p2pnet.net News:- Microsoft is suing Google for tempting away Kai-Fu Lee, a man Bill Gates saw as an important component in his on-going efforts to woo China, and who Google clearly sees in the same light.

“Microsoft said in the suit that Lee is deeply familiar with its confidential business and technological strategies, not only in the search business but also in China," says the Seattle Post-Intelligencer. "Microsoft accused Google of ‘intentionally assisting’ Lee in the alleged violation of his contract."

Lee’s new job at Google, leading an research-and-development center in China, “violates terms of his employment contract that keep him from working in a directly competitive position for a year after his departure,” says the story.

Microsoft ceo Bill Gates is so keen to get it on with the world’s largest remaining communist state that he’s allowing his company to perform as a censor. Surfers on Microsoft’s new China portal are forbidden to use the words ‘democracy’ and ‘freedom’ or the phrase ‘human rights’ while MSN China works with the state-funded Shanghai Alliance Investment Ltd (SAIL).

Google News China edition, in turn, blocked news from within China.

"For users inside the People’s Republic of China, we have chosen not to include sources that are inaccessible from within that country," it blogged.

Meanwhile, "Google is fully aware of Lee’s promises to Microsoft, but has chosen to ignore them, and has encouraged Lee to violate them," the suit alleges.

Microsoft, Yahoo! and Google have all been hiring senior engineers from academia, the Mozilla open source project and each other, says PC Pro, going on:

"As projects become larger, the search for talent becomes ever more acute. This week at the Microsoft Faculty Summit, Bill Gates said he was ‘very worried’ about the lack of talented computer science graduates. He noted that ‘ Microsoft is trying to hire every great college graduate who has basic computer science skills and we think is highly talented. When I sit down and review projects here inside the company, the topic that always comes up is how is the hiring going?’ This is a situation likely to be happening in large software companies across the world."

Interestingly, Lee worked for Apple, for six years, "most recently as vp of the company’s interactive media group which developed QuickTime, QuickDraw 3D, QuickTime VR and PlainTalk speech technologies," says Microsoft, going on:

"Prior to his position at Apple, he was an assistant professor at Carnegie Mellon University, where he developed the world’s first speaker-independent continuous speech-recognition system. While at Carnegie Mellon, Lee also developed the world-champion computer program that plays the game "Othello" and that defeated the human world champion in 1988."

Something you think we should know? tips[at]p2pnet.net

See:-
Seattle Post-Intelligencer – Microsoft sues Google over executive, July 20, 2005
perform as a censor – Microsoft as China censor, p2pnet, June 17, 2005
blogged – Google on China censorship, p2pnet. October 1, 2005
PC Pro – Microsoft sues Google, July 20, 2005

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