Microsoft: The Gatekeeper of the Internet

jeffy124 writes "C|net News.com is embarking on a seven day comprehensive report on how Microsoft is moving themselves into position to be The Gatekeeper Of The Internet through Windows XP. The first installment explains the basics of how this is going to happen: Reminders that last for days encouraging users to sign up for Passport, and how Windows will evenutally resemble services like AOL."

Comments

Microsoft's Future

[jwilhelm]

I think that Microsoft's future, once they have their whole .NET and Passport thing set up, will ride on whether they can provide the security that they claim to be able to provide. It's possible that people will sign up and use the service, but I think that the very second that they have a security breach, and information leaks out, people will stop taking them seriously, and they will be doomed.

Re:Microsoft's Future

[cbowland]

I think that is very optimistic considering the public's history with MS. MS products have repeated proven themselves to be very vulnerable to security breaches and yet there is little consumer backlash. Having the dominant position in the marketplace makes it very difficult for the ordinary user to switch away from MS regardless of any security problems.

Re:Microsoft's Future

[tomknight]

I'm afraid I just don't agree with you. Peple are used to security breaches, they happen all the time. I'm not just talking about the Swiss-cheese IIS, but other companies who aren't able to run their own systems securely, from banks which make data avaiable to the wrong people, to online retailers which leave sensitive data on unsecure webservers.

Okay, a breach would damage their rep a little, and some people would stop using the service, but I think the majorty would just accept the failure as a temporary glitch and continue to use their services.

Tom.

Re:Microsoft's Future

[cloudmaster]

I wish that wasn't insightful, but it's true. :( Stupid real world, not working the way it theoretically should...

Re:Microsoft's Future

[ackthpt]

Consumer tolerance of MS flaws and holes is about equililent to finding a razor blade in every 5th box of one brand of cereal and continuing to buy it, under the assumption that eventually they'll figure out how those things get in there and you'll no longer need a glass of Bactine at the ready on your breakfast table.

Thought: Microsoft as Gatekeeper... well, everyone already knows worms can tunnel under a gate, how fitting.

Re:Microsoft's Future

[xmedar]

From this bit -

Mission: Domination of the Internet

In the second through sixth attempts to connect to the Net, Windows XP will implore consumers to sign up for something called Passport--an identification technology that, in many ways, is a key to Microsoft's future.

Maybe that shows how reluctant people will be to sign up as is not compelling enough for them to sign up at the 1st opportunity.

If Microsoft is successful, Windows XP will eventually resemble an online service like America Online, which runs on top of Windows and other operating systems. That would allow consumers to bypass AOL and other rivals altogether, essentially turning Windows into a one-stop destination that combines AOL-like services with easy access to Microsoft desktop products such as Word and Excel.

I can't ever see M$ ever running anything on a platform other than Windows. As for combining with AOL like services, well AOL has been doing that for many many years, M$ is far behind in the game, and remember AOL has ~30million users against a total Net population of >600million, having a 5% global market share is not what I would call stunning.

Through HailStorm, recently renamed .Net My Services, Microsoft envisions offering consumers and businesses a consistent set of information and services to any devices, whether they be personal computers, handheld devices or cellular phones--often at a cost to the receiver, the provider or both.

Anyone remember "Windows everywhere"? Or the cliams that COM would be running on a large number of platorms? They failed and this will too, as I said above M$ will only do this on Windows, it might licence someone to do a half asses port like with COM and use that to claim cross platform capability.

Many people would welcome the convenience of a reasonably secure mechanism that would instantly find whomever and whatever they were looking for online while allowing them to use various sites and services with a single password entered only once.

Oh yes, I and millions of others really want to hand over my credit card and other details to a reasonably secure system, just like I want to be running ISS and get hit with CR or Nimda. Of course Passport will store more than just CC details so expect there to be cases of identity theft, can you imagine tens of thousands, or hundreds of thousands of people having to cope with having their identities stolen and used in fraudulent activities? How much might this cost the economies of the world? More than the WTC bombing? Ten times more?

In an interview with CNET News.com this summer, Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates adamantly defended his company's right to evolve Windows with new features to meet market demand. "Our customers do want us to make Windows richer and more reliable," he said. "So Microsoft's commitment is to add features that customers want. If we can't add any features, then what is Windows?"

Gates questioned why AOL has not received as much criticism as Microsoft for bundling products and services. "Has AOL ever added any new features to their products?" he asked rhetorically. "They have dominant market share of all their stuff. They actually added features? Unbelievable! Who are these people adding features? What's going on here? Well, what's going on is that the PC industry is the most competitive industry that has ever been in terms of software availability and advances."

As above, AOL only has a small proportion of all Net users ~5% whereas Windows runs on ~90% of all computers, nice straw man there Bill.

Other Windows XP testers complained that the operating system's graphical appearance, which resembles that of MSN Explorer, looked like a cartoon.

Elmer FUD or Mr. Magoo?

Yet this kind of apparent contradiction is nothing new to Microsoft, which has long operated on the Darwinian assumption that the fittest of products will survive--as long as they are part of the Windows family.

Dinosaur fails to predict meteor strike / extinction, News at 11.

"It reminds me of the old story about how to boil a frog," he said. "If you throw a frog into a pot of boiling water, it will immediately jump out. But if you put a frog in a pot of warm water and slowly raise the temperature until the water boils, you have frog soup.

"Consumers aren't going to be thrown into a kettle of boiling water from the get-go, but rather enticed into an inviting, lukewarm bath, and then the temperature will be slowly raised over several release cycles."

I doubt the same tactic will work with Penguins though.

Re:Microsoft's Future

[vitaflo]

MS products have repeated proven themselves to be very vulnerable to security breaches and yet there is little consumer backlash. Having the dominant position in the marketplace makes it very difficult for the ordinary user to switch away from MS regardless of any security problems.

Add to that the fact that when most average users have problems with their computers, they blame the computer maker, not Microsoft. I don't know how many times I've had friends tell me that "This Compaq is a piece of crap, next time I'm buying Dell", or "The HD on this Dell just grinds, I should have baught that Sony Viao", etc, when most of the time it's not the hardware, it's the OS that's screwed things up for them.

Obviously, like the above poster said, it's because most average users don't think of there being any other option for an OS, so they blame things where they do have an option: The maker of the hardware.

Re:Microsoft's Future

[4of12]

they blame the computer maker, not Microsoft.

Or, if you work in a computer support organization, you know very well that YOU are going to get the blame. (Even if you can mumble some technical jargon that shifts blame back onto the proper source - "We've called that Outlook bug into Microsoft and they've got programmers working on it.")

Reminds me, though, of a quote I saw in the IT press a year or so back that I found priceless:

"Customers know what they want.
Customers have told us what they want.
Customers want one throat to choke."

I want Microsoft to be the Gatekeepers!

[Desus]

I don't understand Slashdot. Not everything Microsoft does is evil. Hell, I want them to be the gatekeepers of the internet. I find that worrying about things like personal freedom, privacy, and security tax my little mind too much. So I'd rather have a corporation deal with that for me.

Also, my mother still picks out my clothing for me. Decisions like this worry me so much.

Re:I want Microsoft to be the Gatekeepers!

[Surak]

Hmmm...does anybody remember "The Net"? Wasn't that called the Gatekeeper software, with the little PI symbol in the corner? :)

I can see it now...the new Microsoft logo is the little PI symbol and its at the bottom right corner of all web sites... :) Control-Alt Double Click it and M$ 0WnZ J00! :)

Re:I want Microsoft to be the Gatekeepers!

[$nyper]

Does this mean that Rick Moranis will be repriseing his role as the KeyMaster.

Ghostbusters (It was 80s thing) most of you will not understand.

Re:I want Microsoft to be the Gatekeepers!

[A coward on a mouse]

I suspect that in addition to being a wanna-be-nudist, you must also be a major stockholder in a paper seat-cover company looking to expand its market. You can walk around naked all you want, as far as I'm concerned; it's when you sit down that I will have a problem with your nakedness.

Re:I want Microsoft to be the Gatekeepers!

[Pig Hogger]

Also, my mother still picks out my clothing for me. Decisions like this worry me so much.

You can never go wrong when you only buy spandex.

Patience is a Virtue

[Kletus Cassidy]

Wouldn't it have made more sense for Slashdot to wait for the entire 7 day series to be written and link to it all than to link to the first two articles? What's going to happen now, is Slashdot going to provide a link to each installment daily or revisit the story in a week when all 7 articles have been printed?

BEST QUOTE FROM THE ARTICLE "If successful, Microsoft could challenge AOL Time Warner and other media giants for control of the Internet and entirely new industries"

Basically, C|Net is admitting that AOL already practically owns the Internet and Micro$oft is trying to give them a run for their money. I usually don't support Micro$oft but I'd rather there was some competition to AOL's increasingly massive control of how, where and when most people access the 'net and what they see.

Re:Patience is a Virtue

[Ouroboro]

Basically, C|Net is admitting that AOL already practically owns the Internet and Micro$oft is trying to give them a run for their money. I usually don't support Micro$oft but I'd rather there was some competition to AOL's increasingly massive control of how, where and when most people access the 'net and what they see.

