Bonum Certa Men Certa

Microsoft Staff Trying to Subvert the Freedom of Gemini (Without Disclosure of the Paymaster)

Video download link | md5sum eac34eacdd752f3482f26fa62747de85 Microsoft Taistoism Creative Commons Attribution-No Derivative Works 4.0



Summary: Looking back at the past couple of years, it seems like Microsoft staff and boosters were more than eager to steer developers away from freedom and into Microsoft's cage

THE Gemini mailing list archive of 2020 reveals something I wasn't aware of until earlier today. Apparently it had already been discussed in our IRC channels before, resembling some of the patterns we saw in Microsoft's "evangelism is war" document, resembling Taistoism and corporate cult tactics.



"Thankfully, right now in 2022 lots of Gemini code is Free software (almost everything is, certainly more than 90%) and the code is mostly self-hosted, some with front ends such as GitLab and and some with Gitea-based community-centric hosting."As explained in the video above, which intentionally omits names, in the earlier days of Gemini there were at least 2 people pushing Microsoft and/or Windows into the project, merely a year after it had started. The last thing a secure, elegant and freedom-respecting specification (to replace the World Wide Web for some things) needs is bloat like Windows, GitHub, and Visual Studio. They're all proprietary and we don't want Gemini developers to make projects dependant on proprietary stuff (components, software, hosting and so on). Visual Studio, GitHub etc. are all about Microsoft being in charge; Agate and Amfora, for example, still use GitHub and rely on Rust, which not only uses GitHub but also censors Microsoft critics. Thankfully, right now in 2022 lots of Gemini code is Free software (almost everything is, certainly more than 90%) and the code is mostly self-hosted, some with front ends such as GitLab and and some with Gitea-based community-centric hosting.

The curious thing is that the following year (in 2021) we once again saw people pushing Microsoft stuff for Gemini developers, despite an obvious lack of interest from the community. The people who came to the list to push Microsoft's proprietary garbage were using very promotional language and then vanished (not to be seen before the end of 2021 when the mailing list went offline, due to a hardware crash).

"The curious thing is that the following year (in 2021) we once again saw people pushing Microsoft stuff for Gemini developers, despite an obvious lack of interest from the community."Based on our understanding, Microsoft moreover 'censored' the list by marking the server/relay as "spam", preventing a flow of communication by merely having some gears in the global E-mail system.

While we refrain from going into the nitty-gritty details (we won't mention names), we do have the evidence. As Psydroid put it, it's "more about the coordination that must have happened behind the scenes" (at Microsoft).

Is Microsoft trying to undermine Gemini or take some control?

"It is common for Microsoft to mark mail services as spam and blacklist the domains," an associate has told us. Microsoft "does it a lot and it's common problem."

"Peter N M Hansteen wrote about Microsoft blacklisting site some years ago but the search engines don't index his site either," he said. Here are examples of his posts:



The associate added: "I think the question is not if Microsoft is trying to undermine Gemini but how and on what priority?"

Another person asked, "don't they extort mail services to remove their blacklist? Like pay money to get whitelisted or nobody will email you..."

Here's an example from about 11 days ago:



"Microsoft controls the Outlook users," a person said in IRC moments ago. "I tried to send an email to a Outlook address but it didn't go through because of Microsoft blacklist..."

"There should be a relevant document from Comes v Microsoft about crushing competitors while they are small," the associate concluded.

“Yes We're Talking About Knifing the Baby”

--Microsoft management



“AS LONG AS IT DOES NOT RUN ON Vl[R]GIN PCs I AM AT LEAST SEMI HAPPY”

--Microsoft management



“Cut Those F*ckers Off”

--Microsoft management



“...[C]ut off Netscape’s air supply.”

--Microsoft management



"This really isn't that hard. If you're going to kill someone there isn't much reason to get all worked up about it and angry -- you just pull the trigger. Angry discussions before hand are a waste of time. We need to smile at Novell while we pull the trigger."

--Microsoft management

Recent Techrights' Posts

Google Seems to Have Just Killed All Instances of Invidious
YouTube is rapidly becoming just "another Neflix"
IBM Layoff Rumours, Large-Scale Implementations Weeks Ahead (in March 2025)
There are some people corroborating
 
