Bonum Certa Men Certa

More Criminal Activity in Bill Gates' Past (Corbis Fraud), Russian Spies at Microsoft

Police on the scene



Summary: Corbis fraud is now a fact (Bill Gates is the sole owner of Corbis); Alexey Karetnikov from Microsoft is allegedly a Russian spy

THIS bit of news is not about the Gates Foundation, which is a patents-loving/hoarding operation and image/reputation laundering disguised as a tax-exempt charity. This quick post is actually about this new report from Forbes. "Start-Up Goes Public On Corbis Fraud, Starring Bill Gates," says the headline.



It's a case of David vs. Goliath and, pebble in hand, now David is talking to the press. The David in this case is Infoflows, a six-person company in the Seattle area that successfully sued stock photography company Corbis and won a $20 million judgment against Corbis early this year. Now, Infoflows has decided to go public with its side of the story.

Bill Gates has a starring role in Infoflow's story. The company, made up mostly of former Microsoft ( MSFT - news - people ) employees, was launched to form a technology that would identify digital objects. Corbis first entered into an agreement with Infoflows around 2005, feeding information it gleaned from that relationship to an outside patent counsel, according to court documents. Corbis terminated the agreement in 2006, days after receiving key software designs from Infoflows. Article Controls

A King County, Wash., superior court jury found in January 2010 that Corbis, which is solely owned by Bill Gates, fraudulently entered into a business relationship with Infoflows and then developed the company's ideas into a service for identifying objects in its digital photo collection.


This is coming from the same guy who, according to OpenBytes, is now busy getting people "addicted", just like those pharmaceutical giants he invests billions of dollars in and publicly promotes.

Lets begin by reminding ourselves of two comments made by Bill Gates - you might have heard of him, he is/was? quite influential at Microsoft. ;)
It’s easier for our software to compete with Linux when there’s piracy than when there’s not.

As long as they are going to steal it, we want them to steal ours. They’ll get sort of addicted, and then we’ll somehow figure out how to collect sometime in the next decade.
Read those sentences a few times, take a deep breath and then consider the companies mentioned in the last article. hypocrisy? or maybe underhanded tactics to allow the spread of Microsoft wares until such time as they decide to collect? – I hope everyone can forgive me for thinking this sounds very much like the drug dealer who gives the first few “hits” for free, safe in the knowledge that an addict will keep coming back.

I digress (as is my want) and this article is about the contact I have had from some of the companies/individuals who were named on the Microsoft hit list. It certainly makes interesting reading and certainly (in the cases Ive seen) not a case of selling cracked copies of Windows 7, its more a licensing agreement issue when selling refurbed PC’s as a business. Lets make something clear here, the hit list that has been published (although some sources would suggest otherwise) is not a list of people caught selling copies of Windows 7. As the links that follow will show, this is Microsoft cashing in on alleged licensing issues, in particular (in the example) a business selling on a refurbished PC. This is no “Knock off Nigel”.

There was one company in particular who contacted me from the hit list linked in the previous article. For arguments sake we will call them Company X, as you will see, from theirs (and other supporting comments from others) there is a genuine fear of retaliation for speaking out against the “Mighty Microsoft”. I however have no such fear in regards to my comments and if Microsoft feel the need to ever take legal action over my words, I would welcome it.


It all fits together. Poor ethics and dishonesty about counterfeiting make up the attitudinal issue we witness to this date.

Jokingly, Jan Wildeboer from Red Hat suggests a "conspiracy". A few days ago he wrote: "One of the russian spies worked at MSFT and now Russia gets the sources of Win7 - coincidence? ;-) "

Russia has access to the source code and Alexey Karetnikov is now deported. It probably is just a coincidence though.

Immigration deports Alexey Karetnikov: Microsoft engineer, alleged Russian spy, loyal Facebook user



[...]

The curious case of the Russian spies grows, well, curiouser, as the Washington Post reports that a Microsoft Software Design Engineer named Alexey Karetnikov has recently been ordered out of the country for "immigration violations." According to a government source, Karetnikov had "just set up shop," (spy shop, that is) and the immigration charges were technicalities used to get him out of the country quickly (and without an annoying trial).


We will probably return to this at a later stage (still catching up with news that was missed during absence).

"In honor of the event, Pam Edstrom, who had since left Microsoft to cofound her own agency, Waggener Edstrom, and handle Microsoft's PR from the outside, sponsored a "Windows Roast." Gathered at the Alexis Park Resort in Las Vegas, Gates and Ballmer made fun of themselves and not so subtly apologized for the Windows delays. "To Dream the Impossible Dream" was the theme song playing in the background. With three hundred analysts and members of the press invited to these festivities where Gates and Ballmer let it all hang out, it was another coup for "Gates's Keeper." Gates joked that Ballmer had insisted, " 'We just gotta cut features.' He came up with this idea that we could rename this thing Microsoft Window—and we would have shipped that thing a long time ago."

