russia the Company Shuts Down in Pakistan, Too
Last month Windows' share in Pakistan fell to an all-time low
Rob Musial's June 2025 Additions of Malware in Proprietary Software
Via the GNU Web site this week
Links 04/07/2025: Microsoft's H-1B Visa Applications Show Another Crisis Unfolding, Many More Deep Cuts and Shutdowns Revealed, Complete Microsoft Exits
Links for the day
Gemini Links 04/07/2025: A Day To Remember and "Stop Killing Games"
Links for the day
Crime and Corruption at Microsoft GitHub Cannot be Covered Up by SLAPPs in Another Continent
We'll write about this for a long time to come
Slop Videos Are Disappointing Garbage, Nothing New, Just Brute Force up on Display or a Pedestal of Slop
Slop videos aren't a new thing
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Thursday, July 03, 2025
IRC logs for Thursday, July 03, 2025
The War on Local Storage (People Hosting Their Files Locally and Privately)
There's nothing wrong with controlling one's computing
What Digital Independence Means
Independence in the digital realms means abandoning platforms like GitHub, not just rejecting proprietary software
NVidia is a Bubble
they temporarily see fortunes and wrongly assume perpetuity thereof
Fedora Does Not Care About Diversity and Inclusion, It's About Optics (Corporate Image)
any notion of inclusion is superficial and misleading
Don't Buy the Excuses for Microsoft's Mass Layoffs
Back in the 90s, Microsoft bought a lot of companies to get and stay ahead