Jared,
That is a GOOD one. As for the rest, I haven't found my chemical warfare
suit yet!!
But this is just one more attempt by good old MS to cement their strangle
hold on the PC and PC server market. It seems that MS believes that no Intel
based computer should ever be allowed into the hands of an end user without
first having paid their toll to MS. Is there a problem with a vendor selling a
"naked" PC (namely one with a blank hard drive). Absolutely not. Precisely the
point the anti-monopoly suit was brought, their just once again confirming that
they are a monopoly. Now is there a problem with a "naked" PC getting an
illegal copy of the OS or other commercial software? Yes there is, but that is
also subject to an examination of the facts. If I buy a copy of Win2K for my PC
at home, an upgrade in my case, am I allowed to install that software onto a new
PC that is a replacement for the original? That I would say depends. First is
the original going to stay around with the Win2K still installed? Yes, then
that's wrong, you only have a license for one machine. If no, then that would
depend on the license you agreed to when you purchased the software. The basic
problem here & with the .net system is that MS does not want individuals or
companies to "own" software. They want us to "rent" it meaning more money for
then & less freedom for the consumer. Will .net succeed, I doubt it. The
network bandwidth needed to make that a viable option does not exist today,
especially over the Internet, and there are no plans in the works that I've
heard of to open that up. I know my ISP throws a hissy fit when I try
downloading a 10M file repeatedly. Imagine how much of a fit I'll get when I
have to download Word and all of it's glorious plugins every time I need it?
As for the idea that tech advancement & economics go hand in hand, well I
think that's true to a point. Tech advancement and the military is much more
pervasive. Ask yourself, where did the Internet come from? MilNet was up and
running in a very similar form way before the Internet became more than a mail
man and a scientific tool. TCP/IP was developed for the military, not as a
commercial product but so that data could be safely transmitted from one point
to another on a battlefield. Ever wonder why it's so robust, because
battlefields are electronic nightmares. Rockets came from German support for
science in WWII to carry bombs, not economically advantageous payloads. And a
whole lot of the stuff we take for granted, including that computer in front of
you started out as government sponsored program with a military application in
mind. What kind of torque's me is that we, as taxpayers, paid for the
development of these items once and now we have to pay for them all over again.
As for OSS, sure there's a lot of questionable stuff out there. But there's
a lot of very good stuff as well, stuff that MS would either find of
questionable value or that they could never approach in the first place. I like
OSS as well as "shareware". I've found a lot of very good, reliable, and
scalable software out there that works very well, like UltraEdit and SEE4C. The
first is a programmers editor, the latter an SMTP library. It's actually gotten
to the point that I look to these sources as a first before looking to the
commercial world.
Dick Goulet
____________________Reply Separator____________________
Author: Jared Still <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Date: 5/6/2001 12:20 AM
On Sunday 06 May 2001 00:30, Paul Drake wrote:
>
> But - isn't the consumer - who is able to make intelligent,
> well-informed choices in a competitive marketplace - "the boss"?
> uh - the consumer isn't intelligent?
Does this include users and induhviduals? ;)
For a visually humorous take on this:
http://ars.userfriendly.org/cartoons/?id=20010506
Jared
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