DESPITE Microsoft's bad behaviour, some FOSS groups are successfully being lobbied to give room to this hostile company. It is a company that actively fights against Free(dom) software and one whose plan is to ruin by supposedly 'embracing'.

We used OpenBravo as example a couple of days ago and now comes similar tactlessness which relates Digium's conference.

Instead of ignoring open source conferences, Microsoft continues to invade them. The latest example: John Frederiksen (pictured), general manager of Microsoft’s Response Point business, is scheduled to speak at Digium AsteriskWorld on February 3. Why is Microsoft paying such close attention to an event for open source IP PBX advocates? The answer is obvious.

Why is this happening? Did they not learn from disasters like Microsoft at OSBC 2008 [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]?

As one commenter puts it (regarding the article about OpenBravo), the people are "on leave from MSFT"

I've often wondered how many Microsoft employees have been released on leave to get into other companies only to return to Microsoft with details for harming that other company. They have paid for partners to subvert ISO processes, they have assigned a dozen or so employees just to one reporter to ensure that reporter get Microsoft's story told Microsoft's way. And they've used various leverages to curtail their partners from profiting from non-Microsoft products.

I would trust a Microsoft employee as far as I could throw them. They have been that bad in the past and present.

Regarding the latter article (Microsoft speaker), says one person: "When will people learn?"

Here is another insightful remark that's titled "why are they allowed to invade other companies conferences."

Who are the morons who think anything a Microsoft rep is going to say is going to benefit the people at the conference? They lie in court, they pay people to flood industry standards org to get their way, etc ,etc etc. Microst is bad news to anyone doing open source and especially anything Gnu/Linux based.

So here we are with an Asterisk conference and Microsoft gets a session? They do not play with Asterisk, they play with their own platforms( Windows ) products and one they own. Now what kind of idiotic reasoning could someone have to allow them into the conference to speak to Asterisk customers and think those customers will be getting anything but lies, smoke, and mirror tricks and the normal Microsoft marketing pitch?

Microsoft is not a friend. It can't afford to. It's its obligation to the investors to steal from other people by causing them damage [1, 2]. Ultimately, as Microsoft's evangelism presentations state, they are all "here to help MICROSOFT." It's about turning competitors into serving allies, i.e. part of the Microsoft ecosystem.

Watch Novell's Joe Brockmeier over at OStatic again. Never does he criticise a criminal company (with proven record), but he feels comfortable enough to publicly slam many of Microsoft's rivals, this time Oracle. At least he appends a disclosure.

Joe 'Zonker' Brockmeier is a longtime FOSS advocate, and currently works for Novell as the community manager for openSUSE. Prior to joining Novell, Brockmeier worked as a technology journalist covering the open source beat for a number of publications, including Linux Magazine, Linux Weekly News, Linux.com, UnixReview.com, IBM developerWorks, and many others.

Perhaps because his current employer is a Microsoft ally, never does he really criticise Microsoft, even in FOSS Web sites. Just Apple, Google and on [1, 2]. Yes, they are the villains when Microsoft pays your wage. ⬆

"Our partnership with Microsoft continues to expand."

--Ron Hovsepian, Novell CEO