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Wednesday, October 16, 2013

An Open Letter to Bill Gates On the Occasion of Downloading OpenOffice


Dear Bill --


For the majority of
My adult life writing
Legal briefs
Business plans
A novel and poems
Of assorted length
You've been my
Constant companion
As uber software vender
And grammatical scold
(in addition to other roles
you sometimes chose)

Long did I chaff under
The yoke of those lines
You insistently served up
Always spewing vermillion
If ever I ran even slightly afoul
Of some grammatical
Stricture you
And Mister Softie
Sought to uphold

When quite suddenly
Thanks to my laptop's
Untimely crashing
Yesterday I found myself
Bereft of further recourse
To the full function and use 
Of what I had previously
Deemed indispensable

But in such mishap
I found greater license
For reward as I'm now
Writing to inform you
Of my immediate withdrawal
From the ranks of the loyal hobbyists 
And assorted others who remain 
Licensees in good standing
Of your copyright
Protected work

As I have declined
To enroll as a member in
Your new software
Subscription scheme
(which by its evergreen 
terms seems more than
a tad overreaching)

Instead I've opted
To download a freeware
Program called
OpenOffice Pro
By which means
From this day forward
I am officially severing all
Legal connection between
You folks in Redmond
And the text of my poems
As henceforth my work
Will be exclusively based
On open source code


Very truly yours,

Joe Lamport

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