Gates tried to Blackmail Danish Government 774
mocm writes "The Inquirer has a story about how Bill Gates tried to pressure the Danish prime minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen into accepting the European Union's proposed directive on software patents by threating to terminate the 800 jobs at Navision, which had been acquired by Microsoft." Update: 02/16 00:41 GMT by T : cfelde points out a CNET story which says that "The European vice president of Microsoft Business Solutions, Klaus Holse Andersen, denied on Tuesday that the jobs at Navision were ever at risk." Believe who you'd like.
I don't know (Score:3, Interesting)
How mafioso
The Danish article is very pro-patents :-( (Score:4, Interesting)
Mainly it talks about how parts of the IT sector wants to block the contensted directive and how the proponents have been unable to get through due to effective lobbyism from the contensters.
Danish Government has Tough Decision (Score:5, Interesting)
1. Loss of approximately 800 jobs
2. Implement stifling patent policies that will likely make Microsoft and other massive patent holders even more wealthy while crippling innovation within their country.
I wonder which one they should pick?
Bill rocks. -slightly off topic. (Score:1, Interesting)
Scary (Score:5, Interesting)
I'm beginning to believe that what I read in sci-fi will come true (ie: in the future, mankind is ruled by corporations that want to make money).
And even more scary is the fact that for one extortion of that kind we hear of, numbers of other extortions of the same kind happen and we never hear about it. Brrr.
For those who didn't read the article: (Score:5, Interesting)
He further claims that Microsoft can secure their rights better in the USA.
I call BS on that: if Microsoft relocates Navision to the USA, they can patent there all they want, but guess what, their patents won't mean squat in Europe without the possibility to patent software in the EU.
Re:Blackmail or Extortion (Score:2, Interesting)
This is extortion in much the same way that if you get a better deal at store A than at store B, or if the manager at store B is rude to you, you might choose to buy from store A and you might remind the manager of store B that you have this power. Certainly it is using the power as a customer of your right to say no, but this may not be illegal, and therefore may not be extortion.
On the other hand, it may not have been a matter of retalliation at all. It may be that Microsoft was concerned that they would not own the intellectual property developed by Navision if those remained in Europe. There may be legitimate business reasons to develop intellectual property in those places where it is better protected.
What's the problem? (Score:1, Interesting)
Frankly, I don't understand why powerful people don't use their power more often. If I had been Martha Stewart, for example, I would've told the government that if they convicted me, I would liquidate my company and put all my employees out of work. I would then use my remaining wealth to buy small businesses and shut them down. And then ask the government whether my head on a stake was worth that price. It may sound like I'm advocating white collar terrorism, but I think that if you have leverage, there's nothing wrong with using it.
Former Navision employee (Score:5, Interesting)
However, a while back (before her marriage to our crown prince) our crown princess did work for Navision.
I can't help but wonder if Bill Gates would have dared threaten to close the workplace of an upcoming queen...
The real question is... (Score:2, Interesting)
The Real Reasons (Score:2, Interesting)
Comment removed (Score:3, Interesting)
Patent documentation (Score:2, Interesting)
The software industry in the US is ofcourse terrified at the prospect that Europe will not get software patents... I guess they consider this an "unfair condition" for competition, since the belive that european software companies can create cheaper "copies" of US developed software.
But another thing: as I have understand it you are required to very carefully document what you patent. So, to get a patent on software you will have to decribe the used algorithm very carefully.
Now, US software patents may render quite a dangerous tool for american companies as their european counterparts quickly will gather the needed information from the patents documents and create a substitute version. The tool will turn itself against its master...
Re:Two minutes hate time already? (Score:5, Interesting)
An argument that Gates actually committed a crime. (Score:3, Interesting)
OK, so given that the main article's title changes "blackmail" to "extort", /. is probably not committing libel.
I'd change it. Even though Gates is a "public figure" it really is poor practice to throw around accusations carelessly.
Do the math ... (Score:5, Interesting)
Couldn't Microsoft just buy Denmark?
Hmm, let's see ... Denmark's biggest bridge, that's about 6 billion USD right there? You do the math.
zPatents only for start up companies? (Score:4, Interesting)
These large corporations dont seem to help humanity in any way. Cutting of jobs, threatening governments? It's getting out of control.
Smaller businesses, on the other hand, could produce more jobs and don't jam up the justice system suing anyone against them.
Re:Two minutes hate time already? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Scary (Score:3, Interesting)
And when the corporation exists to benefit from the people it 'governs'.
And when the corporation 'feeds' the people by giving them money, whilst restricting the rights of the people via law.
