Art rock legend Brian Eno, who’s been in cahoots with Microsoft for a cool three decades, is calling them out on their shady dealings with the Israeli government. He’s basically telling them to cut ties because their cloud and AI services to Israel’s Ministry of Defense are helping out a regime that’s allegedly up to some pretty terrible stuff. According to Eno, this whole situation with Israel has been described as genocidal by legit legal scholars, human rights orgs, UN experts, and even a bunch of governments around the globe.
Eno, who famously whipped up the Windows 95 boot-up jingle that’s now apparently a big deal at the US Library of Congress, spilled the tea in an open letter on Instagram. He said he was all about the creative challenge when he took on the Windows 95 gig, but he never thought he’d see the day when Microsoft would be caught up in all this oppression and war stuff. The company’s statement on their tech services in Israel and Gaza didn’t really help their case either, ’cause they admitted to providing Israel’s Ministry of Defense with some tech goodies, but then turned around and said they don’t actually know how it’s being used. Classic case of “I don’t know, I don’t wanna know.”
Eno’s not buying any of it, though. He’s basically saying that selling fancy AI and cloud services to a government that’s knee-deep in ethnic cleansing isn’t just another day at the office—it’s straight-up complicity. He’s calling on Microsoft to hit pause on any services that might be aiding and abetting violations of international law. And hey, he’s not alone in this fight. There are some brave Microsoft employees who’ve put their jobs on the line to speak out against the company’s ties to the Israeli military. Some got the boot, but the protests keep on coming. Not sure what’ll happen to those rebellious employees, but it’s definitely making some waves.
So, Eno’s throwing down the gauntlet and asking all the artsy, tech-savvy, music-loving folks out there to stand with him. And get this—he’s even putting his money where his mouth is. The cash he raked in for that Windows 95 startup sound? Yeah, that’s going straight to help the victims of the Gaza attacks. If a simple sound can make a difference, then why the heck not, right? Let’s make some noise, people.
