Microsoft PR Paying to "Correct" Wikipedia 355
Unpaid Schill writes "Over on the O'Reilly Network, there's an interesting piece about how Microsoft tried to hire people to contribute to Wikipedia. Not wanting to do the edits directly, they were looking for an intermediary to make edits and corrections favorable to them. Why? According to the article, it was apparently both to let people know that Microsoft will not 'enable death squads with their UUIDs' and also to fight the growing consensus that OOXML contains a useless pile of legacy crap which is unfit for standardization."
Bit of FUD Himself (Score:5, Informative)
That would be because respondants have had over 4 years to respond to the OASIS specification. Since it's already a standard that has been reviewed by the industry, the ISO committee can choose to adopt it on a fast-track as a way of putting their own stamp of approval on it.
Re:Honesty.... (Score:5, Informative)
As a matter of fact, yes they are. Corporations (and therefore their various departments), by definitions, only have in mind the interest of their shareholders, therefore if being unethical furthers their interest and a corporation can get away with it, they will be.
I suggest you watch a documentary called The Corporation [amazon.com]: they very clearly demonstrate that the laws governing corporations make then sociopathic by nature.
Re:Bit of FUD Himself (Score:3, Informative)
Does this mean I can expect .... (Score:3, Informative)
Oh how the good ol'days can return....
Still waiting for my first big check from years ago...
Re:Honesty.... (Score:4, Informative)
Since I was (though I didn't make this clear) referring to earlier US history, I'd say that's more of a view of a different part of history, but sure. And certainly neither the earlier US practice nor the more recent one was or is free from the corrupting influence of cash and the cronyism of the connected.
Insightful my eye. (Score:5, Informative)
Howso? From TFA:
"I think I'll accept it: FUD enrages me and MS certainly are not hiring me to add any pro-MS FUD, just to correct any errors I see."
Wow -- that sounds shady AND underhanded. No wait -- not even close. He admits he's been hired, AND he is only going to correct errors. Wow. Sounds EVIL.
>>1. There is public information Microsoft doesn't like.
No, this is public MIS-information that Microsoft doesn't like on a PUBLIC forum. They have every right to correct those errors, but they've gone one step further and hired a third party to examine the validity of the articles and correct any errors he finds.
bullcrap (Score:1, Informative)
"Well first of all, corporations are only accountable to their shareholders, not to anyone else."
Our society and governments and laws say otherwise. You have to follow the laws, a lot of laws ARE BASED ON ETHICAL CONSIDERATIONS. You aren't supposed to be lying sniveling thieving asshole fucks!
FUCK you greedy assholes and your parasitic shareholders. FUCK YOU. You ARE accountable to the rest of society! Get that through your perverted thieving head!
Just keep pushing it, keep being more unethical, keep lying, keep demanding more and more profits for less and less work, keep exploiting and squeezing people for your percentages, and see what happens. If you want a hint, read some history when the elite pigs pushed too far, when the non workers pushed the workers too far. That is what will happen until you GET RID OF THAT NOTION that you are only beholden to your "shareholders". NO, YOU ARE BEHOLDEN TO SOCIETY FIRST, not your stupid profits..
I don't know what economic idiot taught you hallucination you uttered, but it is WRONG. It's not only wrong, it is wrong because it is universally recognized by honest and civilized people as being evil, stupid, counter productive. Do you get it? You aren't some predator out with no checks and balances in your "answering to no one" corporation. Keep acting like a rabid predator and eventually the people will treat you like one,exactly as you would deserve, history has proven this over and over again. When the Incans got pushed far enough by the conquistadores, they finally gave them all the stinking profits they could eat, by pouring liqud molten gold down their pig throats. Stuff like that is what you get when you think you are only beholden to your "shareholders" in your "corporation". Society has a way of altering your reality really quick once you have gone too far. Here's a hint number two-don't even approach that level. Stop being a greedy pig. Stop putting accumulation of monetary profit at the top of your list of what is important. Break the cycle of greed.
Learn from history or repeat it, you and your corporation are NOT special. Either get civilized voluntarily, or don't be surprised if one day civilization gets forced upon you by society at large in self defense. One way or the other, you WILL stop being predatory.