Don't fool yourself. Microsoft's play for the internet will be much more painful than the Fisher Price like work that AOL does. The reason? Control. Once you are locked in with microsoft it is very hard to extricate yourself. Think of AOL as a pair of rosey colored glasses. Now add some duct tape to keep you from removing them, and now you have microsoft.

Re:Patience is a Virtue

[pubjames]

C|Net is admitting that AOL already practically owns the Internet

Not from where I'm sitting. AOL may be popular in the USA, but in the rest of the world very few people use it to access the 'net. And the rest of the world is quite a big place, you know.

Re:Patience is a Virtue

[smartin]

... AOL already practically owns the Internet...
I don't get this. I am a very heavy internet user and have been since long before AOL and I have to tell you, AOL is not even on my radar. I have no opinion about them because they have no effect on my life whatsoever. M$ on the other hand is in my face every day.

Re:Patience is a Virtue

[tshak]

Ya, but they don't use MSN either. And in the "rest of the world", AOL is still the most popular ISP - they just don't have the "sheep" customer base that Americans so easily provide :).

Re:Patience is a Virtue

[brunes69]

You're way wrong here. Subtract the US and AOL has but a pittance share. Even here in Canada AOL has hardly any market penetration, even though we are bombarded with free CD's and ad campaigns. Guess what? In my province 90% f internet users get their access from the local telco. Why? Cause its faster, same price, and consumers trust them.

Re:Patience is a Virtue

[pubjames]

They're in almost every country, and have the lead in a lot of them.

Do you have statistics to prove this? I know internet users in lots of different EU countries, and I don't know of anyone that uses AOL. They may be in lots of countries, but they have a tiny presence as far as I can see.

Re:Patience is a Virtue

[brunes69]

Not likely... AT&T still has to gte its bandwidth from the telco's. They don't own them. but law says they have to sell it t them at some fixed price, which I gather is equal to the cost of the line. I doesn't matter anyways, people wont switch because it not any cheaper.

Re:Patience is a Virtue

[smartin]

No I use Linux almost exclusively and avoid M$ products to the greatest extent possible. The problem is that even with the effort that I take to avoid microsoft, i still an affected by them every day. For example: I have to run a machine at work for the single purpose of reading email, i can not avoid the outhouse/exchange nightmare becuase my employer has made the foolish decision to use it. I often experience service outagage while M$ viruses run rampant around the net. I often have to put up with web sites programmed exclusively to M$ bugs and products. Need i go on.
AOL on the otherhand, well i forgot the netscape connection, i use mozilla and would have to say that if it is an example of the AOL experience then i can't complain, it's great.

I suppose i run into AOL everyday in ways that I'm not aware of. The good news is that I do not feel that they are in any way trying to control my internet experience. Microsoft on the otherhand does nothing but try to control everyone and everything.

Re:Patience is a Virtue

[pubjames]

if you use RoadRunner cable access

i.e. if you live in the USA

Ever hear of a little channel called CNN

i.e. if you live in the USA (CNN isn't that popular outside of the USA except on the TVs in hotel bedrooms)

Like I said, the world's a big place, and AOL is far from 'owning the Internet'. But perhaps it does in the USA.

Re:Patience is a Virtue

[jmauro]

In 1999, 40% of AOL users are oversees.

AOL Latin America, 173 call centers in Brazil. Partnerships with banks reaching up to 17 million customers

German indicators putting AOL second and Compuserve third. (Remember Compuserve and AOL are the same thing.

AOL usage statistics of UK. AOL's three services are about the same level as the biggest Freeserve

AOL operates under a lot of different names in a lot of different places. Your friends can be using AOL and not even know it.

Re:Patience is a Virtue

[ackthpt]

Sheetmetal screws, or more fitting, a big ol' Frankenstein like bolt through the back of the head.

Microsoft really seems to be the Tar Baby, does it it?

Microsoft as Corp. vs. Microsoft as Tech.

[under_score]

Microsoft is in a funny position. Many of the things they do (not all) have a solid basis in user needs or wants. Honestly, I would be/is a lot simpler to have the internet and all its related services (web, mail, chat, identification etc.) integrated seamlessly into the OS so that any application can easily access those services. That's the tech side of Microsoft: they are doing some good. BUT As most people here would agree, their business practices range from sucking to disasterous. Basically, this dichotomy boils down to the issue of "does the end justify the means?" Most people do not think so, and our legal code is set up that way. In fact, if you really get down to it, most of our society is based on the idea that the means justify the end. (That is a whole other discussion...) Microsoft being a gatekeeper to the internet is both a business decision and a technical decision. For many people, it is a way to provide useful services for their operating system and applications. Therefore people will buy it, corporations will buy it (not all of course). But as time goes on, there will be more and more pressure on Microsoft from a legal perspective... because undoubtably, they will not clean up their act on the "means" side of things.

Re:Microsoft as Corp. vs. Microsoft as Tech.

[Mike Schiraldi]

Honestly, it would be/is a lot simpler to have the internet and all its related services (web, mail, chat, identification etc.) integrated seamlessly into the OS so that any application can easily access those services.

Do it with CORBA so that you can choose your browser, mailer, chat client, etc and it will still be integrated seamlessly into the OS so that any application can easily access those services. There's no reason you need a vertical monopoly in order to provide that capability.

Re:Microsoft as Corp. vs. Microsoft as Tech.

[tshak]

I agree. Windows 2000 and XP are great OS's for a large consumer base. Microsoft.NET from a technical side (read: hailstorm != technical) is an incredible platform and (IMHO) is what J2EE should have been. The concept of Passport is GREAT for consumers and web developers alike - who want's to fill in the SAME information each time you visit a site? How redundant (more like archaic).

So, I'm sick of the MS bashing here on a lot of what I consider to be very good technology - even though it's not the best technology for EVERY situation (I don't use the deadly Office/Outlook combo on any of my PC's, but I use IIS (in which I lock down properly), .NET, and MSSQL 2000,etc.). However, I do understand a lot of the "business practices" concerns - although some of them are obviously overstated here (there's a slight bias if you haven't noticed!). It's unfortunate that the "suits" can hamper what I believe to be good technology.

Re:Microsoft as Corp. vs. Microsoft as Tech.

[greenrd]

Basically, this dichotomy boils down to the issue of "does the end justify the means?" Most people do not think so, and our legal code is set up that way.

Nope. There's lots of examples: just war. Killing or bodily harm is ok if it's necessary in self-defense. Police officers are allowed to kill suspects if the suspect is about to shoot someone. In British law defendants have successfully been found innocent of criminal damage, even though they admitted to it, because they were doing it to try to prevent a greater crime (in one case the use of Trident nuclear weapons submarines).

In fact, if you really get down to it, most of our society is based on the idea that the means justify the end.

Huh??? What the hell does "the means justify the end" mean? Does that mean if I do a lot of good things with an intent to murder children, that justifies murdering children???

My advice to you: if you want to philosophise about social norms, you need to think before you speak.

Trusting the Gatekeepers.

[Alien54]

I think we should probably have a set of faked passport profiles, with names insulting to MS.

Some of these can get passed around.

Seriously there is nothing wrong with having a good system running things, as long as you can trust the gatekeepers.

The problem is that you cannot trust these gatekeepers.

Like Ceasars's wife, they should be blameless.

They need to prove they are pure as they driven snow, and this would probably require completely open books, and completely open records of all significant meetings, not just the symbolic ones.

Re:Trusting the Gatekeepers.

[tmark]

I think we should probably have a set of faked passport profiles, with names insulting to MS.

At the risk of being spammed, I am the proud owner of the "windows_sucks" hotmail account.

As an aside, I had to cast about for quite a while before settling on that one...all the "legitimate" accounts I tried to get were all taken, which makes me wonder how far MS can really go in providing accounts for everyone. There is a limit at which the ungainliness of your address becomes a serious hindrance.

Re:Trusting the Gatekeepers.

[Pig Hogger]

Like Ceasars's wife, they should be blameless.

I thought that Ceasar was gay???

Re:Trusting the Gatekeepers.

[Fjord]

It's true

Good - Let them go!

[wirefarm]

By ensuring a Windows-only "internet" they are granting freedom to Linux users and people saavy enough not to play along...
I was happy enough with the BBS culture of 10 - 15 years ago - I will be happy to see all of those morons gone. If you can't figure out that you don't need Windows, I'm not sure that I want to know you...
Good riddance to them - For a while, it was as if the football team had joined the A/V club and now they're being shepherded out of the room - let them go... Maybe I'll get less spam and fewer Code Red attacks...

Obviously Somewhat Embittered,
Jim in Tokyo

Re:Good - Let them go!

[dingbat_hp]

I was happy enough with the BBS culture of 10 - 15 years ago

I don't want to go back to that.

Sure, you lose the morons, which is good.

On the downside though, you also lose access to two things; the enormous pro bono resources that have grown up to serve The Web of the Long September (they weren't there before because there wasn't the demand to make it worthwhile) and also the purely money-grabbing commercial sites that need a population of proles to feed off. You might hate the level to which the BBC or CNN are pitching their news stories, but I bet you still read them.

I never had Amazon@Fidonet or Terraserver@Fidonet to play with. I _like_ these huge resources of on-line data, and I might even use a M$oft product if that were my only way to maintain access.

That's not an endorsement of M$oft, you understand, just a statement of how low my morals might fall if that were the only way to access the Natalie Portman Grits archive 8-)

Re:Good - Let them go!

