[WSIS CS-Plenary] commentary UNESCO, Microsoft, convention

[Dr. Francis MUGUET]

Dear Veni & all.

I went to the Microsoft conference at UNESCO, I got parts of the press 
kit and
I have the text of the agreement.
French journalists questions, especially the first one to speak, whom I 
know,
were very critical.

>
> the problem with Microsoft "working" with UNESCO and other 
> UN-organizations, is that it just gives software, calculated at high 
> prices, and thus pretending they are actually investing... 

Yes, it is exactly that :  Bill told it was a one *billion* USD 
"program", among which
 *700* millions USD were "donated" software ( actually, this is not 
really true, in the agreement, it is mentionned
"deeply discounted licence" ) and *300* millions USD were networking, 
computing hardware and training.

I will post more info on this Friday night
I sent by postal mail the agreement to Djilali that might scan it and 
post it, if
UNESCO does not post the agreement on its website.

Best regards.

Francis

>
> Simple trick, but it works.
> Once you have them "infected" and working on Windows, then it's easier 
> to sell them at even higher prices software, when they become 
> ministers, governmental officials, etc.
>
> v.
>
>
> At 09:42 18-11-2004 +0100, Meigs wrote:
>
>>
>> Hi, lisa, Djilali and all
>>
>> Thank you for your very insightful responses. They confirm the fact 
>> that the
>> UN partnerships with the private sector have to be watched carefully, as
>> they may create precedents, within the WSIS framework. They may become
>> standard practice in the name of multistakeholder partnerships, even 
>> if the
>> other partners have not been consulted and have no public say in the 
>> matter
>> at work.
>>
>> It is necessary to assess how Microsoft has framed its offer within 
>> the WSIS
>> goals and how Unesco deals with this and its other commitments (to open
>> software for instance). The actual text of the agreement is available 
>> on the
>> Unesco site, as Francis Muguet informs us, and it is worth checking 
>> on it,
>> so as to consider all the implications.   We can then address crucial 
>> issues
>> of transparency, accountability, etc.
>>
>> However, I still think it should be the task of the "content and 
>> themes "
>> group to draft a response document, but it doesn't prevent us to 
>> include it
>> within the positions of the  Civil Society Finance Mechanism working 
>> group,
>> as suggested by Djilali. What do yo think, karen and Steve, as 
>> co-chairs of
>> the content and themes group?
>>
>> Best
>> Divina,
>
>
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>
>


-- 

------------------------------------------------------ 
Francis F. MUGUET Ph.D 

MDPI Foundation Open Access Journals
Associate Publisher
http://www.mdpi.org   http://www.mdpi.net
muguet at mdpi.org       muguet at mdpi.net

ENSTA   Paris, France
KNIS lab.  Director 
"Knowledge Networks & Information Society" (KNIS)
muguet at ensta.fr   http://www.ensta.fr/~muguet

World Summit On the Information Society (WSIS)
Civil Society Working Groups
Scientific Information :  http://www.wsis-si.org  chair
Patents & Copyrights   :  http://www.wsis-pct.org co-chair
Financing Mechanismns  :  http://www.wsis-finance.org web

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