Re:No wonder there's a problem ... (Score:3, Informative)
Has Microsoft actually been banned from editing these articles? Even if you consider it to be Microsoft editing its own autobiography, I think it would be acceptable [wikipedia.org] to remove blatant errors -- if "MS wants to enable death squads with their UUIDs" were in the article, I doubt anyone would object to Microsoft removing it.
And yet, Wikipedia encourages you to be bold [wikipedia.org] and make changes yourself, rather than simply saying, "Someone should change this."
Just because they're Microsoft, they have to jump through extra hoops?
Re:Bit of FUD Himself (Score:5, Informative)
Answer: 1 Month vs. 1.5 years respectively.
So, Microsoft rams a specification through the ECMA in a quarter of the time as ODF was moved through OASIS, significantly increases the volume of the standard over their original specs, at least one major partner voted against it [heise.de], then gives everyone exactly one month to review it before it becomes an international standard, and somehow that makes the industry a bunch of whiners for complaining about having only one month to review their standard. Right.
MOD PARENT UP!! (Score:2, Informative)
I will second this without anonymity!!
It's all about priorities.
Re:Honesty.... (Score:1, Informative)
If you are such an erudite historian, how about you stop prevaricating and pony up the truth: it used to be that governments granted monopolies all the time as a means of raising money (licensing monopolies) or as a means of saving money (rather than award gifts or offices, monarchs were notorious for granting monopolies). Indeed, governments were more restrictive about granting corporate charters, but for reasons not elucidated by you.
All of this not withstanding, we have more government regulation of everything today. To finance this, we also pay significantly higher taxes than the barbaric colonial Americans who dumped all of that tasty tea.
Re:I think companies should contribute (Score:3, Informative)
That seems different from what was at issue here, a paid agent of an involved party rewriting material related to the involved party on that party's behalf and to make it more favorable (even if, supposedly, only by correcting "errors") to that party: that seems to fall squarely into the area strongly discouraged by the COI rules.
Re:Honesty.... (Score:5, Informative)
I then asked him whether he thought it was a good idea to have corporations considered "persons" in a court of law ... I then asked him whether he thought it was a good idea to have corporations considered "persons" in a court of law. He said that he'd never thought about it.
I'm not an American lawyer, but I hope this in some way redresses your "Professor's" ... um ... lack of reflection?
The fact that a corporation is a legal person is the very criterium by which a corporation is defined (limited liability is itself the result of such personality). Being a person allows a corporation to own property in it's own right, sue and be sued in its own name etc.
Before the development of the Corporate form (ie. a company with legal personality), the the joint stock company (a kind of giant partnership) was the predominant form of organising shareholders. This was dangerous for shareholders since they were jointly and severally liable (ie. any damage comitted could be recouped from a single shareholder, all of the shareholders, or anything in between). This did not make investing in overly large companies particularly enticing. When it became necessary to raise large sums to fund the massive capital development which we know as the Industrial Revolution, Parliament addressed this impediment by creating the Corporate form, that is to say a company with legal personality, which could deal in its own name, and take the wrap for any wrongdoing on its part.
This history is instructive in two ways. Firstly it demonstrates that our way of life is predicated on the Corporate form. Corporations, though their influence is occasionally (some might say largely) negative, are necessary (well at least if we want to live in the kinds of mercantile culture we inhabit, and enjoy the standard of living this entails). Secondly, there is absolutely nothing natural about corporations (even in the way a partnership might be described as 'natural').
Corporations are creatures of Parliament. They were created for the social benefit they bequeath, and they were granted limited liability, which is in effect a cost imposed upon everyone else in society. In other words it is a quid pro quo. Consequently there can be no objection to the regulation of corporations, as if this constituted intervention into some natural right of individuals to form corporations. Indeed, when the sacrifice made by society, (in terms of limited liability, lower tax rates etc.) is not being returned by corporations, when the mischief the corporation makes is greater than the mischief Parliament sought to cure, then Parliament ought to address the regulation of corporations. Needless to say, such regulation, must not strangle the goose that laid the golden egg.