[spnbs]

What happens when microsoft owns the routers? Maybe the football team will decide that there's just no need for an AV club. It's just a haven for dorks without software licenses, anyways.

Re:Good - Let them go!

[s390]

Microsoft has already taken over an ISP's (Qwest, somewhere) email service and promply imposed a Microsoft-only email client policy. Are you sure you want to be _forced_ to run Microsoft's proprietary software? I know I don't. This is scary and a Very Bad Thing(tm). We can't let it happen.

Re:Good - Let them go!

[Pengo]

Really? You actually use your ISP for your email? :) I use my company and another account where I host my online stuff. I don't think I have ever checked my ISP mail once for that matter (NTL).

Anyway, if you don't like your isp's email, you can find another one. If they all get bought up by Microsoft.. more will creep out of the woodworks to take care of people that despise such service. They will prosper if the demand is there.. if not, and it's so important.. choose not to get on the net or pay for a private email address somewhere.

God, like AOL is any less terrible.

Re:Good - Let them go!

[Dexx]

A friend of mine has a .sig that reads something like:
Remember when the internet was only for smart people?

On that note, I kinda like the idea of having a little AOL version of the 'net and a Windoze version of the 'net and a real version of the 'net. That way once people figure out what they're doing at each step, they advance to the next version of the internet. People who don't want to figure it out, don't. Picture it like a larval/pupal/adult cycle..

Re:Good - Let them go!

[wirefarm]

Dear Anonymous Coward:
No, I will not feel like a Jackass. (At least not because of this post, anyway.)
Yes, I use Linux. I advocate its use. I believe in it, I contribute to it. Find me on a Saturday and I will help you install it. I will help you avoid some of the mistakes that I made and show you some of the cool things about it that made me a convert.
Believe me, I am *not* smarter than others and I know it. More adventurous, perhaps, maybe only more bored... Windows is great if you've got to make a living, which I did for a long time, but linux is a "Good Thing" -
Did you ever notice how the best parties tend to revolve around the kitchen? Well, it's kind of like that - You don't have to be involved in the actual cooking, you just have to want to stay near the action. Linux is like that - You can involve yourself as much as you like.
Windows/passport/msn/ie, on the other hand, is more like a restaurant, where you are content to let others oversee the cooking - if you are happy to see only the end result, fine. Take what they serve you. You might be satisfied. But if you are the kind of party guest who gravitates towards the kitchen, take a look at Linux - you might enjoy your experience more if you can at least feel involved in the production. Something tells me that if you are posting to Slashdot, you are already involved.
Sorry if I sounded like a snob - I probably did, but I think I will happily give up a lot of the 'features' (SPAM/flash/realaudio/hotmail) of the modern internet in favor of the old-fashioned exchange of ideas that I used to see here. (ASCII text)

Cheers,
Jim in Tokyo

Re:Good - Let them go!

[austad]

You can still use mail servers other than Microsoft though.

No you can't. They have blocked port 25 to any servers outside their network. You are forced to use theirs unless you have a VPN that you can connect to your company network with.

Even my girlfriend's mom wants to move away from Qwest now that they are MSN. And she's not the most computer literate person on the face of the earth, but she knows something bad when she sees it.

Re:Good - Let them go!

[wirefarm]

Shutup bitch, you can't stop it.

I don't need to. I've got a modem. Have fun being a consumer.
;-)

Re:Good - Let them go!

[elmegil]

Some of us are less interested in all our private email traversing our company networks (where there are typically specific policies in place that say they WILL look through my email) than in having it traversing an ISP's network (where I'm paying them presumably at least in part for privacy). I'm going to have a lot more legal recourse against an ISP for abuse of my private email than against my employer.

Re:Good - Let them go!

[Billly Gates]

How are you supposed to recieve email without an internet connection?

What if MS puts in thier EULA that "you agree to have MS own your computer and not install any unapproved OS on it"?

What if MS monitored your computer to make sure linux wasn't installed? WIth .net they can do this. Infact did you know XP even checks your computer for pirated software? Or in the EULA for media player microsft has a right to MONITOR YOUR COMPUTER FOR UNAUTHORIZED SONGS AND HAS THE AUTHORITY TO DELETE THEM OFF YOUR HARD DRIVE?

Sorry but if passport and XP win you and I will be screwed over big time. IF you can salvage some computer parts to build your own linux box, there will not be any bbs's left anyway. FInding a linux distro will be hard to find sonce non linux users are restricted from usig the internet if they MSN is the only isp left or the others need to be approved by Microsoft. If ms has there way and needs some more profits all of these things will hapen. Perhaps they will lobby legislators with the help of hollywood to restrict non approved hardware and make it a crime to wrte drivers for them. like the SSCA act being developed in the US senate. We are in deep shit right now. I figured the bbs's are all gone already and there may be nothing but winmodems left after XP takes over.. I like slashdot and the world community and Microsoft may not take it away dam it.

GateKeeper, KeyMaster.

[Alien54]

God, that is so symbolic.

Where are the Ghostbusters when you need them?

[snort]

Re:GateKeeper, KeyMaster.

[ostiguy]

You are just another *Master Baiter.

ostiguy

Re:GateKeeper, KeyMaster.

[ZaMoose]

Microsoft Announces New VP of Internet Operations

Redmond, WA - Microsoft, in what is being regarded as a bold move, has hired Vince Glortho, Keymaster of Gozer the Gozarian as Vice President in Charge of Keeping the Internet Gateway.

This move is viewed as pivotal for Microsoft's .Net OccultXP(TM) program.

In related news, rumor has it that Larry Ellison is pursuing a Papal endorsement of all Oracle products as a way to counter Microsoft's new initiatives.

Quote of the Day (scary!)

[Masem]

"This whole thing is driven by the fact that Microsoft has hundreds of millions of Windows users out there, but Microsoft doesn't have a direct monthly billing relationship with those users," said Matt Rosoff, an analyst at Directions on Microsoft.

(My emphasis).

That word, right there, scares the bejeebies out of me.

Re:Quote of the Day (scary!)

[Neon Spiral Injector]

Well not everyone has a fear of relationships, its the month billing part that I don't like. :)

Re:Quote of the Day (scary!)

[Masem]

Renting whatever is always a lose-win situation for the customer and the renter, respectively, particularly in the long run (more than 3-5 years)

• Apartment renting: Typically, if you frequently move large distances, renting is ok, but if you are fixed at a certain location in the country, you can usually get house payments + utilities + properties taxes well under the monthly rent for property in the same area. In addition, you lose the ability to play with equity on your home, which can be a valuable source of funding for emergancies
• Car Leasing: Again, a loser for the rentee: while the monthly lease payments might be lower than for a new car, you have more liability for your car if it's in an accident, and typically more for insurance in some areas. And again, you lose the money that you can get from a reselling of the car in the future.
• Software renting: Particularly in the case of Microsoft, you must continue to rent the software in order to continue being 'compatiable' with everyone else, so while the cost to rent software might be less than purchasing it on a 2-3 year time scale, you must consider the 5-10 year time scale for mission critical software in order to keep up.

The overall problem with renting software is that renting is just one step away from pay-per-play, which Microsoft has subtly indicated that they wouldn't mind that, and in the opposite direction of the principle of first sale. Just like we are discussing how slowly eroding civil librities is more likely to be accepted by citizens than a swift removal of them, removing the buyer's rights from software by going to seat-licenses, then renting, then pay-per-use will be more of an accepted transition if it is done slowly.

In addition, while I am a linux user, I want my games, and I want them at the same time as most of the rest of the world enjoys them as opposed to months later. While the catch-22 syndrome of linux games has been discussed before, I don't think that will be resolved until the linux desktop is more fully realized. Thus, until that happens, I will continue to have a Windows box to play games on as well as most of my web browsing with a non-MS browser. However, while for the immediate future, I expect Win98 to be sufficient, with all modern hardware and games continue to provide support for it, once MS decides that the latest version of DirectX will only run under XP or higher, I will need to consider upgrading (I'm considering it right now, given the know improvements in stability between XP and 98). I know XP will remain a single-cost purchase, but what happens when the next step comes along? I would suspect that most causal computer users are in the same boat as me in their feelings to software renting vs purchasing.

Re:Quote of the Day (scary!)

[wowbagger]

I. Did Not. Have Billing. Relations. With that company.

Considering some of the connotations that "relationships" can have, this might be more accurate than not. Unfortunately, I think the relationship Microsoft wants to have with me is much the same as the relationship the large, tattooed, shaven-headed man in the prison cell wishes to have with me....

Re:Quote of the Day (scary!)

[datatrash]

Granted it is a contentious thing for Microsoft to want to have a direct relationship with its Windowed users. Most sane folks would probably agree that letting MS in on your life would be to let a "bad" (or something along those lines) company have access to "who you are."

However, just last Friday there was a book review on Gonzo marketing and heads were busting nuts all over themselves with the idea that marketers should be allowed to directly charm them with products that they know they would be interested in because they would have a relationship with them.

So my question really (in general) is why it alright to foster relationships with marketers who are not part of Microsoft, but frightening to divulge info to Microsoft.

Hell, I don't want anyone to know more about my personal habits than I know about myself, MS or doubleclick or anyone, but it doesn't seem to ad (oh that subtle humour) up that it would just be bad for MS to have a relationship.

