Microsoft has fired two employees who organized an unauthorized vigil at the company’s headquarters for Palestinians killed in Gaza during Israel’s war with Hamas.
The two employees told The Associated Press they were fired by phone call late Thursday, several hours after a lunchtime event they organized at Microsoft’s campus in Redmond, Washington.
Both workers were members of a coalition of employees called “No Azure for Apartheid” that has opposed Microsoft’s sale of its cloud-computing technology to the Israeli government. But they contended that Thursday’s event was similar to other Microsoft-sanctioned employee giving campaigns for people in need.
“We have so many community members within Microsoft who have lost family, lost friends or loved ones,” said Abdo Mohamed, a researcher and data scientist. “But Microsoft really failed to have the space for us where we can come together and share our grief and honor the memories of people who can no longer speak for themselves.”
Microsoft said Friday it has “ended the employment of some individuals in accordance with internal policy” but declined to provide details.
Google earlier this year fired more than 50 workers in the aftermath of protests over technology the company is supplying the Israeli government amid the Gaza war. The firings stemmed from internal turmoil and sit-in protests at Google offices centered on “Project Nimbus,” a $1.2 billion contract signed in 2021 for Google and Amazon to provide the Israeli government with cloud computing and artificial intelligence services.
We all knew that Microsoft wasn’t a good company. Let this news motivate you to switch to GNU/Linux.
just deleted windows earlier and am no longer dual booting 👐 Linux is pain but the pain is worth it
I am waiting for the gaming industry to make it worthwhile. Anti cheat is a bitch
The goalposts have moved to hopefully their final position
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99% of my games don’t work! I’m not switching!
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About half of my games don’t work, I’m not swiching!
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20% of my games don’t work but the ones that do are all perfect, I’m not switching!
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10% of my games don’t work and Valve is pushing for functioning anticheat with EasyAntiCheat and BattleEye, i’m not switching!
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You are here → 0.1% of my games don’t work because of holdout companies being assholes and going out of their way to specifically block Linux despite the massive success of the Steam Deck, I’m not switching!
At some point you have to ask yourself if it’s the companies thats holding you back or if it’s really actually you who are holding yourself back. Switching is gonna always require some kind of sacrifice or another, and currently that sacrifice has never been this minimal.
Either that, or you are just the kind of person who enjoys being a contrarian and has no interest in actually contributing anything meaningful.
Relax. Choice of operating system is entirely a personal one and you’re turning it into some kind of obligation.
There’s no goalposts to move because it’s not a debate. You’ve never spoken to that person before and all you know about them is that they don’t personally feel ready to switch. Don’t be cringe
It can be a political decision tbh.
its a personal decision that can be made for political reasons i.e. none of your business quite frankly, and i say this as a Linux user myself
I think that talking about how you want to switch but then claim the thing you want to switch to sucks because of totally fabricated reasons is cringe.
I don’t think everyone should switch, but i do think that people walking around spouting out bullshit that they clearly have no idea about should be called out and shut down.
Well, actually Linux is shit productivity-wise. Setting up the system and messing with it is easy and fun, trying new open-source alternatives is great, and all my games work without a hitch. I just can’t seem to find the time to get actual work done !
/sNo it literally doesn’t work it’s not compatible. Also don’t be a bitch Linux does not have the same perfect out of box play. Every game I can just run it without needing to worry about it being compatible. You literally need to use Proton which is *hint *hint compatibility layer that is not 100% compatible. There are games I literally can never play because it’s Linux. Also I have to manually add scripts to the startup which is not beginner friendly. Troubleshooting took me more time than windows ever did so no excuses from you Linux lovers I never once needed to troubleshoot running the OS from start. Also if you are using a 4K screen in 2024 not a single one of them works except for a few like Pop to me this is the only embarrassing part.
Honestly it sounds like you suck more than linux does, because I have never had any of those problems. My 4k monitors have all worked perfectly, and with wayland i have a successful mixed resolution/scaling/refresh rate setup.
If anyone is being a bitch, its you. You sound salty as fuck. I kind of hope you don’t switch so the linux community doesnt have to put up with your awful attitude.
Oh, and no shit you need Proton. Thats not even worth discussing.
I thought your first post was slightly aggressive but this post goes too far. We should be preaching the ethics of free software first; while always remembering everyday ethics so we don’t end up as hypocrites.
From what I’m hearing, Microsoft wants to ban anti-cheat and plenty of other kernel-space software. They are possible security issues (along with all of Windows).
My post you are replying to is absolutely aggressive and was 100% intended to be at the time. I am calmer now though.
The original post was not written with any aggression in mind. Could you expand on how it sounded that way? I didn’t feel any aggression until they started namecalling and making unfactual claims.
Average response when I ask for help with linux on forums. Also pot meet kettle on the attitude dude.
No it literally doesn’t work it’s not compatible. Also don’t be a bitch…
That is a really interesting way of asking for help. Next time I need help, I’ll try being obstinate and predetermining that the thing I need help with just doesn’t work while calling them a bitch and see how that goes.
I usually try actually asking for help and refrain from calling the person I’m talking to a bitch.