Re:Honesty.... (Score:3, Informative)
How about following Wikipedia's Conflict of Interest guidelines [wikipedia.org]? Is that too much to ask?
About OOXML (ECMA 376) (Score:2, Informative)
I consider this a "killer issue" for ISO (but i'm not on any of the national standards bureaux so rest assured
I quote this from groklaw: http://www.grokdoc.net/index.php/EOOXML_objection
A more accurate statement, perhaps: (Score:5, Informative)
The function of the corporations in early American society was a matter of heated dispute. As of 1780 there were only 7 chartered business corporations in the United States. That number increased dramatically after the turn of the 19th century once the courts and legislatures recognized the legitimacy of private, for-private corporate entities. Ambivalence about the role of the corporation in early American law resulted from tension between those who insisted that corporations serve the public interest and those who believed that the public interest was inherently served by the chartering of private corporations and the creation of wealth that would presumably result therefrom.
On the one side of the debate were anti-mercantilists, Jeffersonian Republicans and artisans who believed variously that corporations were monopolistic in nature; that they the accumulation of vast quantities of capital in private hands characteristic of the corporate form was inconsistent with the civic virtues of a democratic republic exemplified in the American Revolution and would undermine democratic republicanism; and that corporations could be used to dominate markets, driving down the cost of production and thereby reducing demand for artisinal goods. On the other side were those who believed that corporations were a matter of necessity in order to promote the aggregation and investment of capital. In a society of relatively equal wealth distribution, as in the early years of the republic, capital must be drawn from large numbers of small investor/share-holders rather than from individual financiers or aristocrats as could be done in Europe. The structure of the corporation and its ability to centralize management and control represented the most efficient means of operating investments and therefore of developing the American economy, proponents argued.
While demands that corporate charters be granted only in the public interest, and that liability extend to shareholders were common in the early law of corporations, these rules which seemed rooted in longstanding English mistrust of the anti-social corporate form yielded to the demands of the market and of laissez-faire capitalists. These historical developments represent another unfortunate triumph of utilitarianism over tradition in American law.
Re:Honesty.... (Score:2, Informative)
But the point is, that's what PR is all about. If you don't want to have to lie for a living, then don't get into PR.
hi, I'm the guy you're bashing today (Score:5, Informative)
The premise of this thread is a lie. Nobody ever contacted Rick and asked him to "make edits and corrections favorable to" Microsoft. Also, nobody from Microsoft PR contacted him. I am the person who contacted Rick, and I am a technical evangelist specializing in the Open XML file formats. And here is what I asked Rick to do:
"Wikipedia has an entry on Open XML that has a lot of slanted language, and we'd like for them to make it more objective but we feel that it would be best if a non-Microsoft person were the source of any corrections ... Would you have any interest or availability to do some of this kind of work? Your reputation as a leading voice in the XML community would carry a lot of credibility, so your name came up in a discussion of the Wikipedia situation today."
... feel free to state your own opinion."
"Feel free to say anything at all on your blog about the process, about our communication with you on matters related to Open XML, or anything else. We don't need to "approve" anything you have to say, our goal is simply to get more informed voices into the debate
I understand and accept that longwinded discussions of lies and their theoretical ramifications is a fascinating hobby for some, but since it's 100% my own personal actions that you're talking about, I just want to be very clear: the premise of this thread is a lie. Wikipedia's definition of "Microsoft (sic) Office Open XML" is not fact-based, and I think it would be a good thing if there were more participation by persons like Rick who are knowledgeable and interested in the actual facts of file formats, and less participation (or at least less influence) by those with specific agendas based on specific corporate interests.
Call Microsoft evil if you must, but in this case it's Doug Mahugh you're talking about. PR didn't know I contacted Rick. Hell, my own manager didn't know, although it seems likely he knows by now. You're talking about my actions alone, so I think my opinion is relevant. And in my opinion, the premise of this thread is a lie.
- Doug
Re:Mod parent up (Score:3, Informative)
Re:hi, I'm the guy you're bashing today (Score:2, Informative)