Re:Quote of the Day (scary!)

[nologin]

Funny, I can picture the relationship that they speak of now...

Windows user: Why does my computer no longer work?

Microsoft: Sorry, you'll need to bend over some more...

Re:Quote of the Day (scary!)

[NumberSyx]

(I'm considering it right now, given the know improvements in stability between XP and 98

This is an interesting statment, it characterizes each new release of Windows. Before the release all the magazines and Beta Testers tell us over and over how the BSOD is gone and this is a more stable Windows. The it gets released and within weeks, we start finding out that nothing has really changed, Microsoft may have fixed some bugs, but usually introduced several more. Not to mention we loose compatibilty with at least some of our old software. WinME was the worst release to date and I don't hold much hope for XP.

Re:Quote of the Day (scary!)

[barneyfoo]

WinXP is "more" 200 than ME?

Excuse me, but WinXP is to Win2k as Win98-se is to Win98.

So much so, that I'm very inclined to call winXP "Windows 2000 Fischer Price edition". It would be truth in advertising, after all.

Re:Quote of the Day (scary!)

[chrisserwin]

I've said it before, I'll say it again:

All Microsoft has to do is develop encrypted "secure" document formats to protect their "customers" from piracy, and it will be illegal for any 3rd party to write compatible software. At this point, you will not only be renting software from Microsoft, you will be paing *ransom* to access *your own work* created with said software.

Re:Quote of the Day (scary!)

[zerocool^]

Particularly in the case of Microsoft, you must continue to rent the software

This is the part that troubles me the most. No one seems to be talking about it. If you get any magazines that have windows XP features, they will sit and gripe about passport and about activation, and then go on to talk about the amazing new multimedia features, but the fact is that no one is remembering that when you buy windowsXP, after a year, it ceases to work, and you have to pay for it again. The press uses vague terms like .NET, but the average consumer seems to not make the connection that they will be paying for windows AGAIN in a year.

Seems like amazing marketing on the part of microsoft, if you ask me.

~z

Re:Quote of the Day (scary!)

[daviddennis]

You might be better off leasing your car due to lower out of pocket costs, because the car decays over a short period of years and has a predictable residual value. By not paying off that residual, you save quite a bit out of pocket if you want to have a new car every few years. There is very little value in owning a car if it's breaking down all the time and ready for replacement.

A home is different, of course, because it will generally increase in value over time, especially in popular regions of the country like Southern California (where I live). Boat dock homes in Newport Beach that sold for $ 2.5 million five years ago are now going for $ 3.5 million. Obviously I should have bought one :-(.

Renting software is harder to gauge; how many of you use commercial software more than, say, five years old?

At the same time, who wants to lose the use of something they paid for for no good reason? It's tough for me to accept the idea of the forced upgrade, especially when the original software I got still works.

So buying is not always better than renting. But renting usually makes sense only if we're talking about a product you couldn't afford to buy. Most software as it stands is priced reasonably enough so there may be little reason to not buy it outright. And if you don't like Microsoft's draconian "you must upgrade now" licenses, well, it might be a good idea to switch to another vendor.

D

Re:Quote of the Day (scary!)

[Dirtside]

I always preferred "My First Windows" or "Windows for Dummies" (though the latter is redundant).

Re:Quote of the Day (scary!)

[Billly Gates]

YOU MEAN YOU DON"T WANT TO PAY TO ACCESS YOUR OWN COMPUTER!

WHat are you? Some sort of communist. How unamerican and uncapitalist.

Re:Quote of the Day (scary!)

[Erik Hensema]

I usually express the quality of software in the urge to upgrade.

I wanted to upgrade each and every Linux 2.4.x kernel. Hence, they are of low quality. When I was still running 2.2.x I couldn't care less. 2.2.x were fine kernels.

Before Mozilla 0.9.2 came out, I checked about every other day wether the next milestone had come out yet. Mozilla sucked bad. Recently I upgraded to 0.9.5. Big deal. I did it because I do it all the time, but 0.9.4 was fine too.

Somehow Windows users tend to wait anxiously for the next release of Windows. Each and every version again. 'Nuff said, I think.

wincing in pain and laughing at the same time

[headwick]

"Microsoft and AOL are considered to be among the few online leaders capable of providing the security and technology necessary to handle payment systems on an Internet-wide scale"

Joe Wilcox
You have got to be kidding me!

Re:does not apply..

[tomknight]

I think that one thing that will convice many people to switch the MS systems is that they'll make as many services as possible run only on Windows.

Okay, we have the beautiful open-source coders, all out there trying to catch up and offer the same (or equivalent) stuff for other platforms, but it'll be a hard struggle. Picture a nice file-sharing system that all Windows users use. Nice. Along comes Mr Open-Source, who says "Hey, I'd like to get in on this action", but find that he can't because to do so would require him to illegally decrypt something. I don't know what, but if I was MS, I'd find a way to make using their services from a non-Windows platform illegal - and I don't think it'd be very hard to do so...

Tom.

Hold on a second. people.

[Soko]

Of course Bill & Co. are trying to take over the Internet - they get paid to make as much money as possible for thier shareholders, and the best way to do that for them at this point is to commandeer as much of the Internet as possible. I certainly don't like it either, but it's the reality of a company being too sucessful in a Capitalist economy. Bill Gates is not Satan, he's just a really successful player in the Business Game - he's a symptom, not a disease.

Until we can convince the unwashed masses that the Internet can be a force for world change of the benevolent kind and is not just for businesses and pr0n, crap like this will continue. If it's not Gates, look out for Elliston and/or McNealy - any one of them would co-opt the Internet in a second, given the chance.

Soko

They've got some work to do.

[G-funk]

I've been running XP for a couple of months now, and ages ago a mate of mine checked his hotmail from my computer. I now have his msn messenger on my computer and can't find a way to make it piss off and forget his settings, and I've done some looking....

They've got some cool ideas (some, not all) but they need some help implementing them methinks.

It's All About The Average User

[Self Bias Resistor]

The point is not that the technically adept will possibly somehow be denied access to the Internet (which wouldn't happen for a whole slew of technical reasons), but that Micrsoft will get an unfair headstart on those who aren't technically minded. Your 'average user' may not know that you don't need Passport to use the Internet under Windows XP. But if he/she gets constant reminder messages for days suggesting to them that they get a Passport account, then they may start thinking "if I don't get a Passport account, I may be missing out on something (ie. may not be getting the "best" services)". Especially if, as the article suggests Microsoft might starting including "features" in XP that may only be accessed with a Passport account. Those who know enough about computers will know how to set up their systems under XP using their own software and Internet access. But it's the 'average user', who doesn't know these things, that it's going to most affect.

In this case, education will the key. If people know that they can use XP just fine without a Passport account, then they may be less likely to sign up for one in future (hey, it's yet one more password to memorise). That is, unless MS doesn't in future require users to have such accounts to use key features of the operating system. It's bad enough that it's compulsory to register your copy of Windows XP (otherwise it stops functioning). To say nothing of the fact that even in the face of an (once) impending antitrust suit by the Department of Justice, MS are continuing to "bundle" products and services to their operating systems more tightly than ever.

Re:It's All About The Average User

[Foamy]

My Mother is a perfect example. She got a Windows ME box (against my better advice), signed up for DSL from Qwest and bought a digital camera. She received the Qwest software for her DSL connection and installed it.

AFAICT, Qwest installs NN4.7.x and uses the built in profile manager in Netscape to setup a profile which is password protected. It also installs an alias on the Desktop to Dial into the DSL account.

So what's this have to do with the 'average user'? My Mom "logs in" by double clicking Netscape, enters her password and off she goes... to eBay :) She is 100% convinced that Netscape is her ISP!When I showed her that she could dial in using the dialer alias on her desktop and then use IE if she wanted, it would not sink in. She really likes IE better, but since she dials in with Netscape, she thinks that is what she has to use.

Imagine her with XP and .Net. This little box keeps bugging her to input her personal information into her "Passport". She does it because she thinks she has to, or "the Net won't work well without it."

One more person locked into MS and .NET

Oh yeah. She thinks the only place she can put her digital photos is in "My Pictures". When I showed her that she could actually make folders in there to organize "Her" pictures, she was amazed. I figured that was a minor success and I didn't want to blow her away with the fact that she could actually put her pictures in the "My Music" folder if she so pleased!

Re:does not apply..

[Junks Jerzey]

xcuse me, but how does this apply to those of us who don't use windows? are we going to be pushed off of the 'net?

To some extent we already have been. If I made my machine at home boot directly into the Linux partition, my wife would kill me. Not because she cares about operating systems, but because there are a good many mail order sites that do things that either don't work without Internet Explorer (I'm thinking of ActiveX scripting and such) or don't render properly under Mozilla, because the web designers didn't care.

Sure, this is the fault of the companies that design sites like this. But when 95% of all online purchases are made from Windows machines, then from a business point of view it doesn't make sense to worry about the other 1%. How many Linux users are going to buy clothes from L.L. Bean or Chadwick's?

MS as gatekeeper... scary...

[Diabolical]

I wouldn't mind Microsoft resembling AOL. It's their right to try and do so. But the big difference with AOL is that with AOL i at least have a choice in signing up.