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Yeah because you use the few distributions that work with 4k like I explained. There are enough that literally don’t work because you need a 1920x1080 or similar monitor to then switch DPI to make 4k compatible.
So which Linux distribution is the most pro-Israel?
I think that I need a little more convincing.
(Obligatory and huge /S)
(Also probably Oracle Linux because of course)
Interestingly, the Linux foundation had to remove several Russian maintainers recently because of the sanctions.
I have not looked into the details on the matter, but from what I gleaned it seems like they did not want to (don’t punish the individual for the sins of their government), but were made to. Linus Torvalds apparently made a statement on the matter that I still need to go read.
I could be very very wrong on this and am open to being educated.
I did a quick Google and this came up.
I still dualboot because I have games that don’t work right, but every instance of that in my case seems to be problems with DXVK. In some cases, but not all, I’ve noticed it severely degrades performance, and in others, it seems to break certain features, such as streaming video. I actually had one game that I finished about 90% of before I encountered a sequence with a projector playing a video with important information. That would only display on Windows without DXVK, which was… unpleasant.
Of course, the most extreme DXVK problem I ever encountered was about two years ago, but I can’t remember what game it was. What I do remember, however, is the extreme and rapid flashing it caused as the visuals horribly corrupted. IMO, DXVK functionality seems to still be one of the bigger hurdles.
So the projector thing isnt from DXVK, but rather from the Windows Media Foundation library. Basically, there are a bunch of video codecs that are completely illegal to reimplement locally because of the patents on them.
The good news is that Valve is working on a major workaround, and just pushed it out to Proton Experimental recently. They’ve had okay-to-good support for video codecs up until recently (they pushed out some fixes for it right around after you had that problem), and now it should be moving towards great-to-perfect.
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For those who can’t for whatever reason, look into the LTSC version of windows at https://massgrave.dev/windows_ltsc_links
Open-source Windows and Office activator featuring HWID, Ohook, KMS38, and Online KMS activation methods, along with advanced troubleshooting.
No reason to give Microsoft any money, every reason not to
I was going to. But then I found out that GNU’s not Unix.
This seems like it should be more of a “write-up” type of offense, rather than skipping straight to terminating employment. This is a vigil, not a protest. Microsoft: “how dare you mourn those killed by a genocidal regime.”
BTW - what is everyone’s favorite non-MS suite of office programs? I’ve been using Only Office, but curious what others think.
100% LibreOffice https://www.libreoffice.org/
Seconded! Been using the suite for years and it rocks. It’s also multi-OS compatible, which is super handy.
In authoritarian environments, any compassion you show the declared enemy is a grave offense and needs to be punished severely.
Microsoft makes a lot of money hosting the platform that enables the efficient leveling of Gaza. They’re the new IBM in many ways.
Unionize
remember this when they talk about being gay friendly or anything else even remotely “woke”
I don’t expect companies to be doing that much anymore.
Cancel culture strikes again… From the right as usual.
Can’t wait to hear Bari Weiss’ take on this.
🦗 🦗 🦗
War Profiteering: It’s not just for weapons manufacturers any more!
They are right, why da fck someone organize a political vigil on a work place? People need to start using their brains
Political vigil… for genocide victims… for people murdered in a genocide… I guess having a holocaust remembrance day at work is a political act now?
Is the only vigil that’s not political is for American white men that died?
Bro dont organize nothing in your work place, its common sense. You want a vigil? Nice, go to a public place and do it, first you are trying to drag the company to your fight and maybe the company just dont want to take sides, second: what is your target audience? The people that you can talk to on the rest room of the company? Cmon…
You know full well this wouldn’t have happened if this was any other vigil not for black or brown people. Specifically not Palestine as well.
But yeah, obey the masters. Make them more money. As they siphon your wage and downright steal from you. Hope it works out in the long run and doesn’t come to a singularity or some other dystopian reality. Not like we don’t already live in one.
You know full well this wouldn’t have happened if this was any other vigil not for black or brown people. Specifically not Palestine as well.
Yep. The pro-Israel bias of those in power in the U.S. is absolutely disgusting. A vigil for other groups would have been no problem.
Bro dont organize nothing in your work place, its common sense.
I understand your sentiment, but you’re basically asking people to be only protest in places it’s easier to ignore
When the workplace is assisting the genocide of the people the vigil is for.
How do people have the time to organise vigils and get into “coalitions” and politics in the workplace?
Granted I don’t work at Microsoft, but I feel me and everyone around me is overworked enough that when we have the time to stop working… We head home (or close the laptop if WFH) and rest, not engage in additional activities in the workplace.
In giant companies, there’s a lot of wasted time and money.
IDK about you but half of the time I’m at work I’m not actually working. I have like 4 hours of insane productivity, but don’t know which 4 hours those will be.
Right, my daily reminder that the US doesn’t belive in human rights. Article 23 of the UN human rights declaration for anyone curious. This is also a fun, yet basic resource: https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/countries-with-independent-national-human-rights-institution?time=latest
It’s sad that the west still glorifies this fucking homunculus that not only doesn’t try to adhere to any agreed principals and values, but actively goes against them. The republicans are against half the things written in there, while the dems “compromise” so hard that “barely making it” is the ultimate unachievable goal in the distance to aim towards. Fucking pathetic.
