U.S. Army Warns Microsoft To Back Off 635
declan writes "My CNET News colleague Ina Fried has written an interesting article today about how the U.S. Army has told Microsoft to stop sending free CD-ROMs of Office 2003 to government employees. In what's effectively a cease and desist order, the Army said: 'Your offer of free software places our employees and soldiers in jeopardy of unknowingly committing a violation of the ethics rules and regulations to which they have taken an oath to uphold.' Whoops! Perhaps this is Microsoft's latest way to fight free software at the Pentagon. Remember that just 8 months ago, the Army paid $471 million for Microsoft licenses."
donate to schools (Score:3, Informative)
Air Force sent out warnings last week too! (Score:2, Informative)
This is happening at universities too.... (Score:3, Informative)
Here is the UK Web site [microsoft.co.uk], Canadian Web site [optamedia.com], and US Web site [imaginecup.com]
Re:thats all well and good... (Score:5, Informative)
This problem is not government wide. (Score:5, Informative)
Re:I got one! (Score:3, Informative)
DoD rules on Gifts (Score:5, Informative)
1. General rule against gifts. DoD employees are generally prohibited from accepting gifts that are from a "prohibited source" or that are offered "because of the employee's official position." [5 CFR 2635.202(a)]
2. Definitions. The definition of "prohibited source" includes companies and organizations that do business or seek to do business with DoD. [5 CFR 2635.203(d)] A gift is offered "because of the employee's official position" if it is offered because of the status, authority or duties associated with the employee's Federal position. [5 CFR 2635.203(e)] "Market value means the retail cost the employee would incur to purchase the gift. An employee who cannot ascertain the market value of a gift may estimate its market value by reference to the retail cost of similar items of like quality." [5 CFR 2635.203(c)]
3. Exceptions. There are about 30 exceptions to the general rule against gifts. One exception, which is called the $20 / $50 rule, provides that an employee may accept gifts of up to $20 in market value per source per occasion, so long as the total market value of the gifts received (under this rule) from one source does not exceed $50 in a calendar year. [5 CFR 2635.204(a)] One may not accept cash under the $20 / $50 rule. [5 CFR 2635.204(a)]
4. Examples. Here are two examples of gifts that may be accepted under the $20 / $50 rule. First, an employee who gives a speech as part of her official duties may accept a thank you gift having a value of $20. Second, an employee may accept three $16 lunches from a DoD contractor in a calendar year.
5. Buying down to $20. If you are offered a gift that has a value over $20, you may not "buy the gift down" to $20. [5 CFR 2635.204(a)] For example, if you are offered a $21 ticket to a baseball game, you may not pay $1.00 to whomever is offering the ticket, and then accept the ticket under the $20 / $50 rule.
6. Combining items. If you are offered two separate items on the same occasion, and each item has a value under $20, and the items together have a value over $20, you may accept one of the items and decline the other. For example, if you give a speech as part of your official duties, and you are offered a $6 coffee mug and a $15 pen as thank you mementos, you may keep one or the other, but not both. [5 CFR 2635.204(a)(Example 2)]
7. Different sources on the same occasion. Under the $20 / $50 rule, you may accept gifts of up to $20 in value "per source per occasion." This means that the $20 limit applies separately to each company or organization that is offering you a gift on a particular occasion. Here is an example from the ethics regulation.
During off-duty time, an employee of the Department of Defense (DoD) attends a trade show involving companies that are DoD contractors. He is offered a $15 computer program disk at X Company's booth, a $12 appointments calendar at Y Company's booth, and a deli lunch worth $8 from Z Company. The employee may accept all three of these items because they do not exceed $20 per source, even though they total more than $20 at this single occasion. [5 CFR 2635.204(a)(Example 5)]
8. Impermissible gifts. If an employee receives a gift that cannot be accepted under the $20 / $50 rule (or any of the other gift rules), the employee must do one of the following (unless the item is accepted by the agency under specific statutory authority). If the gift is a non-perishable tangible item, the employee must either return the item to the donor or pay the market value of the item to the donor. If the gift is a perishable item and it is not practical to return the item (such as flowers or a fruit basket), the item (at the discretion of the employee's supervisor or ethics official) may be given to an appropriate charity, may be sha
Re:$20 Limit... (Score:4, Informative)
Your MSDN subscription price means nothing. According to the website [microsoft.com] an MSDN subscription costs $2799, and $2299 for a renewal. Kind of a bit more than $500.
