From: looF lirpA News
Subject: MICROSOFT: Bids to Acquire Catholic Church
Date: Thursday, April 1, 2004 7:16AM
MICROSOFT Bids to Acquire Catholic Church
By Hank Vorjes
VATICAN CITY (AP) -- In a joint press conference in St.
Peter's Square this morning, MICROSOFT Corp. and the
Vatican announced that the Redmond software giant will
acquire the Roman Catholic Church in exchange for an
unspecified number of shares of MICROSOFT common stock. If
the deal goes through, it will be the first time a computer
software company has acquired a major world religion.
With the acquisition, the Pope will become the senior
vice-president of the combined company's new Religious
Software Division, while MICROSOFT Chairman Raymond V.
Gilmartin and CEO Steven A. Ballmer will be invested in the
College of Cardinals, said MICROSOFT Chairman and Chief
Software Architect William H. Gates III (or Sir William of
Redmond as he now prefers to be called).
"We expect a lot of growth in the religious market in
the next five to ten years," said Sir William. "The
combined resources of MICROSOFT and the Catholic Church
will allow us to make religion easier and more fun for a
broader range of people."
Through the MICROSOFT Network, the company's on-line
service, "we will make the sacraments available on-line for
the first time" and revive the popular
pre-Counter-Reformation practice of selling indulgences,
said Gates. "You can get Communion, confess your sins,
receive absolution, keep Windows from Blue Screening --
even reduce your time in Purgatory -- all without leaving
your home."
A new software application, MICROSOFT Church 2004 (code
name Third Horn), will include a macro language which you
can program to download heavenly graces automatically while
you are away from your computer.
An estimated 17,000 people attended the announcement in
St Peter's Square, watching on a 60-foot screen as comedian
Don Novello -- in character as Father Guido Sarducci --
hosted the event, which was broadcast by satellite to 700
sites worldwide and via the Internet using Media Player 666
technology.
The Pope said little during the announcement. When
Novello chided Gates, "Now I guess you get to wear one of
these pointy hats," the crowd roared, but the pontiff's
smile seemed strained.
The deal grants MICROSOFT exclusive electronic rights to
the Bible and the Vatican's prized art collection, which
includes works by such masters as Michelangelo and Da
Vinci. But critics say MICROSOFT will face stiff challenges
if it attempts to limit competitors' access to these key
intellectual properties.
"The Jewish people invented the look and feel of the
holy scriptures," said Rabbi David Gottschalk of
Philadelphia. "You take the parting of the Red Sea -- we
had that thousands of years before the Catholics came on
the scene."
Stung by the criticism, MS "Evangelist" Robert Scoble
said "Wait until Third Horn ships and you run it on a TabletPC."
But others argue that the Catholic and Jewish faiths
both draw on a common Abrahamic heritage. "The Catholic
Church has just been more successful in marketing it to a
larger audience," notes Notre Dame theologian Father
Kenneth Madigan. Over the last 2,000 years, the Catholic
Church's market share has increased dramatically, while
Judaism, which was the first to offer many of the concepts
now touted by Christianity, lags behind.
Historically, the Church has a reputation as an
aggressive competitor, leading crusades to pressure people
to upgrade to Catholicism, and entering into exclusive
licensing arrangements in various kingdoms whereby all
subjects were instilled with Catholicism, whether or not
they planned to use it. Today Christianity is available
from several denominations, but the Catholic version is
still the most widely used. The Church's mission is to
reach "the four corners of the earth," echoing MICROSOFT's
vision of "a computer on every desktop and in every
home".
Gates described MICROSOFT's long-term strategy to
develop a scalable religious architecture that will support
all religions through emulation. A single core religion
will be offered with a choice of interfaces according to
the religion desired -- "One religion, a couple of
different implementations," said Gates.
The MICROSOFT move could spark a wave of mergers and
acquisitions, according to Herb Peters, a spokesman for the
U.S. Southern Baptist Conference, as other churches
scramble to strengthen their position in the increasingly
competitive religious market. Messages left on Linus
Torvalds answering machine asking for comments were not
returned by press time.
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