Bonum Certa Men Certa

Gross Openwashing of Microsoft and Windows, Propaganda About Associated Costs

Mask



Summary: Propaganda of assimilation, or trying to make Windows look comparable/on par with GNU/Linux cost and freedom, is the latest propaganda pattern

AS Microsoft so desperately combats the zero-cost advantage of GNU/Linux it uses not facts but fiction. We have grown accustomed to seeing advertising pieces like this one (journalists as Microsoft couriers or copywriters), pretending that Windows is "free" and that it may become "open source" because of some blurb from three months ago. "A per this Wired article," wrote this author, "open sourcing is no longer optional, even for Apple. Even for Microsoft. Even for Windows." Actually, all of these are proprietary, so evidence does not support the argument. Nice try though...



"They are blurring the distinction between "open" and "closed" or between "free" and "proprietary"."Wired has been quite notable in the "googlebombing" of "Microsoft open source" or "Windows open source". It has been quite an effective propaganda campaign that culminated over the past year and we see more of it in light of this proprietary software release that is heralded with headlines such as "Microsoft's Power BI is coming July 24th, adds a bit of open source and Android seasoning" and "Microsoft Says Power BI Will Come Out Of Preview On July 24, Open Sources Visualization Stack". This is not Open Source at all, but Microsoft-friendly sites are openwashing Microsoft's proprietary software. Sometimes even Linux sites fall for it as it's not helping when Microsoft's propaganda channel (Channel 9) is openwashing proprietary software such as Visual Studio. This example from Channel 9 is again fitting a pattern that we first noted one week ago. This openwashing 'thing' is very much 'in'. The Microsoft-controlled Channel 9 increasingly chimes in to amplify the noise.

"Embrace, extend, extinguish" moves are now being used to make Apache software tied to Windows-powered and Microsoft-controlled servers (Azure). Isn't that great? They are blurring the distinction between "open" and "closed" or between "free" and "proprietary".

"Hadoop," says ZDNet, "started out using an open source implementation of Google's MapReduce as its exclusive processing engine." Well, now Microsoft wants it all for itself, to run under Windows (proprietary and pricey) as well as under Microsoft's control (with rental payments for hosting).

Microsoft is acting like a bandit, operating from the inside when it comes to Android as well (see "Windows 10 to allow easy porting of apps from Android and iOS platforms"), not to mention the underlying kenrel, Linux. Watch this new example of bad code that Microsoft has put inside Linux to promote proprietary software like Hyper-V, which runs on Windows (hyper-visor with NSA back doors implied) to control GNU/Linux guests.

"I would love to see all open source innovation happen on top of Windows."

--Steve Ballmer, Microsoft CEO



Recent Techrights' Posts

IBM Culling Workers or Pushing Them Out (So That It's Not Framed as Layoffs), Red Hat Mentioned Repeatedly Only Hours Ago
We all know what "reorg" means in the C-suite
Free Software Foundation Subpoenaed by Serial GPL Infringers
These attacks on software freedom are subsidised by serial GPL infringers
 
