Romania Jails Ex-Minister Over Microsoft Licenses

Yeah, business has been corrupt since before any of us were born. I worked at a US company that reached an agreement with a foreign government to provide all their systems for their entire government. They were dumping Microsoft, and they were going to move to open source provided by us. It was a huge deal.

So Bill Gates got on a plane and met with the country's leaders. Bill explained to them that since they were buying less product then the country would be considered a lower priority to Microsoft - and shipments of all Microsoft products to the country would be significantly delayed - even for all their non-government businesses. Of course, they couldn't let their businesses be put at such a competitive disadvantage. So the country was extorted to adopt Microsoft products.

The country couldn't say any of this publicly - fearing Microsoft reprisals - but they explained this to us in a private meeting.

People who think that the free market is really free are just naive.