MS provides an operating system. Fine. MS provides technology for the internet. Reasonable... better than loose products like in the 3.x days. (trumpet winsock etc..). MS providing security. Bad. Given their trackrecord it would be an outright disaster. MS providing content (MSN). Evil. I want to be able to view any kind of content. Not MS controlled. Who is to say that when MS gets a big stranglehold on the Net they won't start censoring content provided by others. If MS doesn't want people to find out about bugs they just block the sites that provide such information.

Basicly MS tries to not only control the Internet on a technologie side. They can (and most likeliy will) also try to control the content. Power corrupts.. whatever kind of power it is.

And when i have almost no control on which provider or technology i want...

Joe Sixpack will probably just click on the yes button, not knowing they give away their freedom and privacy.

Re:Already looks Like AOL

[Junks Jerzey]

Well so far, win XP looks like somthing you give a 5 year old.

Give KDE a couple of years and it will look just like XP.

M$oft are already doing it

[dingbat_hp]

"if I don't get a Passport account, I may be missing out on something"

Try using IE, then turning off ActiveX controls for restricted sites and adding doubleclick and a few other banner-ad vendors to your restricted list. Now when you browse eBay (or many others, not on your restricted list) then you have a continual dialog box on each page stating "YOUR settings prevent ActiveX. The page MAY NOT DISPLAY CORRECTLY". The clearly implied message is, "Use ActiveX; if you turn it off you're a Bad Person and you're going to miss a party".

Re:does not apply..

[NineNine]

How many Linux users are going to buy clothes from L.L. Bean or Chadwick's?


Don't most of them buy clothes from K-Mart and the Salvation Army, anyway?

Re:But XP is so pretty

[wirefarm]

Recently I saw how pretty XP was and heard it had compatability modes for playing old DOS games.

Why not just load up DOS 5 for old games? Oh, wait, you can't... But then again, if I wanted to run Slackware 1.3, I could probably find it using Google and run it without breaking any license agreements - but you lost your license for DOS 5 when you installed Win 3.1 back in '93, didn't you?

Don't mind me...
Jim in Tokyo

PS - Gnome can be pretty, too - as pretty as you want it to be.

The other gate...

[drnomad]

This passport stuff reminds me of the fuzz we had here in the Netherlands with pay-per-view TV a couple of years ago.

The most popular channels wanted to get behind the digital decoder, but a lesser popular channel chose not to do so. In the end, none of the channels got behind the digital decoder, as the consumer would choose for the other gate: the free gate.

So even when Microsoft succeeds into implementing this passport into XP, the rumour will spread like fire, that there is a free alternative for their expensive habits. This rumour will spread via the internet and likely by the spoken word.

I'm not sure about the future, but I considering the option that MS is shooting themselves into their own feet with this...

Not MY internet

[Private Essayist]

The Net was here before M$ got interested, and before AOL heard of it, and before business discovered it. In fact, some of the most interesting parts of the Net are still those oddball sites totally unconnected to M$ and AOL and their like. When I want to find out information on tech stuff, I prefer homegrown sites where people passionate about tech write their true assessment of stuff, rather than some conglomerate taking advertising dollars from the same companies they are reviewing.

M$ can be the gatekeeper and it won't affect me since I don't run M$ in my home -- at all. Nor do I use AOL. They can charge whatever they want, but they won't get any money from me. And if they decide to start forcing certain sites I use to charge money, I will switch to other sites. It's nice to have CNN.com around occasionally, but there are other ways to get news. I like ESPN, but I could switch if I had to.

If 90% of the online world eventually switches to a vast wasteland of sameness controlled through subscription services, I will just be part of the 10% going to the independent sites, the fan sites, the oddball sites. That's how the Net began, and that will always be a part of the Net. You just have to search those sites out.

Re:Not MY internet

[cant_get_a_good_nick]

The Net existed before that. In ftp sites (anyone remember ftping to wuarchive.wustl.edu?, simtel?, sumex-aim?) gopherspace, BBSs. The search services were not Altavista and Google, but Archie and Veronica. The web started as a way of linking physics papers. No images, no ActiveX controls to worry about. Plain text, with links.

But the Net evolved. It evolved to the point to where it is now. Will you continue to have those options? I do't know. Try running a Veronica search now. That option is gone. What options will be gone tomorrow?

The toughest obstacle for MS yet...your wallet!

[zerofoo]

Isn't it clear? Microsoft knows they want a subscription buisiness model, but they don't know yet what customers will pay for. I've got news for Microsoft, consumers don't pay for anything very easily. Look at all the failed dot bombs: People like free stuff, when the model switches to a payment model, most customers drop it like a bad habit. I used to work in retail, trust me when I say most people are cheap. I admit, I am.

Do you think for a minute Napster will survive as a subscription service? No way!

How about software? Forget about it!

Now factor in a recessonary world economy, and guess what.....HailStorm, XP, and all the software subscription based models are doomed to fail.

Re:The toughest obstacle for MS yet...your wallet!

[phillymjs]

Do you think for a minute Napster will survive as a subscription service? No way!

That's because they probably won't do it the right way, charging 5 or 10 cents per downloaded song, which I and many others would happily pay.

Back on topic, I think it's just completely laughable that Microsoft now expects us to trust them to hold onto our personal data for convenience. Especially when they can't even keep their own sites from belching up passwords sometimes.

Personally, I wouldn't trust Microsoft to carry a still-usable tissue I've already blown my nose in, much less my vital financial information. Microsoft knows there are a lot of people like me who won't be swayed by their marketing bullshit. To take care of us, they'll simply attempt to co-opt as many 'net merchants as possible, until they make it virtually impossible to make a purchase on the 'net without using their service for authentication. And if it comes down to switch-or-do-without, I'll simply do without.

~Philly

privacy

[TheMMaster]

You know what really really makes me mad? The fact that the whole fucking world is talking crap about privacy, people dump shit on the government for taking their privacy, security cameras invade privacy and what else the "people" talk about. And under there noses is a company (let's call them Microsoft) that sells them an OS that they'll install, presents them with a nice dialog and asks if the user wants to create a passport.
PEOPLE WILL create those things... and people WILL use them and in a short while there is a company that has your Creditcard number, expiration date, all your favorite files, knows your surfing habits, knows who your friends are, knows what you like to buy, can present you with "special offers"

I've been preacing this ever since I heard about the passport thing, and passport is pretty old now.... PEOPLE DON'T WANT TO HEAR AND DON'T WANT TO KNOW as long as they can get their daily dose of minesweeper....
And we, the geeks, have seen this coming for quite some time now, but (as always with microsoft) by the time the people know what hit them, it's too late to turn back, all e-commerse sites will be .NET and will require your passport to get to your safely stored creditcard informatation...

The world makes me sick, and most of all these ignorant people that don't seem to care about this kind of privacy.
But what can we do? Well since I hope there are some more talented writers than myself here, write a column for your (local) newspaper... convince people... THIS IS IMPORTANT

and for all the techies: check out .GNU something simular to .NET but with privacy in mind...

end rant

Boy, I hope the DOJ is reading this....

[n8willis]

Is anyone else amused that the Justice Department has a separate contact address just for people who want to complain about Microsoft?

Nate

Re:Boy, I hope the DOJ is reading this....

[HiThere]

Is anyone else amused that the Justice Department has a separate contact address [justice.gov] just for people who want to complain about Microsoft?

A bit. I'm also a bit worried that it's to make it easier to automatically discard.

Re:Boy, I hope the DOJ is reading this....

[NutscrapeSucks]

It would be kinda funny to read the mail that comes into that address. I bet it falls into these categories:

1) I'm a random concerned citizen who wishes to express my views about "The Freedom To Innovate". Any similarity to www.microsoft.com/billg is purely coincidental.

2) I'm from slashdot.org, and I'm karma whoring for Great Justice.

3) Mirco$fot wrecked my comupter!!

4) My stocks are really taking a beating -- please please please give me a break

2nd installment is also available

[cr@ckwhore]

Since c|net started this on Oct. 17th, the 2nd installment is available also.

You can read it here: http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1003-201-7502765-0.htm l

At least the commercials will improve

[roystgnr]

I'm sick and tired of "Where do you want to go today?" It'll be sweet when they replace that:

Bill Gates, uncombed and speaking an octave below his normal voice: "Are you the keymaster?"

Re:At least the commercials will improve

[Psiren]

Heh, does he sleep 4 feet above his covers and bark, drool and snarl? ;-)

Re:At least the commercials will improve

[sharkey]

Bill Gates, uncombed and speaking an octave below his normal voice: "Are you the keymaster?"

Just so long as he's not wearing that slinky dress. Brrr.

A better name for HailStorm

[jcoleman]

The article says that HailStorm was recently renamed ".Net My Services." I have a better idea:

.Net My Ass.

In several years' time?

[orgnine]

CNet has one great idea posting this series. Their job is keeping people informed, and even if they are lacking technical detail, these articles are worth a read.

There are millions upon millions of uninformed internet users in the world. The reality is, if local ISP's keep getting bought out either by AOL or Microsoft, people will eventually run out of alternative solutions to net access.

But the Internet is so vast. It would take Microsoft *quite* a while to accomplish their task. XP seems like it is just the first step... a new piece of software, new features, new activation features, etc etc. Everything is promising to be more secure, more friendly, easier to use, prettier to look at.