Destruction and Distortion of Information, Including Facts About Linux (Bonus: This is Destroying the Planet)
All that LLMs have going for them is hype, and moreover media that intentionally misrepresents them and their supposed capabilities
Microsoft Skype in a Freefall: About 20% Decrease in Site Traffic in 3 Months (Amid Microsoft Phasing Out Credits)
Microsoft axing more services/features may mean that now they scrape the bottom of the barrel and Skype will simply die, discontinuing service (like ICQ) in a matter of years
Gemini Links 12/02/2025: Depression, Gabbro, WikiTok, and More
Links for the day
Links 12/02/2025: Health, Security, and Monopolies
Links for the day
Gemini Protocol is Increasingly Important to the Net
Gemini Protocol will turn 6 this summer
Former EPO Manager Warns That the Illegal 'Court' for "Unitary Patents" Enables “Law Shopping”
Daniel X. Thomas opposed the very existence of the UPC, which any honest person could recognise was both illegal and unconstitutional
Like GAFAM, the EPO is Passing the Financial Pains to Staff
the EPO is operating illegally at this point
Morale at Microsoft Ruined by the Company Labelling Thousands of Workers 'Low Performers', Sacking Them on the Spot and Denying Them Basic Benefits
people laid off as "low performers" go to social control media to bemoan the label
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Tuesday, February 11, 2025
IRC logs for Tuesday, February 11, 2025
Links 11/02/2025: Current state of the Internet and Smallnet Information Services (SIS)
Links for the day
Conservative Estimate: Over 10,000 IBM Workers to Be Laid Off in the Next Two Waves
The morale is low and layoffs are expected soon, with mass layoffs likely happening next month and then again later
Links 11/02/2025: Trade Wars and "Crisis for American Universities"
Links for the day
Parasitic LLM Slop Sites Destroy the Ability to Find "Linux" News in Google News
Remember that Google News laid off lots of its workers
Richard Stallman's English Talk in Italy Less Than 24 Hours Away (Torino) and Then Another Talk in Italy Scheduled (University of Bozen-Bolzano)
He's active and he travels a lot in spite of his medical condition
Links 11/02/2025: Nutritional Poverty, Closure of USAID, More Fictional 'Valuations' Around Buzzwords
Links for the day
Perl Programming Leftovers
recently in perl.org
Microsoft in Africa: From 98% to Less Than 10% in Just 16 Years
Microsoft being on less than 1 in 10 Web-connected devices in Africa is a very big deal
Almost as If MElon Reads Techrights
The joke we started appears to be spreading
Microsoft Blasted for Adding Insult to Injury: Workers Laid Off Without Prior Notice, Without Severance Payment and Basic Coverage (Like Health), Then Stigmatised as Bad Performers So They Cannot Find a Job Elsewhere
Such stereotypes end entire careers
Gemini Links 11/02/2025: NeoVim and Deploying Other People's Code
Links for the day
BetaNews is Still Publishing LLM Slop/SPAM About "Linux"
Assuming it is indeed LLM slop, it seems clear BetaNews has no intention of improving or is simply unable/unwilling to improve
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Monday, February 10, 2025
IRC logs for Monday, February 10, 2025
Scheduled Maintenance Tomorrow and on Valentines
If the site (or Gemini capsule) is offline for a bit, the maintenance windows are likely the root cause
If Matthias Kirschner Loves Free Software, He'll Change the Name of the Microsoft-Sponsored Organisation He Governs (in Order to Avoid Confusion)
The FSF-EEE does not really like Software Freedom, it just loves money (including Microsoft's)
Soylent News Lessens the Scope of Discussion Due to Persistent Trolling and Online Abuse
if they make it a lot harder for new people to participate, then they limit the "general appeal" and reach
EPO's Local Occupational Health, Safety and Ergonomics Committee (LOHSEC) in The Hague: Workers Are Getting Sicker, Conditions in Which to Assess Patent Applications Deteriorate
"According to the Office statistics the total number of days of absence has gone up from 12.4 to 13.1 total number of sick days per Full Time Equivalent (FTE) from 2023 to 2024."
The Standard Needs to Improve Its Standards for Fact-Checking, Aaron Swartz Had Nothing to Do With Reddit and He Detested the Company That Created It
The Web is already bad enough as it is
When the Livestream of Richard Stallman is Apparently Bury-Brigaded Offline You Finally Learn to Avoid Google/YouTube for Streaming
Please, people, stop uploading to Google/YouTube
New Paper From the EPO Highlights Large-Scale Discrimination at the Office, Where People Are Rewarded for Granting More and More Illegal Patents
Even the Kremlin is probably more competent than this
Links 10/02/2025: Ban on D.E.I. Language, Listeria Risk/Outbreak
Links for the day
Links 10/02/2025: Announcing "Stringless" and Mental Health Improvement
Links for the day
Links 10/02/2025: Facebook Mass Layoffs, "Meta" Did What Aaron Swartz Had Done But to the Tune of 81.7 Terabytes
Links for the day
Microsoft Tarnishing the Brand of Arch
Of course Arch can do whatever it wants, but being associated with Microsoft is a badge of shame
The Ultimate and Inevitable Fall of OpenAI (Even Brave is 'Bigger' Now)
"When you advertise at the Super Bowl, you’ve reached just about every consumer in America. It’s the last stop. If you’re not profitable yet, you never will be."
Adding Slop to Your Blog Only Makes One Assume All the Text is LLM Slop
Simon Coter from Oracle has turned to slop
Macao is Leaving Microsoft Behind
Windows is falling to new all-time lows
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Sunday, February 09, 2025
IRC logs for Sunday, February 09, 2025
Microsoft's WSL (LSW) Shows That It Can Never Love Linux, Only Windows
that's just how Microsoft rolls
Activism in Times of War and a Coup
'Linux' Foundation works for fascism
What the Silencing of Neatnik Tells Us About Linus Torvalds Inside a Microsoft-Dominated 'Linux' Foundation
Is Linus Torvalds free to express his mind as he wishes about every topic, even just any technical topic?
Windows Down to 11.35% in Senegal, as Measured by statCounter
Another all-time low (Windows was at 99% in 2009)
"Latest Technology News" in BetaNews is LLM Slop Promoting OOXML and Proprietary Software at the Expense of LibreOffice and OpenDocument Format (ODF)
Remember that "open-source" and Open Source aren't the same; the former is fake