The Ethics of Microsoft

Ethics and Microsoft in the same sentence seems almost oxymoronical no matter what Bill Gates does with his own money. But that's all about to change courtesy of the Mexican Government. That's right, the Mexican Government, that too sounds almost oxymoronical. But thanks to Mexico's new president, Felipe Calderon, the ethical situation of both Microsoft and Mexico are looking up.

In a bid to reduce the terrible crime situation in Mexico the Government is offering a weapons buy-back scheme. Instead of cash, however, the Government is offering Microsoft XBox's in exchange for weapons. The Government is also considering exchanging complete PC's for the more powerful larger weapons, no doubt running one of Microsoft's notorious operating systems.

But will this scheme actually reduce crime? In countries such as the USA, Brittan, and of course Australia it is often argued that video game use actually increases the rates of crime. Those first person shooter (FPS) games have a horrible reputation for promoting violence. You can commit acts in some of those games that many would never conceive of in reality.

It remains to be seen whether this new XBox exchange scheme will reduce any violence within Mexico; maybe it will get even worse! Let's hope that the introduction of violent video games into a society that could not afford to purchase them, in large numbers, previously does not fuel the already raging crime fire.