IBM/Cognos Got Sweetened Deal from Massachusetts Pols

For all the "open IT" crowd out there disturbed that Microsoft (MSFT) bribed a bunch of Swedish kids into voting for the Open Office XML document format, read the March 10 Boston Globe (possibly only available by subscription other than on the day it ran). As usual, Massachusetts shows you how the big boys play ball. Here's the lead:

"The state inspector general has found that a Canadian software company was improperly awarded a $13 million contract last year in an unusually rushed deal in which House Speaker Salvatore DiMasi had an active interest. At almost every turn, DiMasi, his aides, or his friends played a role in either creating a demand for Cognos ULC's computer software or in pushing Cognos to the head of the bidding field. DiMasi personally met with the state's chief information officer to push for the kind of software that Cognos produces. A middleman in the deal, Joseph Lally, portrayed himself to key state officials as DiMasi's friend. A longtime DiMasi friend, Richard McDonough, was hired as a lobbyist for Cognos and was paid $100,000 by the company."

It goes on from there to allege all kinds of corruption. Open IT types are always talking about the Sun (JAVA)/IBM (IBM) attempt to railroad ODF through the Massachusetts state legislature. Massachusetts quickly saw that its “independent” IT taskforce was run by IBM Global Services on a consulting contract awarded, which was jury rigged by also having Sun appointed to it. Even the Massachusetts legislators, the guys that perfected hardball political machination, were appalled. The ODF standardization ploy never even made it “out of committee.”