Don't forget, people, under all that pretty GUI gobbley-gook, there is CODE. A lot of M$ code.

And down the line, where is this code taking us? Is it taking us down the line of product and service excellence, and customer care? Or is it taking us down the line customer control? I think you can see the gist of XP.

org9

I've tried to reason the use of XP

[narfbot]

I was thinking, why should I buy XP?

For one thing I know, there is activation. If there is a moderate change to the system, you have to reactivate--this is very bas in my case because I change hardware out almost every week.

I thought once that a laptop could be better to run XP, because the hardware doesn't really change. But then I remember a story of a guy on a plane, hooks up his spare laptop battery or something, and had to reactivate, which was impossible. Wierd.

I could buy the corporate XP version which has no activation...but why should I pay more because Microsoft cripples its products.

Then heres a look at another angle. This articles shows how Microsoft wants XP to be the gateway to their MSN service (in the future the entire internet) .......... I want to get an OS for productivity! not to be advertised to!

Re:I've tried to reason the use of XP

[(H)elix1]

The real problem here is where do you buy - assuming you want to be a legit windows user - any of the older versions? They will be trying real hard to ablate the Win9x & Win2K OS, along with the Office CD's supply. It won't be bundled anymore, more and more systems are including a recovery CD rather than a real OS CD.

A couple weeks ago I built a system and needed a copy of Office 97 (client request). It was real work to find a copy that I could bundle - the OEM with cert was rare, a few retail boxes, the rest were the "replacement media" type CD's sold as an OEM version.

Re:Not the complete story

[cr@ckwhore]

1. will automatically send Web surfers to an MSN search engine if a Web address cannot be located, rather than resorting to the standard "page not found" message

Ever hear of MSN autosearch? Microsoft has had the MSN search deviously built into their browsers since at least win2k, maybe before. That isn't a new feature of XP. I was able to turn that "feature" off in my browser, (option burried very deeply and obscure), but somehow it re-enabled itself about a week later.

Re:does not apply..

[streetlawyer]

or don't render properly under Mozilla, because the web designers didn't care.

Or alternatively, because the Mozilla developers don't care.

Re:does not apply..

[ttys00]

WINE was made because Linux users needed Windows apps, why can't Mozilla or Konqueror be made to impersonate IE's functionality?

Browsers and other linux internet tools will adapt to allow the use of Microsofts internet. We will not be kept out of it.

Linux Laws Of Addition

[volpe]

But when 95% of all online purchases are made from Windows machines, then from a business point of view it doesn't make sense to worry about the other 1%.

I absolutely, totally, and completely agree with you 96%.

Re:Linux Laws Of Addition

[Junks Jerzey]

I absolutely, totally, and completely agree with you 96%.

That comes from switching the figure from 99% to 95% at the last minute :)

Not News for this Audience

[4of12]

I mean, like, around Slashdot everyone already knows this and has for a long time.

Moving on from that, I'm wondering how good this CNET piece comes out to be, since it will be read by more than just the Slashdot readership. It would be good if they do their research and talk to both technology and business people on the leading edges of IT, as well as those solidly in the middle, those placid people unaware of the tides that carry them.

Re:M$ is the only option for a lot of people thoug

[danaris]

Oi! What about Macs? We have 5% of market share, very user-friendly, and with Mac OS X, there's even a significant amount of cross-platform compatibility--file-sharing through Samba, running files under Virtual PC, which works wonderfully, sometimes even faster than on a real PC. I, personally, am waiting with bated breath for the day StarOffice/OpenOffice becomes properly functional under MacOS, so I can get rid of my copy of Office 98 (probably under an illegal license, since I haven't upgraded to XP). Then I will be totally Microsoft-free--and I intend to remain so. Never forget that there is already something user-friendly to fall back on. I really, really like Linux, but I am so fed up with Linux users dismissing MacOS as a toy or not even counting it at all, as you seem to be doing. Mac OS X is beautiful (XP's design was ripped off of it) and functional?and it sits on top of BSD, so I can do anything you can do. Thank you very much.

Dan Aris

Hey Big Brother, Thanks for the help!

[AmbientBlue]

So I tried using Windows XP a little a few weeks ago.. I quickly went back to, umm, er, '98 after experiencing DNS trouble with my ISP while using it..

But in the day or two of using it I had an application error spawn a process that sent system information INCLUDING personal information like REGISTRATION and whatever NAME you had in the appropriate field. I didnt even have a choice! Well -- you have a choice if you are at the machine when the error occurs. After a minute or so it sends it anyway.

It would be cool if I got a call from a tech support expert with an automatically open trouble ticket, but no.. That isnt what its for.. Its for taking personal information, matching it with your network location, and using it to whatever purpose they desire.

Pretty F***ing sneaky.

Re:Hey Big Brother, Thanks for the help!

[Col. Panic]

Yeah - I particularly like Zonealarm for this sort of thing - MSAGENT.EXE is trying to contact the Internet. A Linux firewall is better for most things, particularly logging, IDS and tcpdump but Zonealarm is nice for this sort of gotcha.

If MS becomes the gatekeeper of the internet...

[ralmeida]

...why don't we just break through the Windows?

The writing's on the wall for Microsoft

[pubjames]

I have a mental image of Microsoft as a huge giant, running ahead of the IT pack at top speed. It's moving faster than ever before and most people think it is still easily winning the race. "Look, it's going faster and faster!" But what they don't notice is that it is stumbling forward, waving it's arms trying to stay stable, and at any moment could fall flat on its face.

I predict this will happen within about three years, perhaps even sooner. Remember when IBM stumbled, in about 1993? Well, when Microsoft does it, it's gonna be a whole lot worse. The reasons are simple. The majority of its profits come from basically two product lines - its operating systems and its office suite. Both of these are under threat from free products. Sure, they're not as good as Microsoft products, yet. But they're improving at an increadible rate - anyone who has assessed Linux for desktop use a couple of years ago, and has done the same recently, will agree with that. One day soon its going to be really hard for a CTO of a small or medium sized company to justify buying Microsoft rather than using a free, similar product.

People say Microsoft's .NET strategy is complex. Technically it might be, but strategicly it's not. The strategy is simple - try to get as much customer 'lock-in' as possible as quickly as possible. To do this, they need to get everyone moving to XP as soon as they can - which I believe is one of the main reasons they've changed their licensing model. Companies that update their software only every three or four years - for instance, companies using Windows 2000 but probably won't do a complete update until 2003 or 2004 - are customers that Microsoft might loose unless they get them locked-in before then.

One of the biggest mistakes that Microsoft has made recently is to make their software more expensive for exactly those businesses they need to get on board quickest - the companies that only upgrade every three to four years. It's exactly those customers that are most likely to move to Linux, and Microsoft has just given them much more motivation to do so. And when they start to move, the development momentum of Linux will increase even more, and larger enterprises won't be far behind. This process is I believe probably more noticable in 'the rest of the world' before it becomes very evident in the USA.

Microsoft is in many ways a pre-Internet company. The internet has caused changes to the way software is developed and distributed. There is nothing Microsoft can do about this. It's demise is inevitable, the only question is when.

Re:The writing's on the wall for Microsoft

[pubjames]

I've just re-read my post and think it would perhaps be better if all instances of "Linux" were replaced with "Open Source". It's really Open Source which is the long term threat to Microsoft, rather than Linux, although Linux might be what makes the giant fall.

Re:The writing's on the wall for Microsoft

[mysticbob]

But they're improving at an increadible rate - anyone who has assessed Linux for desktop use a couple of years ago, and has done the same recently, will agree with that. One day soon its going to be really hard for a CTO of a small or medium sized company to justify buying Microsoft rather than using a free, similar product. wrong - three reasons:

1. microsoft is continuing to develop it's products - it's not standing still, so oss will always play catchup.
2. free != free: there's still support. who do you call when you can't get staroffice to stop crashing? microsoft will always have much better (and more expenseive, but that's their game) support than some oss alternative. the support business model is causing small oss vendors to crater left and right.
3. most importantly: microsoft office stuff will not be unthroned simply because too many people rely on it. people at my office have been dumbed down to the point where they send email with .doc attachments, but _everybody_ does it. given that, unless the open alternative is 100% compatible, no chance of them crushing microsoft office.

Re:The writing's on the wall for Microsoft

[pubjames]

microsoft is continuing to develop it's products - it's not standing still

True.

oss will always play catchup

OSS is playing catchup at the moment. It doesn't follow that that will always be the case. The fact is that there isn't much more Microsoft can add to Office - it hasn't changed that much for the last four years or so. Just adding stuff for the sake of it won't do it much good.

free != free: there's still support

True.

who do you call when you can't get staroffice to stop crashing?

Sun Microsystems, or the Openoffice developers. Does it do you any good to call Microsoft when Windows crashes? I think you'll get a much better response from the OSS developers.

Microsoft office stuff will not be unthroned simply because too many people rely on it

Microsoft does have quite a lot of lock-in with its Office suite. Is it impossible to undo this? No. Is it in Microsoft's customers interest to do so? Yes, I think it is, or at least it will become increasly so.

What I believe will happen is that over the next few years certainly businesses and organisations, probably mostly outside the USA, will make the move to OSS software. They'll find the move not as painful as they thought it would be, and they'll save quite a bit of cash in the process. Others will look at them and say "we should be doing that".

