Rjack <[email protected]> writes: > GNUtians and RMS have blithely blathered and babbled since 1995 that > the GPL and "Copyleft" would destroy Micro$oft.
Care to come up with an actual quote to support that nonsense? The purpose of the GPL as a form of copyleft is to carve out a niche for free software impervious to corporate meddling and software hoarding. RMS has said that he is not going to lend any support to software hoarding practises, as typical for Microsoft. But he never stated that such companies are _dependent_ on him or free software, so destruction of them never was a topic. Instead, people should be freed of their dependence on them. And yes, it is becoming increasingly easier to get along without products from Microsoft. > Micro$oft still owns the personal computer world -- 'nuff said. It's not doing a good job though. For example, my GF has a Windows computer and has not been able to get Wifi going. I have tried quite a bit, and the settings don't stick, stuff does not work with WPA2 and so on and so on. Another housemate also has Windows, and a change of router required complete reconfiguration (also changes between WPA and WPA2). In contrast, my own Ubuntu system asked for the authentication data once. It was not fazed by switches between the routers. It was not fazed by switches between WPA and WPA2. Just for fun, I once plugged in the WLAN USB stick from my GF which was not workable on her Windows system, and it just worked, using the previous authentication data, no question asked. We share a USB printer. I never have any problem using it. Her Windows, however, accumulates "Copy #1", "Copy #2" and similar identical printers when you unplug and replug the printer, and just one of those crazy copies will actually work at any given time. I tend to get thrown off-center by how much worse device support on Windows tends to be nowadays: in a Windows-centric world, it is something that a non-Windows user does not actually expect. The GNU project never set out to create software easier to use than that of Microsoft: the added boon was supposed to be freedom, not usability. It still surprises me if, in spite of vast R&D budgets and usability labs for proprietary systems, free products also end up first in usability. -- David Kastrup _______________________________________________ gnu-misc-discuss mailing list [email protected] http://lists.gnu.org/mailman/listinfo/gnu-misc-discuss
