Microsoft’s Political Vista
Maybe it is not fair but we will take any opportunity to voice our objections on the issue of Bill Gates and Microsoft. In no particular order, some of the hightlights would be Bill Gates’ practices even at the beginning of Microsoft with his acquisitions of DOS and Windows (from Xerox) and his infinite claims of MS innovation.
We posted an article earlier this week pointing to the long history of Microsoft and the lack of responsibility, integrity and ethics. A history of wild claims on software features, chronic failure on meeting announced product launches, unreasonble treatment of third party vendors, infinite security flaws, monopolistic practices and a completely obscene disregard for the public evidenced by their marketing and a product line with little substance to match the hype.
And earlier this week Bill Gates exerted his corporate influence on a Senate committee only too willing to share in the political benefit of his misrepresented case for unlimited H1B visa access to accommodate his personal ambitions. With corporate America pushing for as many visas as they can get and Congressional politicians currently catering to open immigration advocacy gruops, it is only a matter of time before the ill-effects of their intentions will unleash a host of negative consequences for the American public. That public may be too apathetic to respond.
Also currently in the news is another Microsoft habit. Trying to circumvent rulings by the EU by offering license agreements no one with any sense would sign. It just doesn’t stop.
C. Harris
MoreWhat.com
Microsoft to Take a Pass on Patch Tuesday
TechNewsWorld -
By Tim Gray. Microsoft isn’t talking about why it has decided to omit its monthly distribution of security patches. There are several serious problems awaiting fixes, including five zero-day vulnerabilities.
Not only does Microsoft continue to sell seriously flawed software, but they have become so arrogant as to not care or even attempt apology.
Zero-day Office attacks leave experts worried
IT Week, UK - Feb 7, 2007
Cory Nachreiner, a network security analyst at WatchGuard Technologies, said that the crop of five unpatched Office vulnerabilities is leading to a “malware …
How many times do people need to be bitten by the greed of Microsoft before they go elsewhere for answers?
Zero-day attack hits Word
ZDNet - Feb 15, 2007
Word of the new flaw comes a day after Microsoft released updates for nine other Office-related vulnerabilities. Five of them were zero-day flaws, …
The Office suite of products have been a common target of hackers. Doe that not suggest to you that MS could care less if it is vulnerable? Name one MS product that was without major flaws?
Clockwork: Microsoft can’t even get Daylight Savings Time right
MacDailyNews -
“Thousands of Microsoft customers are running into problems understanding and applying the myriad Microsoft Daylight Saving Time (DST) patches required in …
And repeated due to the daylight savings time change this weekend, good luck with those MS patches.
(these additional comments supplied by Stanford Matthews, MoreWhat.com)
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Trackposted to Outside the Beltway, Right Pundits, Perri Nelson’s Website, The Virtuous Republic, A Blog For All, The Random Yak, 123beta, Adam’s Blog, basil’s blog, Stuck On Stupid, Cao’s Blog, The Bullwinkle Blog, Phastidio.net, The Amboy Times, The Florida Masochist, Jo’s Cafe, Conservative Thoughts, Pursuing Holiness, Rightlinx, third world county, Faultline USA, Woman Honor Thyself, The Crazy Rants of Samantha Burns, , stikNstein… has no mercy, The World According to Carl, Pirate’s Cove, Blue Star Chronicles, Overtaken by Events, The Pink Flamingo, Dumb Ox Daily News, and Right Voices, thanks to Linkfest Haven Deluxe.
March 10th, 2007 at 2:14 am
Despite what you say, Microsoft is not the root of all evil. There are a great many good software engineers that work there.
Their products aren’t perfect, but then no software company’s products are. As for “stealing” windows from Xerox, let’s not forget that Apple “stole” the UI first, and there were literally dozens of GUI shells for DOS that were based on what was done by Xerox.
In the interest of full disclosure, I am a former Microsoft Software Design Engineer.
March 10th, 2007 at 4:23 am
Outstanding!! Thanks for the comment Perri. Now the staff and I will have someone to critique our posts (or rants) on items related to Microsoft. BTW, we were careful to refer to Bill Gates and/or Microsoft as one individual and a corporate face. If, understandably, you took it to include the entire workforce at Microsoft, that was not our intent. As we believe the final decisions as well as ultmate project direction is limited as to the input of everyone involved.
I worked for Fortune 500 companies more than once. I don\’t anymore because I was unable to follow orders in all cases if the directive was unethical, especially if there was an ethical alternative that simultaneiously satisfied some corporate objectives. I could go on but you get the idea.
March 10th, 2007 at 5:34 am
I didn’t take your statements as including the entire workforce. There are some very bright and innovative people working at Microsoft. There are quite a few ethical people there as well.
That’s not to say that some of the people there aren’t unethical either. There are definitely some of those as well. I think you’ll find that to be the case at most large companies.
I don’t particularly agree with Microsoft’s political strategies, especially with regard to immigration. There are a lot of things that work against the company’s interests in the stands taken by MSPAC.
I don’t agree with you about the E.U. and their anti-trust case though. I remember the U.S. anti-trust case quite well, and the effects that it had on my own work. There were several features that had to be cut from the first Release of SharePoint Portal Server as a direct result of that case, including some that I worked on.
In my personal opinion, a lot of that case wasn’t about competition, or anti-competitive practices. It was about some major software industry players using the government as a wedge to take market share.
We will probably disagree on this particular point. That’s OK. I’m happy to discuss it with you whenever you like.
March 10th, 2007 at 6:30 am
Stanford and I agree. Perri Nelson’s Website has just been added to our Honor Roll. The first addition was Maggie’s Notebook } Conservative Blog. Just our way of saying thanks for contributing meaningful comments to Blog @ MoreWhat.com
March 11th, 2007 at 1:18 am
Daylight Savings Open Trackback Weekend…
Don’t forget to set your clocks ahead one hour this Saturday night……
March 11th, 2007 at 3:06 am
Interesting slant!..thanks for the link and have a super weekend!.:)
March 11th, 2007 at 3:23 am
Thanks for stopping by. My team won again today, so I’m having a fine weekend.