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Wednesday, May 01, 2024
IRC logs for Wednesday, May 01, 2024
Embrace, Extend, Replace the Original (Or Just Hijack the Word 'Sudo')
First comment? A Microsoft employee
Gemini Links 02/05/2024: Firewall Rules Etiquette and Self Host All The Things
Links for the day
Red Hat/IBM Crybullies, GNOME Foundation Bankruptcy, and Microsoft Moles (Operatives) Inside Debian
reminder of the dangers of Microsoft moles inside Debian
PsyOps 007: Paul Tagliamonte wanted Debian Press Team to have license to kill
Reprinted with permission from disguised.work
IBM Raleigh Layoffs (Home of Red Hat)
The former CEO left the company exactly a month ago
Paul R. Tagliamonte, the Pentagon and backstabbing Jacob Appelbaum, part B
Reprinted with permission from disguised.work
Links 01/05/2024: Surveillance and Hadopi, Russia Clones Wikipedia
Links for the day
Links 01/05/2024: FCC Takes on Illegal Data Sharing, Google Layoffs Expand
Links for the day
Links 01/05/2024: Calendaring, Spring Idleness, and Ads
Links for the day
Paul Tagliamonte & Debian: White House, Pentagon, USDS and anti-RMS mob ringleader
Reprinted with permission from disguised.work
Jacob Appelbaum character assassination was pushed from the White House
Reprinted with permission from disguised.work
Why We Revisit the Jacob Appelbaum Story (Demonised and Punished Behind the Scenes by Pentagon Contractor Inside Debian)
If people who got raped are reporting to Twitter instead of reporting to cops, then there's something deeply flawed
Red Hat's Official Web Site is Promoting Microsoft
we're seeing similar things at Canonical's Ubuntu.com
Enrico Zini & Debian: falsified harassment claims
Reprinted with permission from disguised.work
European Parliament Elections 2024: Daniel Pocock Running as an Independent Candidate
I became aware that Daniel Pocock had decided to enter politics
Publicly Posting in Social Control Media About Oneself Makes It Public Information
sheer hypocrisy on privacy is evident in the Debian mailing lists
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Tuesday, April 30, 2024
IRC logs for Tuesday, April 30, 2024
[Meme] Sometimes Torvalds and RMS Agree on Things
hype around chatbots
[Video] Linus Torvalds on 'Hilarious' AI Hype: "I Hate the Hype" and "I Don't Want to be Part of the Hype", "You Need to Be a Bit Cynical About This Whole Hype Cycle"
Linus Torvalds on LLMs
Colin Watson, Steve McIntyre & Debian, Ubuntu cover-up mission after Frans Pop suicide
Reprinted with permission from disguised.work
Links 30/04/2024: Wireless Carriers Selling Customer Location Data, Facebook Posts Causing Trouble
Links for the day
Frans Pop suicide and Ubuntu grievances
Reprinted with permission from disguised.work
Links 30/04/2024: More Google Layoffs (Wide-Ranging)
Links for the day
Fresh Rumours of Impending Mass Layoffs at IBM Red Hat
"IBM filed a W.A.R.N with the state of North Carolina. That only means one thing."
Workers' Right to Disconnect Won't Matter If Such a Right Isn't Properly Enforced
I was always "on-call" and my main role or function was being "on-call" in case of incidents
Mark Shuttleworth's (MS's) Canonical is Promoting Microsoft This Week (Surveillance Slanted as 'Confidential')
Who runs Canonical these days? Why does Canonical help sell Windows?
A Discussion About Suicides in Science and Technology (Including Debian and the European Patent Office)
In Debian, there is a long history of deaths, suicides, and mysterious disappearances
Federal News Network is Corrupt, It Runs Propaganda Pieces for Microsoft
Federal News Network used to be OK some years ago
What Mark Shuttleworth and Canonical Can to Remedy the Damage Done to Frans Pop's Family
Mr. Shuttleworth and Canonical as a company can at the very least apologise for putting undue pressure
Amnesty International & Debian Day suicides comparison
Reprinted with permission from disguised.work
[Meme] A Way to Get No Real Work Done
Walter White looking at phone: Your changes could not be saved to device
Modern Measures of 'Productivity' Boil Down to Time Wasting and Misguided Measurements/Yardsticks
People are forgetting the value of nature and other human beings
Countries That Beat the United States at RSF's World Press Freedom Index (After US Plunged Some More)
The United States (US) was 17 when these rankings started in 2002
Record Productivity and Preserving People's Past on the Net
We're very productive these days, partly owing to online news slowing down (less time spent on curating Daily Links)
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Monday, April 29, 2024
IRC logs for Monday, April 29, 2024
Links 30/04/2024: Malaysian and Russian Governments Crack Down on Journalists
Links for the day
Frans Pop Debian Day suicide, Ubuntu, Google and the DEP-5 machine-readable copyright file
Reprinted with permission from disguised.work
Axel Beckert (ETH Zurich), the mentality of sexual violence on campus
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
[Meme] Russian Reversal
Mark Shuttleworth: In Soviet Russia's spacecraft... Man exploits peasants
Frans Pop & Debian suicide denial
Reprinted with permission from disguised.work
Hard Evidence Reinforces Suspicion That Mark Shuttleworth May Have Worked Volunteers to Death
Today we start re-publishing articles that contain unaltered E-mails