Anyway, I'm taking big picture, you're talking details. I didn't mean this to turn into a "Linux isn't ready for the desktop" debate. My point is larger than that.

Re:The writing's on the wall for Microsoft

[pubjames]

I believe American English and British English are slightly different in this. In British English, "it's" is a contraction of "it is". Then again, perhaps it's not. Whatever.

Re:The writing's on the wall for Microsoft

[pubjames]

Oh, yes, I've just spotted the mistake in my original post. My mistake.

Re:The writing's on the wall for Microsoft

[pubjames]

The cost of this software is insignificant when compared to the salary of the worker who uses it.

That's true, just as the cost of a hammer is insignificant compaired to the salary or the worker that uses it. However, if I was a hammer manufacturer, I'd be more than a bit worried if people started to give them away for free.

Re:The writing's on the wall for Microsoft

[pubjames]

What I don't get is why so many people are so stubborn in the belief that OSS cannot do serious damage to Microsoft.

Do this mental exercise. Imagine any real-world product. Cars for example. Then image that there was some magical new process that meant they could be manufactured for free. Shareholders would be saying, "Holy f**k! Sell General Motors! Sell Ford! Sell Honda!"

Sure, current OSS isn't quite as good as Microsoft products yet, as I keep repeating. But they're not far off, and are catching up really fast. What I'm really trying to say is: "Holy f**k! Sell Microsoft!"

Re:The writing's on the wall for Microsoft

[phillymjs]

One day soon its going to be really hard for a CTO of a small or medium sized company to justify buying Microsoft rather than using a free, similar product.

Don't hold your breath. Yeah, those Office alternatives may be cheaper, yeah, they may be almost as good. But what good is any of that if you can't communicate effectively with the people and companies your company does business with, because of file format issues?

Rest assured, Microsoft will just keep fucking with their file formats to ensure that the only way you won't have problems with Office documents is to have the same latest-and-greatest version of Office as the people who created them and sent them to you, period.

Look for them to eventually do something to their file formats that will protect them under the DMCA (frankly, I'm surprised they haven't already). Then the companies who make file translators and other like products will have to (if they don't already-- I don't know how it works) pay steep licensing fees to be able to continue making their products. Anyone who doesn't want to or can't afford to pay licensing fees, but still insists on making a non-Microsoft means of reading/writing Office files, could be prosecuted.

~Philly

Re:The writing's on the wall for Microsoft

[pubjames]

The problem for Microsoft is (at least outside the USA) organisations increasingly understand Microsoft's game, and are refusing to play. They understand that it is dangerous to let Microsoft get a headlock on you, and so are starting to wriggle out of it.

Once you make the change from Microsoft to another format, then Microsoft's file formats just become a legacy problem.

Re:The writing's on the wall for Microsoft

[mpe]

microsoft is continuing to develop it's products - it's not standing still, so oss will always play catchup.

Not quite so simple. Since in other ways Microsoft is playing "catchup" with open source systems. e.g. XP has the ability to select user acounts by icons, something kdm and gdm provided long before...

Re:The writing's on the wall for Microsoft

[Ian Bicking]

free != free: there's still support. who do you call when you can't get staroffice to stop crashing? microsoft will always have much better (and more expenseive, but that's their game) support than some oss alternative. the support business model is causing small oss vendors to crater left and right.

Not true at all. You can get good support for OSS products -- either with support contracts, or if you have more load, you can hire a consultant. A consultant has a lot more motivation to provide good support, because if they don't you can just hire another one.

Right now most support for MS products isn't from MS by a long shot -- it's by the tech support guy. OSS often requires more advanced support, but the potential capabilities of that support person are considerably greater. As OSS products become more shrinkwrapped even less skilled tech support people will be able to support them. Linux is certainly easier to support now than it was a few years ago.

And please, when was the last time you got support from MS because Office kept crashing? You just reinstall the damned OS and pray.

Re:The writing's on the wall for Microsoft

[MrBlack]

I _like_ this analogy, but it's not even really like that. Imagine that the car industry was dominated by one manufacturer, who had a reputation for making cars that had a lot of safety problems, and where the hood was welded shut. Imagine also that you couldn't re-sell the car once you bought it, that it came with no warranty of any kind. Now we image this magical new process that means cars could be manufactured for free. Sure, you still have to put petrol in them (but you had to before right?), you still need to get them serviced if they have problems (these new cars are easier to service because you or your mechanic can look inside and figure out how they work, of course when they first come out there are not that many people who understand them but the number slowly grows while at the same time the cars become easier to fix!) But they are free!! On reading this analogy I can't even really understand why I use windows. Better go home and remove that NTFS partition.

Re:The writing's on the wall for Microsoft

[Malcontent]

What you are not considering are the following.

MS will most likely lose market share becasue foreign governments are tired of their cash leaving their country and ending up in Bill Gates pocket. Besides they don't trust MS not to sneak in backdoors.
MS will also lose market chare becasue people in third world countries will not be able to pirate their software anymore. This will increase the market share of free and lower cost alternatives.
MS will also lose market share amongst small mom and pop type of operations who can not afford to buy MS software and who will not be able to pirate it anymore.
MS will lose some market share (maybe not a whole lot but some) amongst small to medium size comapnies who will switch to open source software to save money. Retraining is a lot easier when you are a 20 person company then a 20,000 person company and small companies have less money to play with.
Eventually enough people will be using non MS products so that MS will not be able to coerce anybody to do anything. If even 20% of the people of the world use a non MS desktop people will stop sending DOC attachments. If foreign governments only accept non proprietary documents (or even star office documents) then people will make sure they can generate those files.

Eventually MS will have to be compatible with a significan minority of users or their share will slip even further. It's very important for MS to maintain an almost 100% monopoly otherwise they would have to lower prices and they don't want to do that.

As for support other people have pointed out that you are full of shit if you expect to get support from MS because your office keeps crashing or because your PDF files print with garbage on them.

Re:The writing's on the wall for Microsoft

[Malcontent]

Hate to say this but...

The reason you should sell Microsoft is because Microsoft is the number one target for terrorists right not. Bill Gates is the richest man in the world and Microsoft represents America's superiority in technology. So far the terrorists have gone after highly visible symbols of american dominance (WTC for economic dominance and the pentagon for military dominance). The remaining two are MS and hollywood.

Not only should you sell Microsoft but you should also move away from Redmond or LA. Those are diffuse targets (I.E they are not single buildings) and the attack is likely to take out a lot of people.

Time to cash in those stock options if you ask me.

Nobody wants to thinks about these things but we have to face reality sooner or later.

Re:does not apply..

[A Tin of Fish Steaks]

I think that it should be of concern to us. It will affect our society whether or not it directly affects us as individual computer users. Microsoft is not content to be a software monopoly; they want to be a media/communications giant as well. In attempting to become "The Gatekeeper of the Internet", Microsoft will have enormous influence over what sites and services Windows users choose. It isn't comforting to think a single corporation will have so much control over the information that the average internet user has access to.

Of course, AOL is trying to do the same thing. It's already hard for the novice AOL user to tell where AOL ends and the Internet begins.

Given the corporate consolidation that has already occurred in the media business and AOL's huge market share in Internet access, maybe what Microsoft is doing isn't such a bad thing. We need more competition in this area, and Microsoft may be the only company in a position to do it. A world where AOL/Time-Warner has a disproportionate influence over what we see, read, and hear isn't any better than one in which Microsoft is in charge. I just hope Microsoft isn't overly successful. No one should have a near monopoly over access to information.

Re:does not apply..

[GlassUser]

Code to standard, not to browser. If it doesn't display, it's the browser's fault.

Is it time for Linux marketing?

[MongooseCN]

Ok, I know how everyone here hates marketing, I don't like it either. But for most of the people in this world they only listen to marketing, not factual intelligent reports or people. These people need all their information given to them, they can't go out and search for reports. How many people do you think will read this Cnet article if it's not email/icqed to them by a friend?

Most people have never heard about Linux until a few reports started popping up here and there on the news. I have had relatives email me news articles about Linux because they think it's some new and interesting thing. Usually I've already read about the topic months ago but they are just getting around to hearing about it because it was just shown to them by a local newspaper or on TV.

We need to start giving people more information about Linux and Open Source projects and their goals. We need to inform people about how their information and freedom is going to be controlled if they don't stop it. If we just sit back and keep denying that we need to announce these things to the world and keep trying to feel safe in our little groups, then MS will keep shoveling out how great it and it's products are and people will keep handing their money and freedom over to them.

Re:Is it time for Linux marketing?

[Mr. Sketch]

Linux has always needed a marketing machine behind it, but now I think it's absolutly vital for it's survival. Sure, there will always be slashdot readers who use linux and it should hopefully stay in the server market just fine.

I would propose the formation of the Linux Marketing Foundation that organized large marketing campaigns, commercials, etc to promote Linux and inform people about how their freedom is being stripped away by Microsoft. With an few articles on slashdot and a paypal donation account, they could probably get up quite a bit of cash to get started since I doubt they'd be able to get any sort of official VC.

IBM seems to be trying to promote Linux, but it's mainly on the server, and there's no information about how Microsoft is restricting their freedom which the public needs to know about. So far, every person I've told about Microsofts subscription model with Windows XP has vowed not to get it, and I'm sure that if the public knew about it, they would think twice too before running out and buying in next week.

