Gates thanks Compaq witness for help over trial

MS on Trial David Boies for the DoJ slowly set up Compaq VP John Rose by asking when he had last met Gates, and how frequently he had been in Redmond-at the end of October 1998, for instance. Rose replied he did not believe he had been there then. Had he spoken to Gates or anyone at Microsoft about the present case, Boies asked. Only to Paul Maritz when he had invited him to testify on Microsoft's side, Rose replied. Rose then produced an email, dated 2 November 1998, in which Gates referred to a 30 October meeting between Compaq and Microsoft. Gates noted: "I thanked Rose for all of his trips to Seattle and his willingness to extract [sic] a lot of time for the lawsuit." Judge Jackson then asked Rose to confirm again that he had not discussed the matter anybody at Microsoft. Rose replied: "That is correct. Nor with any of Microsoft's counsel." Now why would Gates, whose manners are brutish at best, take the unusual step of singling out Rose for thanks in this way? Surely there had not been any improper collusion over the presentation of evidence. Either some mannered human is handling Gates' correspondence, or there is something very fishy going on here. Could it be that Gates was setting up Rose? ® Complete Register trial coverage