The Register has an article

June 28, 2000 5:57 PM

The Register has an article describing how Oracle hired thugs to prove that Micro$oft did indeed back/finance users groups, watchdog groups, and other entities. (found on the Hacker News Network)
posted by Dean_Paxton (4 comments total)

This was a totally boneheaded move on Oracle's part. Anyone who heard what these groups were pumping out, who also possesed half a brain, could figure out where their funding was coming from.
posted by mikewas at 8:07 PM on June 28, 2000

Why was it boneheaded? Does this somehow hurt Oracle's reputation? Everyone who deals with them already knows that Oracle is probably the most thuggish company in the computer industry, so this sort of behavior is par for the course with them. Besides, as it turns out the investigative firm that Oracle hired has also worked for Microsoft and for AOL in the past.
posted by rafeco at 6:51 AM on June 29, 2000

This just cracks me up... Ellison has never been anything but a low-rent, no-class version of Gates, and now he's got the embarrassing revelations to prove it. And as Rafeco pointed out, there's no "Oracle reptuation" to damage, since they're the pond scum of the business software industry. Ellison's pathological desire to beat Gates at any cost ("I'm the richest man in the world and Gates isn't! Uhm... yeah, well, if you only count our software companies...") has forced Oracle down lame-brained paths in the past; obviously, it will continue to do so.
posted by m.polo at 7:18 AM on June 29, 2000

Leave it to Salon to give an alternate take on the situation.

Myself, I just see two rich boneheads butting heads.
posted by solistrato at 8:26 AM on June 29, 2000