Summary: COPsync hires from Microsoft, Level 3 dumps Microsoft’s proprietary software to stave off Free software, and Yahoo! keeps falling apart
ONCE in a while we try to keep track of where Microsoft employees end up (especially the senior ones). They cause damage to potential rivals even after they leave Microsoft. We keep seeing evidence, so this demonstrably true.
COPsync adds a Microsoft person to its Board of Directors based on the following new announcement:
COPsync, Inc. Announces the Appointment of Joel Hochberg to the Board of Directors
[..]
Previously Mr. Hochberg was the president of a prominent software company in the video game business that was sold to Microsoft in 2004. After the sale of this company, Mr. Hochberg acted as a consultant with Microsoft’s X-Box division for three years.
Additionally, Microsoft is creating new “partners” every week in order to extend the ecosystem (we rarely cover examples of these, unless it’s relevant to Free software). Sometimes Microsoft just gives some “awards” to win the loyalty of some other companies or as this news suggests, even persons. Someone called John Scott gets what’s called “Microsoft Innovation Award”.
Microsoft now adds Level 3 to distributors of its dumping programme which goes by the *Spark banners [1, 2]. We have explained these before. Poor businesses are still putting the shackles on, perhaps not realising that Microsoft will squeeze them later. They really should stick with Free software, which is why Microsoft launched this programme in the first place (suppressing migration to something else, based on short- and long-term considerations).
A big pick-up for Demand Media; The content distributor has hired Yahoo (NSDQ: YHOO) SVP Joanne Bradford as its chief revenue officer, according to AllThingsD’s Kara Swisher.
This is the type of thing that happens when companies let themselves be infiltrated by Microsoft. It’s just appalling as it removes choice from the market. Are antitrust laws no longer being enforced? █
Summary: Microsoft’s idea of “search” continues to incorporate business bias, unnecessary censorship, bribes, and advertisements that disparage Google
THE simple reality hurts Microsoft’s Bong [sic] because having about 3% in global market share is laughable, especially when one loses over $2 billion per year in this area. Microsoft is trying to compete with Google, but perhaps it just can’t understand that by fooling users with fake rankings it simply sends out the message that it’s not interested in search, it just wants to decide for users what (mis)information that should get.
Last week we wrote about Microsoft’s Middle East censorship ((this is now confirmed by more sources [1, 2]) and recalled that in China, for instance, Microsoft does even worse things which had the New York Times (NYT) call for a boycott (at least one writer of NYT called for a Bing boycott). Homophobia at Microsoft was also brought up because of this news (Microsoft still censors the subject in some places). So what is Microsoft to search really? It’s just a business looking to maximise profit. The integrity of the search and the honesty is placed very low because Microsoft believes that it can lie to customers as long as some accomplices like the Chinese government are happy. Not a smart strategy, Microsoft, not so smart. This only reinforces the perception that Microsoft is an innately “bad” company.
“This only reinforces the perception that Microsoft is an innately “bad” company.”“Microsoft Bing bribes Farmville enthusiasts on Facebook with farm,” says this report. It would not be the first time that Microsoft is accused of “bribing” to compete with Google [1, 2] and there is also the Verizon deal [1, 2] (Microsoft reportedly paid Verizon half a billion dollars to drop Google).
Microsoft now resorts to brainwash on British TV [1, 2, 3, 4] (Google never did this), it uses US-only numbers from a partner (comScore) to make claims that are difficult to trust because of many conflicts of interests [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10], and in MSN we find new changes [1, 2] which Microsoft boosters like Microsoft Nick are advertising in the form of articles and galleries [1, 2]. This is not reporting, but then again, it’s Microsoft friends from Ziff Davis [1, 2, 3]. Here is another article about the “new” MSN:
–Remember when Microsoft was, well, Microsoft? The House That Gates Built is trying to stand tall against Google with a newly redesigned page for its portal, MSN.com. The new-and-improved site is a little cleaner and a little fresher, but not significantly different. The main purpose of the page seems to be to steer people to Microsoft’s Bing search engine, which is a good deal better than previous Microsoft search offerings but, it must be said, isn’t a Google beater.
Rupert Murdoch, a friend of Microsoft and an ally against Google [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13], seems to be collaborating a little more with Microsoft, the abusive monopolist. Microsoft’s CNET booster writes about it gleefully and more details can be found here:
Now under new management, MySpace is looking to reinvent itself and rise like a Phoenix from the ashes. The once dominant social networking site fell from nearly 70 percent of the social networking market, to only 30 percent in less than a year, and was plummeting on the verge of extinction.
