MicrosoftCampusAgreementSaga

If it weren't for the fact that i was trying to write a paper, I would have relished the opportunity to track down the elusive information.

I was trying to write a paper on Microsoft licensing -- ethics, etc.. for my ComputerScience99 class. And somehow I thought that I could get some information from Dartmouth about the MicrosoftCampusAgreement that we had at our college.

But as I tried asking different people, I kept on getting the same answers: Dartmouth (well, ComputingServices) wasn't going to share that information with me. Somehow, even though my tution went to pay for the license, I wasn't allowed to know how much the College spent on that license or the exact details of the licensing scheme.

When I was told that "I am not able to disclose more information on our contractual agreements than is available on the web site" by RitaMurdough?, Director of Computing Support and Fiscal Services, I was disappointed. Not with her -- she's probably just toeing the party line -- but with Dartmouth's policy to withold information from its students.

I should note that Microsoft has been trying to keep the terms of their licensing policies secret (for whatever reason -- perhaps so that MS can charge more money to certain schools). Although Dartmouth may have other reasons for witholding information, it appears that they are following MS's wishes completely...

But what you really want to see is the correspondance between me and employees of the College. So here you go:

(these are listed in chronological order)

My first email to BillBrawley. (JoeHill is a friend of mine who works in ComputingServices).

Date: 27 Jan 2003 23:33:12 EST
From: Robinson P. Tryon (make list)
Subject: MS Campus Agreement?
To: William D. Brawley (Verbose)

hi,

Joe Hill and I gave you a call a couple of weeks back asking about the MS Campus 
Agreement.

I'm currently writing a paper for my computer science course, and I was trying to 
find out some more specifics about the Campus Agreement, including the overall cost  
and the actual content of the agreement.

You could email information directly to me, or email/send information to Joe (his 
HB is #6223).

thanks,
--Robinson

I didn't hear anything back from Brawley for a few days, so I emailed JoeHill on the 31st -- just to see if he had heard anything.

Date: 31 Jan 2003 15:38:14 EST
From: Robinson P. Tryon (make list)
Subject: Campus Agreement?
To: Joseph L. Hill (Verbose)

have you heard anything back from Bill Brawley about this?

Then, later that day I got a reply back from Brawley. Unfortunately BillBrawley didn't seem to know anything more than what was on the website.

Date: Fri, 31 Jan 2003 16:26:04 -0500
From: Bill Brawley  (make list)
Subject: Re: MS Campus Agreement?
To: Dogmatix@Dartmouth.EDU (Dogmatix) (Verbose)
Cc: Joseph Hill 

Robinson:

Sorry, but I won't be able to answer your questions. All the info I
have is on that store web page. Sorry.

Bill

On Monday, January 27, 2003, at 11:33 PM, Robinson P. Tryon wrote:

> hi,
>
> Joe Hill and I gave you a call a couple of weeks back asking about the
> MS Campus Agreement.
>
> I'm currently writing a paper for my computer science course, and I
> was trying to find out some more specifics about the Campus Agreement,
> including the overall cost and the actual content of the agreement.
>
> You could email information directly to me, or email/send information
> to Joe (his HB is #6223).
>
>
> thanks,
> --Robinson

Undeterred, and fresh on the trail of the elusive information, I blitzed back. Surely someone knew something about the Agreement, right? I mean, we have a receipt or something somewhere, right? :-)

Date: 31 Jan 2003 16:35:20 EST
From: Robinson P. Tryon (make list)
Subject: Re: MS Campus Agreement?
To: William D. Brawley (Verbose)

> Robinson:
>
> Sorry, but I won't be able to answer your questions. All the info I
> have is on that store web page. Sorry.
>
> Bill

hi,

Thanks for looking into the Campus Agreement for me. It's okay that you don't 
have any more information. But thanks for looking into it!

Do you have the name of someone who could give me more information about the 
Campus Agreement?

I really don't know who to ask, but perhaps I could email Larry Levine (he's 
the head of Computing at Dartmouth, right?).

thanks again,
--Robinson

Brawley blitzed back and told me to talk to RitaMurdough?. The plot thickened, and although my paper was due that day, I continued to investigate the Campus Agreement. Even though I turned in my paper, I wanted to get this information for further revisions.

Date: Fri, 31 Jan 2003 16:53:35 -0500
From: Bill Brawley  (make list)
Subject: Re: MS Campus Agreement?
To: Dogmatix@Dartmouth.EDU (Dogmatix) (Verbose)

The responsible party is Rita Murdoch, Director of Fiscal and Auxiliary
Services. She reports to Larry. She told Joe and me that what's on that
page is as much as she's willing to discuss.

Good luck!

