Bonum Certa Men Certa

Moles Watch: Will Poole, Sprint Nextel, Wipro, Slate

WE OCCASIONALLY take a glimpse at Microsoft seniors/alumni and especially where they happen to land after leaving Microsoft. Such shady figures can cause more damage from inside other companies, which they are likely to 'marry' with Microsoft. Unless there is sufficient opposition and sanity, companies might wed an eternal betrayer, just like EMC did.



As a bit of background on this topic, consider:



Today we look at 4 more reports that are worth keeping an eye on.

NComputing/Will Poole



Will Poole prefers to present himself as a man of goodwill, but he helped the sabotage of GNU/Linux-based OLPC XOs (leading, eventually, to the possible destruction of this charity as a whole). He also participated in programmes and groups that are related dumping techniques (EDGI) against GNU/Linux [1, 2]. It's about getting children "addicted" to Microsoft, to borrow Bill Gates' explanation of this situation.

Will Poole recently entered a company that distributes many GNU/Linux solutions to schools and we have already explained why this is troubling [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6]. There is this new article about him with a portion that ties him to another malicious part of Microsoft.

Poole is one of the most prominent ex-Microsofties to leave the company in the past year. Until last September, he was vice president of Microsoft’s Unlimited Potential Group (one of the better division names, in my opinion), and was in charge of providing software to markets in less-developed nations around the world. Before that, he was responsible for the Windows desktop operating system, so he knows a few things about shipping large-scale products. He first came to Microsoft in 1996 through its acquisition of eShop, a company he co-founded in 1991. Some of his post-Microsoft insights can be found on his “creative capitalism” website here.

[...]

Poole says NComputing is having a “profound effect on markets that were previously unable to use computer infrastructure because of cost.” His role is to help the company build its business from a strategic perspective, using his knowledge and contacts from around the world. “The exciting thing about NComputing is they’re already at scale,” he says. “It’s cheaper to fill up a school [with these PCs] than any other choice out there.” Poole says NComputing has about 150 employees in 14 countries, and they’re currently selling into 90 countries.


This can be more sinister than it sounds assuming children are turned into clients of foreign companies, only to be exposed to artificial limitations such as DRM.

Sprint Nextel



Another Microsoft executive has landed inside the board of another company, this time Sprint Nextel. It's worth bearing in mind in case Microsoft signs some deal or collaborates with Sprint Nextel in the not-so-distant future.

Sprint Nextel Corp. has appointed a former Microsoft executive to the Clearwire Corp. board.

Brian McAndrews’ appointment to the Clearwire board took effect immediately, Clearwire said in a Tuesday filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. He most recently led the advertiser and publisher solutions group of Microsoft Corp. (Nasdaq: MSFT) as senior vice president and also is a director of Fisher Communications Inc. (Nasdaq: FSCI).


Wipro



Wipro was recently banned for malpractice, but most people may recognise Wipro as Microsoft's 'shill' in India [1, 2, 3, 4, 5] because it helps suppression of GNU/Linux and freedom across the country. Here is Wipro doing a lot more legwork for Microsoft, based on this new report.

Wipro says that it has deployed Office Communications Server 2007 to more than 80 customers, who range in size from 10,000 to 80,000 employees.


Wipro has a role in what locals sometimes call Microsoft's “Axis of Evil”, which together with the EDGI programme (see above) makes it clear that the country is exploited, as opposed to offered any real help. As we noted before, the India Daily said that "Wipro is just a servant of Microsoft facilitating Indian cyber slavery under the American corporate banners."

Slate



We have already dissected Microsoft's relationship with Slate and further elaborated this in an analysis of the Microsoft-Abramoff tie. This new article from the New York Times (a Microsoft hostage too [1, 2]) reiterates important facts:

SOMEWHERE at Microsoft, there is a closet packed with leftover Slate umbrellas — a monument to the folly of asking people to pay for what they read on the Internet. These umbrellas — a $20 value! — were the premium we offered to people who would pay $19 for a year’s subscription to Slate, the Microsoft-owned online magazine (later purchased by The Washington Post). We were quite self-righteous about the alleged principle that “content” should not be free. The word itself was an insult — as if we were just making Jell-O salad in order to sell Tupperware.


This is why people must be skeptical about what they see in the media. Microsoft owns portions of it and as we demonstrated just hours ago, it shows.

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