Talk:Gregory Fossedal

Relocating open source conetnt from article page pending a rewrite - at the moment it refers to broad material on ADT, Fossedal and Microsoft/open source and is perhaps best on a side page but linked to both pages on ADTI and Fossedal. will return. --Bob Burton 15:31, 15 Jan 2006 (EST)

At Alexis de Tocqueville Institution Gregory Fossedal saw published some articles that some purport makes him the hitman to smear "Open Source Software" on behalf of Microsoft monopoly perpetuation in the Operating Systems field. Such claimants cite an Oct 2003 article written by Mr. Fossedal as evidence below because he recommends a buy on The SCO Group. That he also recommends buying Red Hat and VA Linux and SELLS of Microsoft, Sun, and Oracle because he believes the future is NOT in the proprietary model merits no mention because that would seem to undermine the claim that he is a tool of Bill Gates [Note closing quote from that article, in footnotes below]. The lesson here -- don't let the facts get in the way of a good smear.

Microsoft Funding Scare Tactics?
Open-source advocates wondered if the white paper is actually a veiled Microsoft response to recent reports of rising government and military interest in open-source systems.'

A Microsoft spokesman confirmed that Microsoft provides funding to the Alexis de Tocqueville Institution.

"We support a diverse array of public policy organizations with which we share a common interest or public policy agenda such as the de Tocqueville Institution," the spokesman wrote in an e-mail." - WIRED, Jun. 05, 2002

The institution, a Washington think tank that is partly funded by Microsoft Corp., released the paper written by its president, Kenneth Brown, and titled "Opening the Open Source Debate."

The paper repeats many of Microsoft's arguments around open source and the GPL, stating that while open source is helpful to the global software industry as a development model, the GPL holds many risks and threatens the cooperation between different parties collaborating to create new technologies. - eWeek, June 11, 2002

''Open Source and Free Software activist Bruce Perens recently sent us a Call for Donations to try to counterbalance the "findings" of "think tanks" like AdTI. I've been hanging around the Washington, D.C., area for a good number of years now. I've watched the professional lobbyists in action, and they get the big bucks because they're good at what they do. But there are a lot more of us than there are of them. We have seen that Open Source activists can make a difference if enough of us make the right calls (and send the right emails and faxes) to the right people.''

Bruce is 100 percent correct when he says, "Free Software is no longer 'under the radar.' Our electronic freedoms -- even our right to program -- are under a very well-funded and vicious attack. We must actively defend ourselves now, or the good that we've created will be erased."

''It takes money, time, and effort to advance the causes we hold dear. Often the effort seems futile. It is easy to get overwhelmed by the endless wear-you-down tactics and resources the people on the other side enjoy. But the alternative is to simply walk away and let them have their way, and that simply won't do.'' - NewsForge,

UPI
The future of The SCO Group (TSCOG), which claims copyright ownership of Unix, is in danger by open software products like Linux. In 2004 they were involved in five lawsuits related to Linux (they sued in 2003 and early 2004 four companies and they were sued by Novell) and they threatened Linux end users if they didn't pay licences. Microsoft directly and indirectly pumped money into The SCO Group because Linux is also a threat to their profit and monopoly so spreading FUD about Linux is also in Microsoft's interest. (see also SCO Group campaign against the free Linux OS)

In articles published on October 3, 2003 and July 24, 2004  Gregory Fossedal was suggesting that buying stocks of The SCO group was a good investment. The closing price of that stock before that first article was $16.90 and the closing price before the last article was $4.25  so that is a 75 percent loss in less than 10 months. He however also suggested buying Red Hat and VA Linux, and suggested shorting Sun and Oracle. He concluded the article by saying that the future belonged to Open Source. His October 2003 article concludes: "Sell the proprietary software makers, buy the feisty open-source servicers. If the software behemoths awake, you'll read about it first here. In the meantime, that low rumble you hear from Santa Clara, Redwood City, and Redmond isn't a giant stirring. It's just a loud snore."

- Relocating comments posted into article page --Bob Burton 14:01, 16 Jan 2006 (EST)
 * AdTI index of articles on Open Source, accessed January 2006.
 * http://www.adti.net/opensource_debate062703.html AdTI additional links to OSS-related articles. (Dead link)
 * Kenneth Brown, "AdTI Opening the Open Source Debate White Paper", AdTI, 2002,.
 * Michelle Delio, "Did MS Pay for Open-Source Scare?", Wired, June 5, 2002.
 * Peter Galli, "eWeek article White Paper Attacks GPL", eWeek, June 11, 2002.
 * Robin "Roblimo" Miller, "Anti-Open Source lobbyists need love, too",NewsForge, October 25, 2002

Oddly though, the citations to those articles have been removed because they prove in fact the opposite, while the original slander has been allowed to let stand. Word to Open Source slanderers: There is enough real bad stuff going on in the world that you really shouldn't have to be making stuff up. Abramoff and the sixty congressman he has the goods on -- who are they? What did they get for what? -- is not a bad place to start.