--Barbarians Led by Bill Gates, a book composed
by Pam's daughter

Recent Techrights' Posts

New XBox Leaks Probably Serve to Confirm XBox's Collapse (Many More Layoffs)
It's very much consistent with what many other sites have reported lately
 
Noteworthy Claim That IBM is Firing a Lot of Lawyers This Week (RAs in the Legal Department)
A lot of what they do is patent 'trolling' or lawyering up against their own staff (e.g. HR disputes)
Links 10/10/2025: US Judge Bars Attacks by ICE On Journalists and Protesters; “We Took The Freedom of Speech Away” Says the President
Links for the day
Slopwatch: Serial Sloppers, Google News Gifting Slopfarms, and Fake News/Plagiarism About "Linux"
Google itself is a slop pusher these days
Qualcomm, the New Owner of Arduino, Blasted for Its Software Patents Tax on 'Smartphones'
A lot of Qualcomm's patents are on software. We wrote about this in prior years.
XBox Layoffs Rumours, Downtime, and Criticism From XBox Co-Founder
"everyone is ditching the xbox."
Links 10/10/2025: Honoring The Legacy Of Robert Murray-Smith, Many Articles on the Hey Hi (AI) Bubble
Links for the day
Gemini Links 09/10/2025: October Gothic and Reading Middle Earth Role Playing; C and Ada
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Thursday, October 09, 2025
IRC logs for Thursday, October 09, 2025
Links 09/10/2025: Farewell to Jane Goodall, California Bans Algorithmic Price-Fixing
Links for the day
Gemini Links 09/10/2025: Lost Wages and a Saga Of Continuing To Use Palm PDAs
Links for the day
Richard Stallman's Talk in Helsinki is Done. Tomorrow Göteborg.
There are scarce details in Finnish about Dr. Stallman's talk
The Slop Song
The train wreck marches on
LLM Slop/Advanced Plagiarism Flooding the Zone With Capital That Does Not Exist
Many publishers out there still participate in this bubble instead of calling it what it is
Links 09/10/2025: Sacked Microsoft Workers Make "Sackbird", IBM Taps CockroachDB for PostgreSQL
Links for the day
"Happy Hacking Day" Richard Stallman Talk This Afternoon (From 14:00 to 16:00) at Haaga-Helia University in Pasila
Richard Stallman in Helsinki, Finland
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Wednesday, October 08, 2025
IRC logs for Wednesday, October 08, 2025
Links 09/10/2025: Impact of Microsoft Layoffs, More Data Breaches
Links for the day
Gemini Links 09/10/2025: Autumn Blues and C IRC Bot
Links for the day
Slopwatch Appreciated by Real Authors of GNU/Linux Articles
We do try to keep on top of those things
Upgraded R.R.R.R.R.R. Today
The Web of 2025 is full of garbage, not limited to slopfarms
Freedom From Proprietary Prisons
Forking always an option
IBM's Watson Died in 1956, Now Watson Dies Again
IBM is becoming just a reseller of GAFAM and other stuff
Slopwatch: LinuxSecurity, UbuntuPIT, and Google News
We've also just noticed more slop from UbuntuPIT
Microsoft Says That Constant Mass Layoffs Are Success, the Media Isn't Buying This Microsoft Narrative Anymore
If people in the media feel an obligation to repeat whatever lies Microsoft tells, what point will there be to the media?
Links 08/10/2025: "Mali Puts Free Speech on Trial" And Apple Enforces Dictatorship
Links for the day
Links 08/10/2025: ‘Death to Spotify’ and Law to Ban Loud Commercials on Streaming (Dis)Services
Links for the day
Links 08/10/2025: Real Innovation and Nina.chat is Dead
Links for the day
Links 08/10/2025: Y2K38 Bug is a Vulnerability, Chat Control in Europe a Threat
Links for the day
Microsoft Windows is No Longer an Operating System, It's Surveillance Project
Why is this even legal to preload on PCs outside the US?
How and Why Once-Legitimate Sites Turn Into Slopfarms
Many sites will go offline and many social control networks will shut down once they realise or even openly admit they spend money and time gardening a bunch of bots and slop
UbuntuPIT Became a Slopfarm and Gnoppix Tarnishes Its Own Brand With Slop
It fits all the characteristics of mildly-edited (if at all) slop
Slopwatch: Linux Journal and Other Slopfarms
GAFAM needs to go the way of the dodo
Gemini Links 08/10/2025: "Seek Seek Revolution" and Gradient Backgrounds
Links for the day
Qualcomm Arduino Takes Aim at Raspberry Pi
Qualcomm is a Microsoft partner
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Tuesday, October 07, 2025
IRC logs for Tuesday, October 07, 2025
Stagnation of the Economy and What Free Software Can (or Could) Do For It
If your economic model is based on a pyramid of lies, it won't last very long
Social Control Media is Sinking
it would rightly seem like the era of centralised "social" sites (they're not social, they're about controlling the users) is ending, not overnight but gradually