On Fri, Oct 12, 2001 at 07:36:22PM +0100, Grainge, Derek wrote:
The difference is that Sun is not a monopoly, nor have they been found guilty (more than once) of breaking the law. The simple fact is that Microsoft is a quite nasty organisation, who at some time in the past appear to have become something more akin to gangsters and terrorists than an honest business.
You also appear to be missing the point that tendering rules may well have been ignored or a tender may have been put together in such a way as to exclude all bar one supplier.>
No Mark, YOU are missing the point. You are slagging off Microsoft in such an intemperate fashion that no-one in the big wide world will listen.
Indeed lots of people in this group might well feel the same but be less inclined than me to chip in.
I'm afraid Derek I'm with Mark on this one.
Tendering rules have been broken? Slag off the Civil Service. I'm afraid that business is business and if someone in Westminster is daft enough to agree to set up a contract like this, it's a government problem, not Bill Gates'.
To assign it as purely a government problem is missing the point. If there was perceived to be anything like a choice with regards fitting out the NHS with software, then the contract would have been put up for tender by the government. That they did not indicates the insidious effect a monopoly (which was largely gained illegally) has on the market.
Unless you know something about how this contract was arranged??
The crook Gates is a regular visitor to another crook's abode at No.10, we can only surmise what kind of `quid pro quo's are stitched-up.
There is no way that ANY businessman would miss out on a contract like this, if offered.
It's a matter of public record of how Mr Gates does business - the findings of fact from The People v Microsoft should disabuse you of any notions you may have of that company competing fairly and doing business in an honest manner. FYI, it describes episodes in which that company acted as little short of mobsters - threatening to put people out of business unless they played ball. Your suggestion that no businessman would miss out on this sort of sleazy business is wrong. I'm a businessman and I don't do deals with crooks as a matter of principle, so it upsets me when our government does.
I have read a few emails here talking about gangsters, terrorists, New York ... I think the whole thread is developing into something very sad.
The common thread is that gangsters, terrorists and MS are all criminals - that's a fact whether you like it or not. What's more, MS used gangsterism and terrorism, in their strictest sense, to gain and maintain their monopoly. To watch the government reward some gangsters and terrorists with 70 million whilst in the same breath bombing the crap out of the starving inhabitants of some Godforsaken country in a proclaimed `war against terrorism' has to be some kind of very sick joke indeed. -- Frank *-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-* Boroughbridge. Tel: 01423 323019 --------- PGP keyID: 0xC0B341A3 *-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-* http://www.esperance-linux.co.uk/