Re:Yep, it's happening in the Navy, too.... (Score:5, Informative)
As the deployment is progress they are finding that people do more then send email and write word documents and they have to leave some of the existing infrastructure intact and many have two desktop machines - the nmci email kiosk and the other machine where work gets done. This neither lower costs or inceases security - both goals of the contract.
Also if they are successful the Navy will be a sitting duck with a monoculture IT infrastructure and a successful exploit will be able to cripple it in short order.
The NMCI contract is the largest IT contract ever and you hear scant little about it in the press. I sure hope some watchdog group or even the GAO start monitoring the progress of this contract.
Re:Military Computers (Score:4, Informative)
Re:This is happening at universities too.... (Score:2, Informative)
First MS Academic licenses cost close to nothing (something like 500 bucks for ALL MS products for an ENTIRE departement).
Second, they like programming contests too.
I still have this unopened, sealed box of Windows XP Pro that MS gave to me for winning a local (just my university) programming contest in 2002.
Somewhat funny as the contest was hold on machines running Linux
And at a conference for students last year, they were giving away Visual Studio
Just like drug dealers : the first is always free.
Re:Yep, it's happening in the Navy, too.... (Score:5, Informative)
Flight Sims on Linux (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Yep, it's happening in the Navy, too.... (Score:5, Informative)
With very few exceptions, we buy nothing but Windows and Intel for PC aquisitons, since woefully few of the senior engineers and scientists (who really dont deserve those titles anymore) know any different. Since it is so hard to fire a govie, the govt. is bloated with people who haven't meaningfully increased their techincal skillset since they graduated from college in the 70s.
SPAWAR, at least, recognizes their problem and a few people with a clue are trying to change things. They are trying to clear out some of the good-old-boy cruft and the stagnant dead weight. Some of the fresh-outta-school new professionals (myself included) are trying to exert what little influence we have to push for some alternative platforms and architectures in the work place. I have a few linux boxes up for internal uses and am working on a mosix cluster, among other things. Not much, but I guess its a start, and the bigwigs are starting to take notice.
We joke that if some monster new windows worm went tearing through the network we would be the only ones with functioning computers. Unfortunately, its probably not so far from the truth.
Re:Yep, it's happening in the Navy, too.... (Score:2, Informative)
Microsoft... (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Yep, it's happening in the Navy, too.... (Score:3, Informative)
Typical Slashdot drone again. The .doc file format and .xls file format (the two most popular) did not change from Office 97 to Office XP (2002). Five years and three version of Office, no changes. The only reason the file format has changed in Office 2003 is to take advantage of XML. Of course, if they hadn't updated it to use XML you would be bitching about that also, saying how they don't "support new technologies" or innovate in new version. You should really try doing some research about these things before you blindly bash them. Microsoft also
makes the schema available for FREE [com.com] and offers Royalty-Free licensing of their specific implementations!
The limit applies to ALL government workers (Score:4, Informative)
That includes the $20/$50 gift limit ($20 for a single gift, $50 total for all gifts from a single source in a given year). All of this is administered by the Office of Government Ethics, an independent agency that used to be part of the Office of Personnel Management, another independent agency.
http://www.usoge.gov
The applicable regs are here, in S 2635.201:
http://www.usoge.gov/pages/forms_pubs_
Or there's a handy cartoon pamphlet:
http://www.usoge.gov/pages/forms_pubs_
I had to learn all about this because I used to work for a publishing company that was going to launch a magazine for federal workers that we were going to give to them for free
Now I work in a small consulting shop. Microsoft has a program and gives us *everything* for free for our internal use because they want us to push it onto our clients. I'm talking Office, Server, Exchange, Project Server, whatever. Some of the big-time VARs and integrators get deals too.
Re:Send back at *huge* MS expense (Score:2, Informative)
Re:HUGE NO-NO (Score:4, Informative)
I've worked as a contractor to the USAF and it's the same for contractors as it is for the military: no gift over $10.00 in retail value may be accepted as a gift from a vendor. Things like mouse pads, coffee cups, items that would be considered swag at a trade show, etc. If it's over $10.00, then you have to politely return the item and notify your manager/commanding officer. What Microsoft is doing is considered to be an attempt at BRIBING a government official/representative. They've been working with the government and military long enough to know this. It sounds like Microsoft still thinks the rules don't apply to them.
Re:Yep, it's happening in the Navy, too.... (Score:3, Informative)
Do you have an evidence to back up that claim? Any studies? Documents? Or are you just making up crap as you go?
I guess there is no such think as a GUI under Linux? I take it you cannot write GUI [gnome.org] apps [kde.org] for Linux? All taks need to be done from a terminal? You are very "Insightful" aren't you?
