eWeek: Lies, Damned Lies and Research Projects: Microsoft & Linux

“People love winners. That’s why we love research reports: They
give us winners. Moreover, that’s why companies will lie, cheat and
steal to win in research reports. And when they can’t do that,
they’ll hire someone to write reports in which they win.

“Lately, Microsoft Corp. has taken to this last course like a
duck to water with a report from Forrester Research that showed
that it’s cheaper to build enterprise applications with Windows and
.Net then it is with Linux and J2EE. Who would have thought that a
report paid for by Microsoft would say anything else?

“Forrester, realizing that this kind of ‘research’ project was
hurting its reputation, has decided to drop out of the ‘paid for,
publicized product comparisons’ business, according to Forrester
CEO George Colony…”

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