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3-Minute Honorarium, Vol. 2, No. 20

A Poke in the Eye of the Most Unfair Justice System on Earth

[scientifically tested to take no longer than 3 minutes to read, unless you've been unfairly singled out by government agents for being too smart]

"Let My People Innovate!" by Billy Bob Gateslovsky
A 3MR Op-Ed

Redmond, WA -- The U.S. Dept. of Justice is going too far trying to stifle the great minds of the Microsoft Corp. with a frivolous antitrust investigation. I am a humble citizen of the hamlet of Redmond, Wash., a fuel-delivery expert by trade (I pump gas at the local Exxon), and I think I speak for the common Everyman when I say, "enough is enough, quit spending tax dollars trying to limit the creativity of our local geniuses!"

Like many of my friends, family and neighbors, I use the Window operating systems to help me surf the Net for oil company news, sports scores, and the Gillian Anderson Testosterone Brigade, of which I am a card-carrying member. When the new Microsoft Internet Explorer No. 4 came out, I spent the happiest four hours of my life downloading it and installing it into my system drive. A group of my cyber-friends are planning to sleep overnight in front of CompUSA, so we can be the first to get Windows 98, the new, innovative operators system.

The Justice Department thinks that Microsoft can't use a browser with it, but that's just plain wrong and oppresses innovation in all forms. I want an operating system that lets me use the Internet, gives me a cable TV guide, checks my system for pirated software, and makes sure I'm flossing regularly. Why can't we let Microsoft do that?

And what's all this talk about Microsoft bugs? As if bugs don't have rights, too. Sure they're tiny, measly beings, but we are all God's creatures. Microsoft bugs have the right to exist just like all their other products.

In summation, I'd like to see more attention paid to murderers, rapists, robbers and bad grammar in ads ("Think Different"?), and less paid to glasses-wearing philanthropists who are just trying to scrape by with some smart people who are helping all of us make life compute. This publication, and others like it, have spent too much space on this issue, and should just leave Microsoft alone and look at monopolies like multinational banks and that Java thing that Sun thinks it owns.

[This message was brought to you by the People For the Ethical Treatment of Overworked Programmers (PETOP), and the Save Our Stock Options campaign.]

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LoveRace 2000(tm)

[each week we'll tell you how wonderful three online ventures are doing: Snap!, HotWired and Slate]

Slate Subscription List Grows Exponentially

The very smart Slate online magazine (owned by Microsoft) has showed its innovation by charging subscriptions while others give away content for free. Slate announced that it has passed the 10,000 milestone in paid subscribers, well on its way to reaching a 20,000 goal in the first few months. With some quick math (10,000 x 19.95/year = $199,950), that means Slate can easily pay for editor Michael Kinsley's calls to the East Coast.

[follow the evil twin of LoveRace, DeathRace 2000, by heading to: http://www.mediawhore.com/deathrace
it may even be updated someday soon!]

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"3-Minute Honorarium" is an irregular advertorial, letting the voice of big business get its say in the marketplace of ideas.

Bill Gates - Editor-in-Chief
Steve Ballmer - Online Editor
Nathan Myhrvold - First Amendment Squelcher

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* The material is the exclusive copyright of Microsoft's Hidden Op-Ed Agenda, the best-kept secret since "The Crying Game."
* Feel free to forward this to three friends or enemies. Some call it a pyramid scheme; we call it distribution.


This e-newsletter is copyright 1998 Mark Glaser

 

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