"Just a Ploy" PLOY

"Just a Ploy" PLOY

Posted Jan 8, 2004 8:22 UTC (Thu) by eyal (subscriber, #949)
In reply to: "Just a Ploy" PLOY by AnswerGuy
Parent article: Suddenly, competition is in (Haaretz)

There's another angle to this, which I didn't want to involve in the first post, but maybe it will make things a bit clearer.

There's some politics involved here, and with all due respect to M$ in this regard, it's not to do with them. The news media in Israel (like in most other democracies) is left wing oriented, only in Israel news items very often border on plain propaganda for certain ideas.

In particula the media HATES the current Finance Minister (Benjamin Netanyahu). They bash everything he and the MoF do regardless of any merit their actions might have and without minimal journalistic standards. For example, some reproters bash him for not doing something, but when he does they bash for doing it.

I'm not a supporter of the Finance minister, the Ministry or the current government - they aren't particulary better or worse than any of the previous governments. I am however very disappointed with the media in Israel. I'm sure there are some exceptions but most journalists just can't avoid abusing their position for promoting their own political agendas.

In perspective, that journalist is not against Linux or in favor of M$. I suspect he might be even on "our" side. However that won't stop him from playing the popular journalistic sport of bashing the MoF never mind the facts.

I have pointed out the inherent contradictions in the article, and there are a few more, especially if you consider additional relevant information that was NOT given in the article (eg. that the Ministry of Labor is in the process of switching hundreds of desktops to Open Office).

So, overall the article isn't against Linux and it's not some clever form of FUD from M$. It's just a confused, pointless article motivated by reasons not related to Linux.

However, as most PR people would testify, even bad PR is PR. That article wasn't even bad PR for Open Source and Free Software, so it does contribute to the general perception that M$ got a blow and Linux and Open Office are becoming a standard part of the IT landscape.

Eyal.

---

(Log in to post comments)