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SearchBiz: Google Talks About Yahoo Ad Deal; Open Source Community Upset With
Google; Has Microsoft Lost It?; Vakili Leaves Yahoo
,----[ Quote ]
| On a related note, Slate looks at the pros and cons of the Google-Yahoo deal
| — with an emphasis on the cons. The article quotes Microsoft attorney Brad
| Smith, who shared his company’s objections...
`----
http://searchengineland.com/searchbiz-14965.php
Slate is/was Microsoft-owned. It's attacking the deal, as expected.
Recent:
Corn Farmers Against Google?
,----[ Quote ]
| Only if they're planting in AstroTurf
|
| [...]
|
| How do you know the organization, and the op-ed, weren't created by LawMedia
| Group at the behest of some well-funded clients? If they did their jobs
| right, you don't know.
|
| Some of them have left digital fingerprints here and there, though, says
| Declan McCullagh, in a blockbuster of a report exposing the intellectual
| whoredom offered for various important issues. Shortly after Microsoft hired
| LawMedia, for example, legislators, national agencies, and news outlets
| received pointed complaints from coalitions of farmers, rural voters, and
| geeky Latinos about how Google's advertising deal with Yahoo would wreck
| everything.
|
| [...]
|
| Don't call them a PR firm or a lobbying firm though, Law Media – which has a
| ton of lawyers working for them too—is a "public affairs firm" specializing
| in producing "remarkable coalitions" for anything one might need a coalition
| for.
`----
http://www.webpronews.com/topnews/2008/08/14/corn-farmers-against-google
Related:
The Best Enthusiasm Money Can Buy
,----[ Quote ]
| We might think that spending several hundreds of millions of dollars every
| year on commercial speech would be just about enough to allow any company
| to "tell its story" to the public. But we would not be Microsoft, who the Los
| Angeles Times revealed was gearing up a multi-million dollar public relations
| campaign which included planting ersatz letters to the editor in major
| national newspapers. The goal: to create the appearance, if not the reality,
| of "grassroots" support for the company.
|
| "Spontaneous" testimonials penned by hired guns may not be an entirely novel
| idea in the surreal world of public relations, but Microsoft's response to
| having been caught in the act of committing such a crass act was certainly
| uncommon. At first, the company denied their intentions to actually implement
| such a plan. Then, a few days later, company spokespersons announced a new
| spin: Microsoft has a perfect right to engage in public opinion manipulation
| campaigns, if that's what it takes to "tell its story."
|
| Now, what exactly was that story, again?
`----
http://www.vcnet.com/bms/departments/dirtytricks.shtml
The Bill Gates portfolio - beyond Microsoft
,----[ Quote ]
| Other bets by Gates’s investment vehicle included the Mexican media company
| Grupo Televisa, the Mexican brewer Fomento Economico Mexicano and the
| waste-management company Republic Services.
|
| Gates has invested in several energy ventures, including ethanol producer
| Pacific Ethanol and PNM Resources, a utility based in Albuquerque, NM.
| Another investment, Minnesota-based Otter Tail Corporation (NASD: OTTR),
| provides electric power, as well manufacturing and health services.
`----
http://news.muckety.com/2008/04/27/the-bill-gates-portfolio-beyond-microsoft/2431
Is Microsoft Trampling on First Amendment Rights?
,----[ Quote ]
| In three separate legal actions, Microsoft has been using the courts in an
| attempt to smoke out sources, challenge the first-amendment rights of writers
| and reporters, and chill press coverage and public disclosure of important
| information that it prefers remain secret.
|
| Two of these cases have been conducted publicly, and one in secret. In early
| October, Microsoft subpoenaed the source materials of Dan Goodin, a reporter
| for the online news organization C/NET, and a hearing on the matter will take
| place next week. Appealing a lower court decision that denied its demand for
| source materials, Microsoft is still pursuing access to these materials from
| the authors of Competing on Internet Time, Harvard professor David Yoffie and
| MIT professor Michael Cusomano.
`----
http://www.vcnet.com/bms/features/rohm.shtml
Bill Gates lends cash to buy newspapers
$350 million to MediaNews
,----[ Quote ]
| Gates involvement has been very behind the scenes. In fact many of
| those involved in the deal didn'teven know he was one of the investors.
| It was carried out through the Gates Foundation, the world's largest
| philanthropy outfit.
