[LINK] Jobs not all bad

[Kim Holburn]

http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20111006/09505916234/microsofts-844-million-software-giveaway-to-nonprofits-pure-charity-cheap-marketing.shtml

> Microsoft's $844 Million Software Giveaway To Nonprofits: Pure Charity Or Cheap Marketing?
> 
> from the free-now-pay-later dept

> So the actual cost to Microsoft of that donated software is likely to be only a small fraction of the $844 million "fair market value" cited. This inevitably tempers our admiration for Microsoft's ten-figure generosity somewhat.
> 
> But there's something else. Microsoft wasn't just handing out a bunch of any old products: it was giving away mostly Windows and Office, judging by a table showing a breakdown by region. Both of these are well-known for the lock-in effects they produce: once you start installing applications and creating documents with them, it's quite hard to move to a completely different platform like Apple or GNU/Linux. Most people don't even try.
> 
> So these free copies not only cost Microsoft considerably less than the $844 million figure it used to calculate that near-billion dollar total for its corporate brochure, but it wasn't really altruistic at all. With hundreds of thousands of copies of Windows being distributed (417,030 were supplied for refurbished computers alone), there is a very high probability that Microsoft will be benefiting financially – and not just in terms of goodwill -- from upgrades and follow-on sales for many years to come.

> Making copies available at zero or very low prices is something that Microsoft has done time and again whenever there was any danger of customers "defecting" to open source. For example, in 2009, Russia planned to deploy free software throughout its education system. That didn't happen, in part because Microsoft offered to license Windows for $30 a copy (article in Russian.) It's part of the rough and tumble of the highly-competitive software business.
> 
> Still, it's a little rich for a company as profitable as Microsoft to try to dress this up as “corporate charitable giving.” It's really nothing of the kind: it's marketing, pure and simple, and Microsoft should be big enough to describe it as such.



http://business.in.com/article/cross-border/how-bill-gates-blew-$258-million-in-indias-hiv-corridor/852/0

> How Bill Gates Blew $258 million in India's HIV Corridor
> The purpose was noble, the money generous. But the software mogul’s charity for HIV prevention in India has failed to make a lasting impact

http://knol.google.com/k/david-blomstrom/bill-gates/1i6e04re3w2kp/4#

> Gates Foundation
> 
> The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation was established in 2000. The three trustees are Bill Gates, Melinda Gates and Warren Buffett.
> 
> On June 25, 2006, Warren Buffett pledged to give the foundation approximately 10 million Berkshire Hathaway Class B shares spread over multiple years through annual contributions, worth approximately 30 billion in 2006.
> 
> According to the Foundation, endowment assets available for charitable activities totaled $38.7 billion on December 31, 2007.
> 
> Astonishingly, the media persist in portraying the Gates Foundation as a philanthropy, even after the Los Angeles Times printed a sensational exposé (Dark cloud over good works of Gates Foundation) in January 2007, revealing that the Gates Foundation is an investment firm. Moreover, the Gates Foundation’s investments sometimes work at cross purposes with its charities.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-gatesx07jan07,0,6827615.story?page=1&coll=la-home-headlines

> Dark cloud over good works of Gates Foundation

> Ebocha, Nigeria — Justice Eta, 14 months old, held out his tiny thumb.
> 
> An ink spot certified that he had been immunized against polio and measles, thanks to a vaccination drive supported by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.
> 
> But polio is not the only threat Justice faces. Almost since birth, he has had respiratory trouble. His neighbors call it "the cough." People blame fumes and soot spewing from flames that tower 300 feet into the air over a nearby oil plant. It is owned by the Italian petroleum giant Eni, whose investors include the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

> The Gates Foundation has poured $218 million into polio and measles immunization and research worldwide, including in the Niger Delta. At the same time that the foundation is funding inoculations to protect health, The Times found, it has invested $423 million in Eni, Royal Dutch Shell, Exxon Mobil Corp., Chevron Corp. and Total of France — the companies responsible for most of the flares blanketing the delta with pollution, beyond anything permitted in the United States or Europe.
> 
> Indeed, local leaders blame oil development for fostering some of the very afflictions that the foundation combats.

....

On 2011/Oct/10, at 6:28 AM, Martin Barry wrote:

> $quoted_author = "Kim Holburn" ;
>> 
>> And the old lack of charity thing and gumpf about how charitable BG is?
>> Without mentioning that the BAMGF has a considerable agenda.
> 
> Other than fairly run-of-the-mill agendas like trying to eliminate
> tuberculosis?
> 
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_%26_Melinda_Gates_Foundation#Criticism
> wasn't very juicy, is there a link or a Google search I should be using to
> read about these "agendas"?
> 
> thanks
> Marty
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Kim Holburn
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