Micro$oft as usual is conducting international software competition whose theme is based on its latest technology Multi Point. As an influence, the Nepalese Micro$oft society is conducting a similar type of competition based on same theme Multi Point and have given their best effort to localize it (Even named the competition BahuBindu).

Micro$oft has left no loop holes in their publicities as their die heart followers (M$P’s) continue to convince every single student to take part in the competition. After researching some more about such competitions being held in Nepal, I found that this was the second of its type being conducted by Micro$oft and its sister organization.

Previous year, I remember some man representing M$ running through college to college convincing students to take part in the software competition named “The Leading Edge” whose theme was cloud computing and localization. I remember hundreds of our friends registering to take part in the competition. The winner of the competition was promised an Xbox 360. But ever since I have never heard any news of the competition being held nor anyone being awarded Xbox 360.

Ever since this competition, I found that Micro$oft favorable activities have grown in the society like appointing a or two community leader/s from each college(M$P). Their main objective was to clear the student’s brain with their mind blasting (Note: not mind blowing, mind blasting) technologies. Students have been given access to Legal copies of Micro$oft softwares. When I dug deep into the issue, I figured it out that this was a policy to overcome their great loss in Europe. They are creating a developer’s base. In the coming years maybe 4-5 years, Micro$oft is going to corner all the government and other organization(not only in Nepal but also in other IT developing countries), forcing them to either buy a legal copy of Micro$oft or switch to an Open Source alternatives. With programmer base being low for opensource alternatives and lacking local support, the government and other organization will have no other option than buying Legal copy. This way they can overcome their losses. Moreover, the license copy that we obtain through Micro$oft’s so called Academic Alliance cannot be used for bussiness purpose. The software that are developed using those licensed copy cannot be sold.

Now back to the software competition, I don’t even remember any of my friend being provided the certificates. Now through Multi Point they are again trying to boost their reach. They are even charging the student’s to take part on the competition. When inquired, one of the guys related to Micro$oft said that they use the approach “We are Micro$oft, we never give anything for free.” Last year my friends wasted their Rs. 75, registering for the competition, some of them giving their valuable time and effort but no response for the Micro$oft software competition committee.

Maybe this year too they are just using the competition as a means to boost their reach. These are all my analytical view regarding Micro$oft Multipoint challange (BahuBindu) and its policies regarding not only Nepal but all the IT developing countries.

Your open views are highly welcome.