Then you have slavery.
Now for a rant with lots of flaws...
The solution is to equalise the lobbying power of corporations with that of the common person. Disallow corporate funding/gifts of government employees. The government should be run FOR the people, because the people elect the government. If government is run for the corporations because of corrupt self-interest by the government employees (I'm sure a large portion of the readership here can guess which country comes to mind first, although sadly many others join the list quickly) then what is the point of democracy? Democracy is nothing but a facade, nothing better than what we had before blacks, women, poor people had the vote. It is rich people conniving together to run society for their own benefit only.
With modern technology, it shouldn't be that hard for the individual to vote themselves on the issues they care about. They don't need their local elected offical to toe the party line (or run after the corporate carrot) when voting. With this, government would be for the people, by the people, and because the party line, or the corporate carrot, won't be available for government employees (although government would exist to organise it all still) the will of the people, not the rich or the corporation, would be foremost.
Take Europe. Software patents as they were suggested would merely protect corporations in the USA. There is no benefit to having them over here, it would destroy lots of businesses in the arena. Businesses that make a lot of money and employ a lot of people who contribute to their country's economy. I think that a few governments are thinking past the initial bluster and seeing it for what it is - a way for US companies to extend their domination throughout Europe, before Europe gets too powerful.
Re:Not blackmail (Score:0, Interesting)
Exactly! It's Bush that is encouraging companies to be dishonest. Just look at all his has done for Enron and Worldcom. He's all but given their CEO's a room in the White House!
Never forget the hatred Bush and the Bush crime family have for the common man. Maliciously putting 800 people out of work is bad, so Bush, of course, supports it. He's said many, many times how much he supports firing employees without giving them severance pay. The man is a nut. Help fight the corporate slant of
Re:Obligatory Simpsons Scene (Score:2, Interesting)
(And for the record I'm a Brit who finds some USan spelling ocnfusing/annoying.)
Probably out of context (Score:4, Interesting)
If I had to make a guess, I'd say one of two things actually happened - First BillG may have threatened to MOVE the company, which isn't quite the same as firing them all but it just about as bad morally. Unfortunately, companies do this all the time, especially manufacturing companies - hell, its half the reason auto makers have unions.
The second option is that he was planning on axing the workforce for valid business reasons and offered to throw them a bone and keep it open if the PM supported software patents.
Neither is too many shades better than the extortion reported in the article, but both are common tactics in the business world. Personally, I think we should say screw them all to all the companies that try to pull off BS stunts like this. Starting with Microsoft.
Denmark, Holland, USA, Navision, BillyG and Linux (Score:3, Interesting)
Navsision is quite popular in Europe as it's very easy to install and admin, has a huge set of CRM and ERP modules and is small enough to be useful for companies of up to around 250 people or so. Navision was quite clever in their set up in that they have a network of so called Navision Solution Centers in Europe where customisation specialists sit around and write add on modules and customise existing db scripts for local businesses. Imagine if MySQL or PostgreSQL had a similar setup!
This was Microsoft's way of gaining a foothold in Europe with the hope of competing eventually with SAP (Navision also has a larger db product called Axapta).
Navision being Danish helped because Denmark (and Holland) have very much become the USA's bitches in Europe in the last few decades, probably because they thought they could use the USA to balance out the weight of their larger European neighbours.
On the whole this has also worked out as Holland and Denmark are doing pretty well economically (They're also much smaller than their neighbours and thus much more flexible). The problem is that they have thus also become the USA's bitches to a certain extent in that their militaries and sections of their economies are more dependent on American good will than others. The JSF fighter fiasco where loads of countries get to pay for development of the fighter in return for industrial contracts which never materialised is a good example.
This open extortion (blackmail isn't really the word) of a Danish national politician is what they get for their trouble. Microsoft would not do the same in Germany, for example, as the resulting scandal would kill Microsoft in Germany. (Let's leave Germany's economic mess out of this for now)
This should be awake up call to Europeans that sucking up to large corporations, especially large foreign corporations, is like handing away your birthright in the long run.
(Actually, I suppose this applies to all countries, really)
Re:Danish Government has Tough Decision (Score:1, Interesting)
Considering that MS also owns Great Plains, there is always the possibility that they bought Navision for the purpose of nuking it. It would not be the first time that somebody bought a competitor for the purpose of migrating the customer base and shutting them down.
Re:Two minutes hate time already? (Score:1, Interesting)
Remember that he also has admitted to dumpster-diving for other people's code ("pirating") and he used time on university-owned mainframes after he'd dropped out of school.
http://philip.greenspun.com/bg/