Bill

On Friday, January 31, 2003, at 04:35 PM, Robinson P. Tryon wrote:

> Do you have the name of someone who could give me more information
> about the Campus Agreement?
>
> I really don't know who to ask, but perhaps I could email Larry Levine
> (he's the head of Computing at Dartmouth, right?).

So I set my sights on RitaMurdough?. Hopefully she'd have some more answers for me....

Date: 31 Jan 2003 17:03:26 EST
From: Robinson P. Tryon (make list)
Subject: MS Campus Agreement
To: Rita T. Murdoch (Verbose)

hello,

I have been trying to find out more information about the Microsoft Campus 
Agreement at Dartmouth for a paper I am writing for my computer science class (cs99).

I was recently corresponding with Bill Brawley, but unfortunately he didn't 
have any more information than what was present on "the webpage"

(I'm assuming he meant the webpage here: 
http://www.dartmouth.edu/~store/sales/mscampus.html)

Mr. Brawley gave me your name and mentioned that you might have more information 
about the particulars of our campus agreement, including the overall cost.

thanks,
--Robinson

So I waited over the weekend, but I didn't get a reply back by Tuesday, so I blitzed her back.

Date: 04 Feb 2003 02:58:39 EST
From: Robinson P. Tryon (make list)
Subject: MS Campus Agreement information
To: Rita T. Murdoch (Verbose)

hi,

I wanted to make sure that you got the email I sent out last Friday about 
Dartmouth's MS Campus Agreement.

I'm working on a paper for my cs99 course, and I've been trying to get a 
bit more information on the Microsoft Campus Agreement that is talked about 
on the dartmouth website here:

http://www.dartmouth.edu/~store/sales/mscampus.html

Bill Brawley mentioned that you might know more about the details of the Campus 
Agreement.

I hope that you'll be able to get back to me soon, because of the importance of 
this information to my paper.

sincerely,
--Robinson Tryon

Estimating the employee count of the college at 1000, I figured that I could get bounced from person to person for at least 3 years if I got and sent 1 email per day. Therefore, I applied some ParallelComputing? principles and decided to ask two people for the information -- that way I'd be twice as likely to get an answer.

Lary Levine (Director of ComputingServices) could probably give me the information I wanted.

Date: 06 Feb 2003 17:33:34 EST
From: Robinson P. Tryon (make list)
Subject: Microsoft Campus Agreement
To: Lawrence M. Levine (Verbose)

hi,

I'm an '03 CS student working on a paper for my CS99 course.

I've been trying to get some more information on the Microsoft Campus Agreement
that is referenced on the Dartmouth website here:

http://www.dartmouth.edu/~store/sales/mscampus.html

Any help you could give would be greatly appreciated.

thanks,

--Robinson Tryon

Then the next day, I got an email back from Rita explaining how she was "not able to disclose more information on ... contractual agreements". Although I was a bit miffed, it sounded like she had nothing to do with the policy. I needed to go higher up the chain of command.

Date: 07 Feb 2003 09:34:53 EST
From: Rita T. Murdoch (make list)
Subject: Re: MS Campus Agreement information
To: Robinson P. Tryon (Verbose)

Robinson,

I am not able to disclose more information on our contractual agreements than 
is available on the web site. Sorry not to be of more help.

Rita T. Murdoch
Director, Computing Support and Fiscal Services
Dartmouth College
6028 Baker/Berry, Room 229
Hanover, N.H. 03755
603-646-2662, voice
603-646-2810, fax

So I plugged away and sent her a response:

Date: 07 Feb 2003 10:48:52 EST
From: Robinson P. Tryon (make list)
Subject: Re: MS Campus Agreement information
To: Rita T. Murdoch (Verbose)

> I am not able to disclose more information on our contractual
> agreements than is available on the web site. Sorry not to be of
> more help.

hi,

thanks for the reply.

I'm really quite interested in the specifics of the Campus Agreement, and I 
am wondering if there is a way that I could petition Computing Services or 
the College to release that information.

Is it a policy of the College or a stipulation of the MS Agreement that 
information on contracts remain secret?

I understand the responsibility of Dartmouth to protect information concerning 
individuals of the Dartmouth community, but as undergraduate tution pays (at 
least in part) for the licensing, it only seems fair that we understand the 
details of a product that our money went to buy....

thanks again,
--Robinson Tryon

... and that's all the information I have so far.

Current Status

I have pending emails (I sent to LarryLevine and RitaMurdough?), which hopefully will give me information and/or leads.

End Result

Hopefully someone will agree to give me information (eventually). If they promise to give me information on the condition that I not share it with the rest of Dartmouth, I will have to refuse. Unless they have a very good reason (I can't think of a single reason right now) for keeping this secret, I will continue to ask for access to the details of the MS Campus Agreement

-- Robinson Tryon

RobinsonTryon - 07 Feb 2003