`----
http://www.theinquirer.net/default.aspx?article=33849
Bill Gates fund reports 12.8 pct PlanetOut stake
,----[ Quote ]
| Bill Gates' investment fund Cascade Investment LLC reported in a regulatory
| filing on Friday that its holds a 12.8 percent stake in the common stock of
| online media company PlanetOut Inc.
`----
http://www.reuters.com/article/topNews/idUKN1331033020070713?rpc=44
More on Troy Wolverton, the Street, and Apple Scandal
,----[ Quote ]
| MediaNews did buy the Mercury News with a loan from Bill Gates' foundation,
| and is in the process of paying back that loan by publishing information
| without much journalistic or technical integrity.
|
| Specifically, I wrote “One might think that the San Jose Mercury News, being
| located in Apple's backyard, would tend to trumpet the company's success. One
| would be wrong... Apple's corporate proximity to San Jose is trumped by the
| Mercury News’ need to publish low cost, highly sensational news to make
| enough money to pay back Bill Gates for the favor of his humanitarian loan.”
`----
http://www.roughlydrafted.com/RD/RDM.Tech.Q3.07/082663E0-6FD8-4F1D-909F-1BC72833AD02.html
Openwave's unit Musiwave to be acquired by Microsoft for $46 mln
,----[ Quote ]
| Microsoft will also assume the net debt of Musiwave as part of the deal. As
| of Sept. 30, 2007, Musiwave had a net debt of about $4 million.
`----
http://www.reuters.com/article/marketsNews/idESWNAS262220071115?rpc=44
http://slated.org/bbc_microsoft_bias
Beeb slammed for 'fawning' to Bill Gates
,----[ Quote ]
| BBC viewers have flooded the corporation with complaints over how it
| covered the launch of Microsoft Vista earlier this week.
|
| In one cringingly servile interview worthy of Uriah Heep, the
| Beeb's news presenter Hugh Edwards even thanked Gates at the
| end of it, presumably in appreciation at being allowed to give
| the Vole vast coverage for free.
|
| In other TV news items presenters excitedly explained how Vistac
| ould be obtained and installed - details courtesy of the BBC's
| website.
|
| But British viewers, currently forced to pay a £131.50 licence
| fee to maintain the BBC's "impartiality", were less than impressed.
|
| Scores got in touch to complain that so much was Auntie up Bill's
| bum that you could barely see her corset.
`----
http://www.theinquirer.net/default.aspx?article=37411
Gates sold 100,000 Univision shares-SEC filing
,----[ Quote ]
| The foundation said it sold its remaining stake in Univision,
| which is in the process of being acquired by private investors,
| for an average of $35.34 per share in open market transactions.
`----
http://yahoo.reuters.com/news/articlehybrid.aspx?storyID=urn:newsmlreuters.com:20070105:MTFH49951_2007-01-05_22-11-13_N05298823&type=comktNews&rpc=44
http://tinyurl.com/yll88p
Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation- Truth Revealed
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ttq0IdULfjg
Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation- Truth Revealed Part 2
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cVlnqnMHQ1c
Spying the Gates Foundation: Diversified Holdings Stay Ahead of Market Weakness
,----[ Quote ]
| The foundation made moves in other sectors during Q3, as well, adding shares
| in Caterpillar and Canadian National Railway, while maintaining
| stakes in energy giants Exxon Mobil and BP.
`----
http://biz.yahoo.com/indie/071126/1004_id.html?.v=1
Dark cloud over good works of Gates Found
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-gatesx07jan07,0,6827615.story?coll=la-home-headlines
Gates Foundation Revokes Pledge to Review Portfolio
,----[ Quote ]
| ...the Gates Foundation took down their public statement on this
| and replaced it with a significantly altered version which seems to
| say that investing responsibly would just be too complex for them
| and that they need to focus on their core mission: 'There are
| dozens of factors that could be considered, almost all of which
| are outside the foundation's areas of expertise. The issues
| involved are quite complex...
`----
http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/01/12/1756212&from=rss
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