One of the ways that MySpace is looking to build some relevance again is through the Microsoft Outlook social connector feature–giving it some new business credibility it has always lacked. MySpace beat its social networking rival Facebook to the punch to integrate its member information and updates into Microsoft Outlook. Facebook and Windows Live integration is still listed as “coming soon”.
For those who do not know, MySpace is owned by Murdoch and it shows. █
Summary: Microsoft spends a lot of money ensuring that it becomes the only gateway to misinformation to more people, even users of Linux
Microsoft is losing over $2 billion per year because of its failed efforts on the Web (this cannot carry on until the debt grows too big). If the reports are true, Microsoft pays Verizon half a billion dollars not to let customers use Google [1, 2] and instead deliver to many people Web results that Microsoft doctors to deceive people and promote its own agenda. If Microsoft controls information, the company believes it can also control the minds and affect coverage about itself. Microsoft has quite a PR army which it built over decades of rogue operations that required a lot of spinning, denial, and harassment of journalists.
The sad thing is that Canonical, the company behind Ubuntu, has already decided [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6] that it’s okay to send users to Microsoft’s Web profiling (spying) algorithms and warped search results that are hostile towards Ubuntu, by design. This is not a violation of any law, but it is clearly a violation of ethical guidelines (not that Microsoft ever cared about ethics).
According to this new report, Microsoft must have paid Motorola a lot of money to redirect users of Android (Linux) to the same trap Ubuntu users will be sent to by default.
Motorola will start loading Microsoft’s search and map services onto its Android smartphones in China, bringing more non-Google services to the phones amid a row between Google and China.
Based on Verizon’s story, Microsoft must be sparing a lot of money here. It pays to have more users to spy on, deliver warped realities to, and exploit for a fake triumph symbolised by tiny gains in US market share (Microsoft is estimated to have ~3% market share in search worldwide). Verizon’s phones also use Linux, according to this new writeup.
A Review of Verizon’s One-on-One Droid Training
[..]
Jennifer showed me how to download a program (or app) from the Android Market that identifies what programs are currently running on your Droid.
Is having Microsoft ‘preinstalled’ on such phones any good? As we showed before, Verizon’s customers were very upset about the company’s deal with Microsoft, which prevented customers from even switching to another search engine, notably Google. Microsoft hates choice and it cannot stand fair competition. Only antitrust regulators with threats of billions of dollars in fines can change this (and even then, Microsoft fails to comply properly [1, 2, 3, 4]). Customers should not sit back idly. █
“Ten people who speak make more noise than ten thousand who are silent.”
–Napoleon Bonaparte
“The only thing necessary for the triumph [of bad] is for good men to do nothing.”
Summary: Without any disclosure, Gartenberg’s smears continue to be disseminated by IDG, which cares about traffic rather than accuracy and conflicts of interests (Gartenberg is a former Microsoft employee)
Microsoft Evangelist Michael Gartenberg is doing his annual “anti-GNU/Linux” [1, 2]. Gartnerberg, who has been working for Microsoft for years (sometimes on the payroll directly), is publishing lies about GNU/Linux at least once a year and IDG not only publishes this in one site; it even modifies the headline and posts it another site, only to receive somewhat angry responses from people who can call “FUD” when they see it. Here is one such response:
I am seriously annoyed by the constant disingenuous articles that state GNU/Linux is not ready for the average user’s desktop PC as the primary, or only, operating system. What a dump truck load of manure! The majority of the people making such spurious claims are usually ignorant end-users, clueless “reporters”, Microsoft fanatics or Apple worshippers. I am not sure which of these categories may contain Mr. Gartenberg. But I suspect it is one or more of the above. If not, then someone point out to me just exactly where Mr. Gartenberg stands in the operating systems wars. Yes, these are wars. If you do not believe that, fine. You can be wrong if you want to.
This FUD is nothing to be upset about. It’s just one of those routine things from the Microsoft ecosystem. “The MicroShills Are At It Again,” writes another person:
It’s almost impossible to read anything from the mainline computer press that does not have the hard and heavy thumbprint of Microsoft on it. We get it. You all depend on Microsoft for your continued existence, so all articles pointed at them will be heavily slanted in their favor, and, every once in a great while, when Microsoft really screws the pooch, the sarcastic remarks and criticism can fly, but only for so long. (If you don’t believe this, you aren’t paying attention. Also, gander at the amount of criticism Vista got, and then there were a load of articles saying how no one – not even them – really gave Vista a chance, and it wasn’t that bad. Then, magically, when Windows 7 started looking halfway good, and Microsoft itself admitted what a pig Vista was, again it was alright to criticize again.)
