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Technology Stocks : How high will Microsoft fly? -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Sir Francis Drake who wrote (21584)	4/25/1999 10:34:00 PM
From: Shea Jones	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 74651

I'm not making a big deal out of this, but I think it's still good to be accurate about characterizing the situation. I completely agree that it is important that one be accurate. That's why I take issue with your characterization of events. We have no indication that Maffei instigated lobbying for the Roadrunner position AT ALL. Certainly Maffei has not "publicly" spoken to indicate anything of the sort. In fact, the presence of the veto clause that MAFFEI insisted on in the Roadrunner/MSFT contract would seem to indicate that Maffei certainly wasn't planning any secret lobbying for the RR position or even thinking along those lines. So in short, I don't find your comments that M lobbied for the RR post, or "went to" RR accurate in the least. I further don't consider it logical to state that media attention to a given event indicates anything substantial about a company or CEO's handling of events. What happened here occurs every day in big companies, and in fact has occured many times within MSFT, sometimes with media attention, sometimes without. A company made a move on a highly prized company executive. Through good business sense, company A manages to hold on to the prized company executive. Prized company executive leverages the interest in him to get more of what he wants from his company. Gates may have veto power over Maffei moving to RR, but he doesn't have veto power over Maffei simply getting OUT. If Maffei is unhappy, you can bet he will walk. The reason it is apparent to me that the situation is "well in hand" is because it appears that not only is he not going to walk, but MSFT has responded by indicating that they are going to respond to the leverage. Smart moves all around, good for MSFT, and so good for us, MSFT investors.