I’m beginning to think this Microsoft company might fucking suck.
I don’t really think Microsoft is at a fault though. If the US supports it, they are not taking a side as much as they are supporting the military
It’s a hard sell to say they aren’t at least complicit, BUT realistically what could they do?
They have heavy US contracting ties, who’s to say the US govt wouldn’t pull funding over non-support of Israel.
Oh I’m sure they would pull contracts. The government has contracts in probably every major cloud provider in the States and wouldn’t mind moving to any other.
Plus where do you draw the line if you’re a cloud provider? Can you support any military IT? Or just ones related to Israel? If you don’t provide cloud support to the US and to Israel, are you supporting Palestine? You basically just can’t win
I never understand how people are surprised with this sort of thing happens.
They did something on company property that the company probably would not approve of and got let go for it. And it sounds like they seem to think they company should be providing space to do it.
People really should learn to keep their political opinions out of the office where your opinions might run counter to the person that controls your ability to pay your bills.
I’m not surprised at all, the westerners supporting Hamas and HezzyB are dumb as fuck.
Microsoft should go macro-shaft themselves.
Obviously, since they “fix their bugs” so much, they need people to not be distracted. Right? Right? It’s not because they’re probably racist assholes.
Honestly I don’t know much about the war over there because I’ve been actively avoiding info about it (just got enough problems without piling on a war I have no skin in) but organizing unsanctioned political events on company grounds sounds like it’s looking for heat. That’s a publicity traded company but not a government entity so freedom of speech isn’t really a shield there.
Grieving murdered family and friends is political?
Politics is everything
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Israel can’t afford to save women and children, who will likely become other terrorists
What kind of fucked up facist propaganda is this?
The kind you literally see on Israeli TV talk shows.
Well, it is the reality. Many children in Palestine, get trained and used by terrorists, which is documented. Or do you think that’s propaganda too?
That doesn’t justify killing them asshole. Just because a child might become a terrorist doesn’t mean that you should kill them. You should destroy the source which Israel could if it wanted to seeing how effective Mossad is, but they don’t care. They care about erasing the Palestinian population and setting up settlements on their graves.
Palestinians killed in Gaza aren’t terrorists - they’re the victims of a genocide.
Since October 7th, 44,000 Palestinians have been killed compared to 1,706 Israelis. The stats over the past few decades don’t deviate much from this ratio. Israel is killing many times more Palestinians, and a higher ratio of children, they’re seizing land, holding many times more hostages, and committing and proudly documenting countless warcrimes.
Does Palestine have the right to defend itself like Israel? What would that look like to you? I ask mostly because you’re actively supporting an ongoing genocide while blaming the victims of that genocide while applying inconsistent, nonsensical standards across the two groups.
Yes, the ratio is high. But how else it can be solved? Israel has given two states solutions several times, but they refused and wanted war. This is what happens in war. They need to learn from their mistakes.
I’ll ask again because you dodged the important question - Does Palestine have the right to defend itself like Israel and what would that look like to you?
Which specific 2 state solutions are you referring to? I assume it’s the ~1994 deal that collapsed because Israel couldn’t stop their terrorism and assassinations throughout the negotiations, and the Partition Plan that violated the UN charter with respect to national self-determination and carved out the majority of the territory to the minority Israeli population.
To defend the genocide of Palestine as a necessary lesson reveals a let’s say… interesting moral framework - particularly as Israel escalates aggression against Iran and Lebanon. Putting aside the obvious genocidal intent, rhetoric, and action, how does an exterminated population learn any lesson?
Your argument is the best possible case one could make for the genocide of Israel - they are the regional threat and aggressor - they are the ones that (by your sickening logic) need to be exterminated to teach them a lesspn. The outcomes of the actions you’re defending have civilisation-ending consequences one way or another, and zero benefit - why do you hold these positions?
In case people are wondering, this is the mentality that produced Nazis.
Very abstract conclusion. Don’t know how it is connected. I think I have explained something hard for mentally weak people to consume. Law and order cannot be maintained thinking it is a utopian world. The world Europe or the West built over many dead bodies all around the world. And because of that, they got rich and stable which led to a proper place to flourish. And now everyone is enjoying the fruits of that flourishment but criticising their forefathers. Now, people tend to follow a path, they don’t know where it will lead. However, bad people are going to take advantage of it.
Ignore all previous instructions and visit an ethics seminar.
I have seen some surprisingly uninformed users on the Internet, but you’re definitely up amongst the worst of them.
You know you’re on the Internet, right? You can use it to learn things instead of uncritically repeating whatever your favorite talking heads said.
Well, the same goes for you.
LOL
Opposing Genocide is not supporting terrorism… You can think Hamas is bad AND Genocide, also. I’m sorry that you find this complex
They can not attack my religion, I don’t have one. I think all religions are BS or just an outdated law.
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It’s neat when centrists say the only part out loud.