Now, it’s Bing. Bing is acceptable as a search engine – for anyone that has never used Google, or Yahoo, for that matter.
But the press is beating us with the “gains” of Bing in the market every time they show up. Enough already.
He then refers to US-only figures (that roughly quadruple Microsoft’s real presence in several areas of computing) which come from Microsoft’s business partner, ComScore [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10]. He also does not mention the fact that Microsoft is losing over $2 billion per year because market share gets bought, not earned (see Verizon for example [1, 2]) █
John Dvorak wrote an article titled “Is Microsoft Behind Google’s Italy Woes?”
Microsoft is up to its old tricks again. Google is under all sorts of attacks right now—all somehow related to Microsoft. There are a slew of stories about how Microsoft managed to get Google into anti-trust trouble with the EU. This proxy fight may also have had something to do with the situation in Italy, in which Google executives were indicted for allowing some dopey video to be uploaded in that country.
Yahoo CEO Carol Bartz has taken the high road as more and more antitrust regulators start to display an interest in Google’s practices. Rather than cheer on the investigations – or instigate new ones – Bartz has stayed mostly neutral on the matter, perhaps even supporting her biggest rival a little.
Yahoo’s position is interesting given what Microsoft did to it and news like this. Following some interview/s, there was the following additional coverage:
Microsoft Nick published an article that says: “If Bartz were Yahoo CEO then, would she have accepted Microsoft buyout? ‘Sure’”
Microsoft is still trying to defend its abuse of Yahoo!, pretending that it was a saviour rather than a bully. It is crucial to remember Bartz’s past ties with Microsoft and how she came to power (proxy battle).
BNET writes: “It’s Official: Yahoo Is Available for Purchase. But Who Wants It?”
Yahoo (YHOO) CEO Carol Bartz put in an appearance on CNBC yesterday during her company’s 15th anniversary. There was the bravado you could expect from any CEO of a publicly-traded company trying to convince listeners why the company is doing better than many may think. However, one interesting tidbit that came out was that any company could buy Yahoo for the “right price”. The question is, of the potential suitors, who would bother with an acquisition?
Microsoft is getting Yahoo! users (including Ubuntu users [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6]), so it doesn’t need to buy Yahoo! anymore. Microsoft got what it wanted from Yahoo! very cheaply.
So anyway, Microsoft has not only abused Google but it was abusing Yahoo! too. Microsoft is trying to hurt its competition rather than improve its own product. Microsoft’s entire history is like that.
A world where Microsoft is relevant in search is a rather scary one because Microsoft — being the control freak that it is — changes the search results to suit its own agenda. Here is a new look at what Microsoft does in the Arab world: [via]
Sex, Social Mores, and Keyword Filtering: Microsoft Bing in the ‘Arabian Countries’
[...]
It is unclear, however, whether Bing’s keyword filtering in the Arab countries is an initiative from Microsoft, or whether any or all of the Arab states have asked Microsoft to comply with local censorship practices or laws.
[...]
Microsoft’s declared aim from this type of censorship is to filter out “results that might return adult content.” However, filtering at the keyword level results in overblocking, as banning the use of certain keywords to search for Web sites, not just images, prevents users from accessing—based on Microsoft’s definition of objectionable content—legitimate content such as sex education and encyclopedic information about homosexuality.
Microsoft, unlike Google, never said that it wouldn’t be evil. So when it comes to censorship of its search engine Bing, it should come as no surprise that the company is much more willing than Google to block content rather than risk upsetting censorious governments around the world.
That doesn’t just apply to China, where Google says it plans to stop filtering search results.
Google is changing its position in China, with an announcement to come shortly (according to Google’s CEO). Microsoft Nick has meanwhile assured that it’s business as usual for Microsoft in China where it will maintain operations. Microsoft is generally close to the Chinese government, for diplomatic reasons that we covered here before.
Microsoft’s fear of Google does make sense. Google is no longer a search company (maybe the googol refers to money); it threatens Microsoft’s fattest cash cow and this new acquisition (announced here) is doing more to undo Microsoft lock-in in office suites:
Stepping up its fight against Microsoft Corp., Google Inc. acquired DocVerse, a technology startup that allows people to edit Microsoft Office files online.
Google has stepped up its assault on Microsoft’s productivity software with the acquisition of a start-up company that allows Office users to edit and share their documents on the web.
People ought to avoid both Microsoft and Google when it comes to mail and office suites. both are proprietary.
NetSuite woos Microsoft resellers with commissions
NetSuite Inc (N.N), which makes Web-based business accounting programs, is offering software resellers commissions to promote its products over those of bigger rival Microsoft Corp (MSFT.O).