Re:Yep, it's happening in the Navy, too.... (Score:4, Informative)
Simpler than the article makes it seem... (Score:5, Informative)
Seriously, though, I work at a fast food restaurant. We're not supposed to give free or discounted anything to any government official (police, health inspectors, etc.) even in good faith, or in kindness, because it makes it seem like we're bribing them. The one exception is donating sandwiches to the fire department's fundraiser/awareness day thingy.
Office Product Activation=Security Risk (Score:5, Informative)
Military and classified networks are walled fortresses with complete isolation from the internet world. They do not tolerate breaches of this nature that puts classified data at risk. If even a laptop enters from the outside world, it will not leave without a complete wipe of the hard drive, memory, and any other removable media. No exceptions.
M$ Office Product Activation phones home over the Internet. That's a no-no in a classified secured area.
Someone at M$ is going to get das boot.
Re:$20 Limit... (Score:1, Informative)
Of course, there are many people who simply don't pay attention to that.
Re:Oh yes... it's worse than that (Score:3, Informative)
The pharmaceutical industry spends billions of dollars on various freebies for doctors -- free pens, free post-it notes, free lunches, free samples, etc. Invariably, the doctors receiving this largesse are utterly convinced that their behavior is unaffected. Of course they don't believe they're selling out their patients, or they wouldn't accept.
Instead of getting your feathers ruffled at the indignity of the implied accusation, stop and use your brain for a minute. Billions of dollars in freebies. The pharmaceutical industry isn't spending that because of their love for doctors. Obviously it works. The industry is getting a good return on their investment, or they wouldn't continue spending those billions, year after year. They see the big picture, unlike the highly-educated physicians who fall for the scam.
I'm glad to hear that the military is anal enough about the gifts doctors receive to insist that they refuse a 5-cent pen. Need a pen? Get one that isn't emblazoned with a brand name working its way into your subconscience. Obviously the cost isn't a problem, is it?
More doctors in private practice should follow the military's lead on this. Sure, everyone likes free stuff, but doctors make life-and-death decisions and should hold themselves to a higher ethical standard. Health care is too important to be so heavily influenced by marketing -- and anyone who can't see the influence of pharmaceutical marketing is just fooling themselves.
Office Mac 2004 has some cool new features ... (Score:3, Informative)
But I have to say there's some great new features in Mac Office 2004. Word has what looks to be a really neat note taking mode, with full audio recording capabilities as well.
Here's a link [macworld.com] - although MS's WinTel products may be shite, the MBU does some really nice work.
Re:Yep, it's happening in the Navy, too.... (Score:1, Informative)
Re:Yep, it's happening in the Navy, too.... (Score:1, Informative)
https://ascp.monmouth.army.mil/scp/index.j
Here's the way it works. An IMO (Information Management Officer) counts up how many systems they have/need licenses for. They then login to that site and click on how many desktop licenses they need. They then put in the local DOIM/NSC POC info in there and click SUBMIT. The local DOIM/NSC POC gets an email saying that their licensing has been approved. They then burn them their CD copies of the software. They way I do it is I burn a CD that has ALL the current hotfixes/patches/service packs for both Office and Windows XP rolled up into it, and I automatically install antivirus software and poin t it to our AV servers and our SUS servers. Secure form the get-go and all the IMO has to do is type in a computer name and join it to the domain. Easy and fairly secure.
Re:Yep, it's happening in the Navy, too.... (Score:4, Informative)
But, he said, they were supposed to make sure it didn't work 100% of the time. If users of older versions couldn't read your documents maybe 1% of the time, you'd chalk it up to "inevitable" software problems (which you'd assume were normal and unavoidable, since you were a Microsoft user) rather than a deliberate attempt to get you to upgrade. Eventually you were supposed to get tired, and just give up and upgrade.
Re:Yep, it's happening in the Navy, too.... (Score:4, Informative)
Our business relies on being able to transfer documents to and from our clients. Occasionally we have a problem with having an old version. It tends to be when someone has embedded some ActiveX thing that we didn't have. It is so rare that this happens that nobody ever suggests that we should upgrade.
One of our satellite offices upgraded to Office 2000 (without permission) to fix a perceived problem that they had when opening files sent from outside the company. We didn't know about this until a long time afterwards. In the meantime, we transfered documents backwards and forwards between the offices and never had a hitch.
On the other hand, occasionally we have our own documents get corrupt and crash Word as soon as they are opened or printed. In those cases, I fire up OpenOffice and resave them in that. Works every time. Sometimes having a different suite can get around the bugs in the old 97 code.
