Microsoft Corp. lobbyists and allies are aggressively pressing Congress to reduce next year's proposed funding for the Justice Department's antitrust division, the giant software company's accuser in a storied court battle.Microsoft representatives have urged House and Senate members to cut President Clinton's proposed funding for the division by about $9 million this year. And nonprofit organizations that receive financial support from the company have also urged key congressional appropriators to limit spending for the division when they begin their final negotiations on the Justice Department budget, possibly as early as Monday.
Microsoft's lobbyists are being investigated by a state commission about a $2,399 dinner the company hosted for state legislators in New York City, the company confirmed. The guests included state assembly minority leader John Faso and his assembly members as well as staffers from New York City mayor Rudolph Giuliani's office. At issue is why the company provided the New York Temporary State Commission on Lobbying with an inaccurate list of attendees at the dinner Microsoft paid for at the Old Homestead steakhouse last November.
The Times reported that Microsoft had retained Reed's firm, Century Strategies, to contact key Bush supporters and insiders and persuade them to send letters of support for Microsoft to Bush. After the newspaper published its story, Century Strategies issued an apology: "We should have been more sensitive to possible misperception." It announced that in fact Reed had never personally lobbied Bush on Microsoft's behalf, but that it would nonetheless adopt an "abundance of caution" and henceforth cease "encouraging citizens to make their views known to Governor Bush's campaign."
01-Feb Salon:
Life, liberty and the pursuit of free software
01-Feb ZDNet:
Microsoft clarifies exec s open-source concerns
02-Aug BBC:
Linux battle becomes political
A new body called the Initiative for Software Choice has started lobbying governments over their use of so-called open source software.The group is backed by Microsoft and critics see it as an attempt to stifle governmental use of open source software.
But the Initiative said it has only been set up to ensure fair play for all firms when bidding for government business.
We stand for these principles:
Open Standards
Intercommunication and file formats should follow standards that are sincerely open for all to implement, without royalty fees or discrimination.
Choice Through Interoperability
No user should be required to use a particular product simply because other users do. Competing products should interoperate with each other through open standards.
Competition by Merit
Software vendors should compete fairly on the merit of their products, rather than by attempting to lock each other's products out of the market.
Research Availability
The people pay for government-funded research, its fruits should be available to all of them equally. We promote Open Source / Free Software licensing as a means of distributing research results fairly.
Range of Copyright Policies
We support a broad range of copyright policies, from Public Domain through Open Source and Free Software to Proprietary. We support use of the GPL and LGPL licenses when appropriate. We assert that Open Source and Proprietary models can be used together effectively. A number of our companies deploy software under the GPL license and proprietary software in the same product.
Freedom to Set Policy
Individual users, businesses, and government should all be free to set their own policies regarding what sorts of software they will acquire and use. They should not force their policies upon others.
But it's a new class that has caused the stir. As part of the deal, the university will offer a programming course in Microsoft's new C# language. The class will be available online for about 1,500 high school students applying to the electrical and computer engineering department--a first for the university.The class will also be mandatory for the 300 students per year who are accepted. The new class would replace an existing course that taught C++.
WASHINGTON -- The Justice Department, a longtime adversary of Microsoft Corp. until the two decided to settle their antitrust dispute, may now be preparing to line up on the software giant's side as it battles the states of Massachusetts and West Virginia.The department has put a federal appeals court on notice that it may enter the appeal filed by those two states seeking stiffer antitrust controls on the way Microsoft does business. If it does enter, it almost certainly would be to argue against added restrictions on the firm.
A top lawyer from Microsoft will head a legal committee with influence in the level of oversight American courts have in antitrust settlements, like the one negotiated by the company.Microsoft (MSFT) associate general counsel Richard J. Wallis takes over later this year as chairman of the American Bar Association's antitrust section, an unusual role for a corporate lawyer. The panel has already begun organizing opposition to a congressional plan that would require more aggressive oversight by the courts of such antitrust settlements.
