Date: Fri, 6 Nov 1998 02:34:27 -0500 (EST) From: Daniel Berlin <root@danberlin.resnet.rochester.edu> To: Greg Lehey <grog@lemis.com> Cc: Wes Peters <wes@softweyr.com>, freebsd-advocacy@FreeBSD.ORG, miker@cnet.com Subject: Re: Halloween memo - what does it mean? Message-ID: <Pine.LNX.4.05.9811060203050.11645-100000@danberlin.resnet.rochester.edu> In-Reply-To: <19981106154908.A1776@freebie.lemis.com>
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> > > I wonder how Mr. Raymond is going to feel, when he wakes up after all > > this is over, faced with his real position in this global power play. > > The Microsoft PR engine, recognizing Mr. Raymond for his rabid > > advocacy and limited foresight, has played him like a Stradivarius. > > They don't even have to conduct the campaign themselves; all they > > have to do is conjure up a fake memo each week, "leak" it to their > > unwitting friend Snark, and let him tell the entire Internet and > > hence the world that Linux is going to clobber Microsoft and render > > them monopoly-less. > > Certainly there's a good question about how Eric came to get hold of > these documents. Sigh. The memos aren't conjured up. They are just months old. Unless all of us at MS are in some great conspiracy to lie to the entire world. I dunno about the rest of the people who work for/at MS, but I sure as hell don't get paid enough to do that. I saw the first one in August, and the second after. Any intern will tell you they are authentic. Don't have to take the word of the ones who still work for MS, find some disgruntled ones, and they'll tell you the same thing. I have no idea how Eric gets ahold of these documents. MS has a very large number of employees. Our letters to Beta testers get leaked to the press constantly, as do other sensitive things (not for any intentional reason. I've personally helped track down people (outside MS) who were the source of some of the leaks, and trust me, bad things happened to them.). It's not that tricky for someone to forward this to Eric. There are plenty of people at MS who run Linux/FreeBSD/what have you. And there are plenty of us who contribute to Open Source stuff. Personally, i'm not about to violate all kinds of legal agreements, as the money i make working part time for MS research helps pay for my college tuition. But remember, the average employee is a millionaire. (Note i said EMPLOYEE. I don't know stats offhand, but i'd say most MS'ers are contractors) There are those willing to take the risks. MS leaks like a sieve. Why now? Who the hell knows. Maybe Bill got drunk. (I know that one will come back to haunt me). Who the hell cares anyway? It seems to me that if it had come anytime during the timeframe of the antitrust stuff, from the beginning of when the case started, everyone would still say the same thing. So it's like anything leaked in the past 5 months is a plant. And anything leaked until the case is over is also a plant. It's getting out of hand. People saying that MS is planting people on Slashdot, mailing lists, etc. Like the same marketing people who thought up "Windows 2000" would think up planting people. They must be schizophrenic, since some days they are completely stupid and innocent, others, brilliant and diabolical. Completely different personalities, complete opposites. <Begin ADHD tangent> I've had people tell me i'm a plant. I've always thought myself an animal, but thats okay. I'm a plant. No, really, I am. Want proof? I subscribed a few weeks ago. I work for MS Research. Therefore, i'm a plant. Quod Erot(sp?) Demonstratum. It's as if they pay me big bucks to sit here and write the freebsd mailing list, while i procrastinate instead of doing my calc homework. It looks great on my resume too. "Fall 1998-Present Plant for Microsoft in the FreeBSD advocacy list - I was responsible for sitting around and writing the mailing list, doing absolutely nothing important." Can't you just see some employer looking at that and being impressed? Gotta run, the black helicopters are chasing me again, Dan Covert Plant - FreeBSD mailing lists^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H Microsoft Research^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H danielb@university.microsoft.com^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H root@danberlin.resnet.rochester.edu (Pheww, almost gave it away there. The life of a spy is always exciting) To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-advocacy" in the body of the message
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