Eventually we will upgrade. When we do, I am hoping that it will be to OpenOffice. There are a few things that still need to be fixed in OpenOffice before we can use it, some of which is to do with file compatibility with the Microsoft format. I am hoping that I can convince management here that it would be in our interest if we got the source and help make the changes that we require. They are actually quite eager to use Open Source stuff that I think that they will get the concept of giving back to the community.
It is still cheaper than upgrading all our Microsoft products.
The new feature is INcompatibility (Score:2, Informative)
With the great inroads open source software is making into Microsoft's market and profit (85% of their profit comes from Windows and Office), why else do you think they would push the latest Office so much and not mention features at all?
The biggest new feature is one they don't want to talk about, incompatibility.
My desktop is being converted to Linux and other open source software, especially as Macromedia announced this week that they will be making their products fully compatible with Wine under Linux,beginning with Flash.
Bye bye Bill. The harder you squeeze, the more of us slip past your heavy hand.
Not too much money though... (Score:3, Informative)
On the other hand, our school went to StarOffice three years ago. Cost? $79. For the entire school. Every computer. And OpenOffice.org for the boarders. Under the new StarOffice 7 licensing terms I can even give THEM a copy if I wanted.
We were one of the first schools to move to Open/StarOffice however and not too many more have yet. Why? MS Office is 'cheap'!
Re:Yep, it's happening in the Navy, too.... (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Yep, it's happening in the Navy, too.... (Score:4, Informative)
Either you're lying, or the person you claim to know is lying.
They bothered because it makes sense (Score:5, Informative)
Consider this move of theirs with Office 2003 to be viral marketing at its best. Office itself still makes them a lot of money, but they know that they'll lose office desktop market share at some point if people can easily switch away from MS Office to other office products (which is getting easier all the time). So, if they make sure that there is tight integration between Office and their server products, you'll get locked in and won't (easily) be able to move off of Office, much less Windows.
But, what Microsoft forgot about gov't agencies in general, is that grass-roots marketing is a no-no. Strict hierarchies do not appreciate circumvention, especially where budget impacts may occur because of it.
The Air Force addressed this last month (Score:2, Informative)
Free software must be returned
by Staff Sgt. C. Todd Lopez
Air Force Print News
2/20/2004 - WASHINGTON -- Air Force people who have received a promotional copy of a popular office productivity software suite, are instructed to return it to the sender.
The Microsoft Corporation sent promotional copies of its popular "Office" software to a half million customers -- some in the Air Force. The commercial value of those software packages, more than $500 each, exceeds Joint Ethics Regulation limits for personal gifts, said John Gilligan, Air Force chief information officer.
"Our ethical regulations govern the acceptance of gifts from those who do business with us," Mr. Gilligan said. "The value of those packages is well in excess of what Air Force members can accept, in particular since we are customers of Microsoft. In the public sector we are not allowed to accept that type of gift."
Mr. Gilligan said Air Force members who received the promotional software are obligated to return it to Microsoft.
People may return the software by re-sealing the packaging, marking it "refused delivery -- return to sender" and taking it to the post office. Mr. Gilligan said if the post office refuses to take the packages, they can be turned in to local communications squadrons.
"Our installation communications squadrons will be collecting the packages and mailing them back as a group," Mr. Gilligan said.
The policies regarding acceptance of gifts are in place to protect the Air Force from undue influence by organizations it does business with. Mr. Gilligan said the principal desktop productivity suite used in the Air Force comes from Microsoft. He also said the service is in negotiations with the company for additional product licenses.
While it is unethical for employees of the public sector to accept gifts, Mr. Gilligan said the Air Force does not believe Microsoft had any ill intent.
"This was simply a marketing campaign that Microsoft undertook where they failed to understand the impact of sending free sample software to government employees," Mr. Gilligan said. "I think it was just an oversight by not realizing the ethical restrictions we are under."
Re:Send back at *huge* MS expense (Score:2, Informative)
Obligatory HHTTG reference:
"With any luck," Ford Prefect muttered as he fell asleep, "The long distance charges will force them to go broke."
Re:Yep, it's happening in the Navy, too.... (Score:3, Informative)
ALl the money that bases used to spend at local businesses for computers, office furniture, etc., that used to be supporting local businesses, now basically goes to EDS corporate.
And the good reason for spending the money in local businesses is that these bases are not taxed. Therefore their tax dollars don't go to pay for anything. I grew up in a town that existed ONLY because the Navy built a base there. Most of the employed population was employed by the base. Taxes on businesses are what fund the schools, and with so many people and so few taxable businesses, the schools were in really sad shape. By having the base buy locally, there's that much more money being taxed to support the local economy and schools.