Microsoft is feeling the heat on the Web, where it is losing over $2 billion per year. █
Two years ago we explained how Novell helped Microsoft fight against SVG, which Microsoft is now pretending to have embraced [1, 2] (the results remain to be seen). Novell’s work on Moonlight helps Microsoft ‘extend’ the Web with Silver Lie, which is direct competition to the standard, SVG. Will Microsoft try to ‘extend’ HTML5? Microsoft is always trying to control both sides of the competition so as to manipulate the struggle in all fronts. Microsoft usually does this by ‘extending’ the standard in proprietary ways while promoting its own proprietary substitutes to that standard. This is very typical and includes Java, as well as ODF [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7].
“Microsoft is always trying to control both sides of the competition so as to manipulate the struggle in all fronts.”Need one recall the hostile hijack of Yahoo!, which gives Microsoft control of both companies? There are several Microsoft executives who are now in Yahoo’s management. Sooner or later it’s possible that Yahoo! too will spread Silver Lie.
Microsoft booster Joseph Tartakoff shows a development (by linking) after he reported that “Yahoo’s Bartz says there will be “smallish acquisitions;” Specifically, she mentions mom sites and analytics firms.” Analytics for what? For search? Advertisements? That can actually serve Microsoft and spy on Ubuntu users [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6] (Novell/Mono and Yahoo! in Ubuntu both help Microsoft). Yahoo also disbands its mobile group as another manager quits.
Mitch Lazar, Managing Director and General Manager of Yahoo Mobile Europe, is leaving Yahoo after about five years. According to Tricia Duryee, Lazar admitted in a message to some colleagues that he doesn’t know what he’ll do next, either, which makes the situation look rather worse for Yahoo.
Microsoft destroyed Yahoo! in a very major way just before its big anniversary. On the other hand, Microsoft loses its ability to track customers of T-Mobile (via Yahoo!). “Yahoo may have lost its exclusive search deal with T-Mobile USA,” says this report, “but it is banking on a major reorganization to help recharge the company’s mobile efforts.” When Yahoo! wins a mobile search contract, it is a win for Microsoft, whose presence in mobiles is very scarce. █
Summary: AT and T to continue tradition of spying by diverting customer traffic to Microsoft datacentres
A FEW months ago, Microsoft sued TiVo with patents in order to support its buddy, AT&T. It is worth adding that AT&T is a lobbyist for more patents, an illegal spy, and unauthorised censor for the United States government [1, 2]. Here is a reminder of this from the news:
Here in the US, AT&T eagerly helped the administration in spying on users with no warrant and no official process (even allowing private info to be passed on with just a post-it note request).
More importantly, however, AT&T made a deal involving Windows Mobile a few weeks ago. AT&T has a close relationship with the patent bully [1, 2, 3, 4] (yes, that would be Apple attacking Linux phones) too.
To Microsoft, Yahoo! is a form of brand-washing. People use what they believe to be Yahoo!, but in fact they just use an alternative front end to Microsoft Bong [sic] (supporting an abusive monopolist and receiving ‘cooked’ results without realising it). Microsoft will harvest data and advertise based on its own biased preferences, but users will be presented with deceiving logos after the hijack. We recently found out just how friendly Microsoft is to warrantless spying. █
Summary: Must users of GNU/Linux give Microsoft clues with which to criminalise? If not, then why make it the default option for them?
A reader has sent us the following short post that refers to a Microsoft handbook being leaked to the Internet. It does raise some questions for users who get in contact with Microsoft servers (e.g. users of Ubuntu after the Yahoo-Canonical deal [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]).
Sharing is good, usually. See page 13 of this document:
Note that Microsoft and Yahoo were sharing detailed information about their customers before 2008. This should be a red flag for Ubuntu about handing over their users to Microsoft via Yahoo. If things were that bad two years ago while Yahoo was fighting the take over, imagine how bad they are now.
Another problem I’ve noticed is that Microsoft is already ruining Yahoo mail by making it look just like Hotmail. A friend of mine was dumbfounded when the interface change happened. Instead of normal links, right mouse clicks were disabled with a useless custom menu and real tabs were replaced with crummy fake ones in the browser tab. To say that the new interface made reading email a pain would be an understatement. The poor guy thought he was losing his mind and was relieved when I was able to fix things. The “classic” interface is available but normal users won’t find the button in the clutter. The option will vanish after enough people fail to press the button and some Microsoft mole says, “See everyone likes the Hotmail interface better!” Microsoft delusions are self perpetuating.
Thoughts welcome. The following banner might even be better, but we’re still working on something informative yet simple. Maybe we should turn the two “O”s into eyeballs. █