Now is a critical time to start these kinds of promotions with all the heat that microsoft has been under from the DOJ, people are starting to be a bit suspicious of them and to think twice about what microsoft is doing. The seeds of doubt have been sown, now it's time to nurture them and soon we will reap the harvest.

Re:Bill Gates Is The Antichrist

[well_jung]

Hey, look. We have all these nifty t-shirts talking about Tux and "Total World Domination", well at least Bill's doing something other than making t-shirts to accomplish this end.

It's a dirty game people! We should all know this by now. Stop waiting around for Mom/Dad/Gov't to step in and make them play fair. They ain't gonna. There is a swell of resentment towards MS in the Corporate IT world right now the likes of which have never been seen.

We need to make our shit better. We need to get the word out about WHY MS is Evil, and WHY Free software is Good. We need to do this OURSELVES. And we need to do it somewhere other than the choir chamber.

Re:does not apply..

[DrSpin]

Its OK, MS can't do this- it would certianly be illegal as well as immoral. ... Outside of the USA, even clauses forbidding reverse engineering are illegal.

Thats another reason why Linux got going in Finland, while BSD didn't in the USA.

Anyway, Computer history teaches us that first time users can be sold any amount of overpriced sh*te. After they have been badly burned, they wise up. Mainframes did it - IBM nearly died as a result of a sales plan based on kicking the sh*te out of their customers. Minis did it - where is DEC now? DG? Prime?. The PC has brought 100 million suckers to the market. Next time they upgrade, they will do it to get a feature they can USE. Easier access to viruses probably is not it.

Non technical users keep asking me "why do I get these messages about my programs committing immoral acts?" I tell them its because they were fool enough to buy programs from Microsoft. Maybe they should consider alternative suppliers.

I still wonder how, with the infinite pool of developers that is open-source, how comes kde is not as slick as Win95? and gnome won't install on anything ever, and includes virtually every piece of open source ever written in its dependencies.

Identification - don't need it, don't want it

[dingbat_hp]

Honestly, I would be/is a lot simpler to have the internet and all its related services (web, mail, chat, identification etc.) integrated seamlessly into the OS

Identification is The Embodiment of Pure Evil (tm). We DO NOT NEED THIS !

What we actually need is the ability to prove rights; the right to listen to streamed Metallica, the right to check a bank account balance for Fred Bloggs. Neither of these requires identification (believe me - this is what my cow-orkers at HP keep inventing).

Identification is easy though. It's the dumb, obvious, server-based architecture for M$oft drones who can't think out of the box (or similar sucky HR phrase).

What identification does in addition to proof is that not only does it make the user's requirements work, but it also allows the Nasty Evil Corporates to track when it does so. Passport is good, but it's good for M$oft, not for the users.

Sun are no better. They're riding the anti M$oft hype with a non-Passport Passport-alike that suffers all the same problems.

Human nature to bow to higher powers

[heroine]

Unfortunately while some of us still want to determine our own business ventures and say what we want, we're constrained by the majority of the human population which wants to be controlled. You can't for instance, start a business in Silicon Valley without first having Microsoft approve it because the technology for running a business of any worth is controlled by Microsoft.

You can't broadcast material of any form without Microsoft's approval because every means of information transmission is controlled by Microsoft. Sometimes the restrictions are rediculous, like using the color red because red is a Microsoft color or saying contacts are better than glasses because Bill Gates wears glasses. I especially hate not being able to travel freely because it would disrupt Microsoft's ability to balance its monthly license revenue across the world. I'm probably going to move to China where at least you can change lanes on the freeway without written permission from MS.

For Heaven's sake

[hawk]

Just get married. Then it's easy. If you come downstairs and your wife screams then hangs her head to shake it, you go back up and try again.

OK, so it's not foolproof. SHe didn't think that that plaid suit & plaid shirt went together, but , really, they did!

hawk

Web Proxy Co-Op (huh?)

[SomeoneGotMyNick]

With the price of broadband getting cheaper (or more accepted), and as M$ chokes off compatibility to the services on the Internet, why not make a shareable translation system which will keep other systems compatible.

I recommend a co-op of sorts. A group bands together to get one (1) copy of a M$ product, a server. Someone in the group w/ broadband can run the server as a proxy whose sole job is to proxy web services and translate them to/from RFC standards on the fly. All members surf through the proxy. They can use whatever browser they want. The whole system SHOULD be Lynx compatible.

I mention the M$ product because the M$ standards will most likely be already installed and useable. A custom application can be coded to leverage the new "standards" and translate them as needed. Just buying the one copy puts less money into M$ pockets than every user buying a copy of an M$ operating system.

Disclaimer: These are just thoughts. A spark of an idea if you will. I'm sure there will be AC responses describing any flaws in it.

Re:The Microsoft's on the wall for writing

[StrawberryFrog]

fall flat on its face.. I predict this will happen within about three years

People have been saying that for 3 years or more. Remenber when win2000 was supposed to be a disaster due to code size & complexity?

Microsoft is in many ways a pre-Internet company. The internet has caused changes to the way software is developed and distributed. There is nothing Microsoft can do about this.

Microsoft would like to be a post-internet company and they are working hard on it. That is, each time when you fire up Microsoft office, it will make a Microsoft connection to a Microsoft server so that you can sign on to Microsoft passport, get out your Microsoft wallet and make a Micropayment into Microsoft's not-exactly-micro account. (Integrating passport into applications is mentioned in the article). This is what they can do about it.

And the first email virus would be..

[malkavian]

Given that people are now getting conditioned to MS using these 'reminders' to get people to sign into things, not really being aware of what that entails, I'm just waiting for the XP specific virus that comes up with the 'confirmation' reminder, or similar, that asks the user to re-send their details and password as confirmation of the account.
Bingo, how to compromise the financial security of about 50% of the net in one easy sweep.
Of course, MS could head this off by educating users not to keep clicking buttons, but then, they'd start understanding just why they don't need all the Windows add on garbage, and stay with what they have...
Instead, it's easier to let the users risk their money to let MS make a buck, than let MS lose potential revenue by educating people as to what is really going on...

It's my redneck background...

[wirefarm]

It's my redneck background, I guess - Back in high school, we used to get drunk, drive around in in pickup trucks and shoot at mailboxes and stopsigns and other inanimate objects. This is kind of the same thing...
I know I occasionally cross the line between Linux advocate and Linux asshole, but it's a very fine line. I think of the cost of Windows (NT/2000/XP) and I can't help but think that I could spend that money buying something other than software. Sure, I could install illegally, like many people, but I get a kick out of supporting the efforts of people who actually think that writing software is *cool*. People who write software to fit the needs of themselves, not the needs of their marketing department.
If, as you say, you are trying to help me, take a moment to examine your own motives. Why do you oppose the free software movement? Do you feel inadequate because you never got the hang of 'tar -zxvf'? Did you install Slackware a few years ago and never manage to get 'X' working? Take another look.
Yes, as you said, I probably think too much about free software, but doing so has afforded me a good life - freedom to do what I want, where I want, when I want, regardless of what the MSCE drones are handed down from Redmond.
Enjoy your life, I will enjoy mine. :-)
Cheers,
Jim

Re:does not apply..

[Anonymous Coward]

I help run a reasonably popular information / e-commerce site. Under no circumstances shall the site ever EVER depend on Microsoft software or services, from web server to authentication mechanism to browser.

Nor, mind, will it rely on software controlled by any large corporation; I also ensure that hardware purchases avoid Intel, for AMD may not know how to cool a CPU given a vat of liquid nitrogen, but at least they're Not As Evil.

Statistics show that the majority of our visitors use AOL, yet we do little more than a passing test with the AOHell versions of browser software to ensure there are no nastinesses (caching issues come to mind, and were fixed). As long as AOL remains capable of downloading and rendering standards-compliant pages, so shall AOLers be welcome, even if they do whine like spoilt children.

And what if/when AOL/a Microsoft bastard child begin to refuse to download non-MSified content? Well, if business requirements prevent me from locking them out completely with a huge warning message, they will instead receive content with a huge warning message, that details every last lock-in evil that has caused us to need to create a "special version" of the site. If businesses everywhere did this, and such messages included awareness of alternatives[tm], ah how much better things would be..

I urge responsible sysadmins everywhere to ensure that their company is as unlikely as possible to invest in Evil** software or hardware. That's YOU, readers.

** There's always someone who replies "Hitler was evil, Stalin was evil, but Microsoft are not 'evil'." Get over it, OK. Less unecessary whine, more action.

Re:The Microsoft's on the wall for writing

[pubjames]

Microsoft would like to be a post-internet company and they are working hard on it.

Of course. The question is, can they do it fast enough?

It is true that people have been predicting Microsofts demise for years. However, that doesn't mean that it is not going to happen. I personally believe that they conditions today mean that Microsoft is in a position that it is practically impossible to get out of, at least maintaining its current turnover.

Analyst on crack.

[Medievalist]

Gary Hein, an analyst at Burton Group, said Microsoft has never been shy to influence that evolutionary process where the consumer is concerned.
"It reminds me of the old story about how to boil a frog," he said. "If you throw a frog into a pot of boiling water, it will immediately jump out. But if you put a frog in a pot of warm water and slowly raise the temperature until the water boils, you have frog soup.
"Consumers aren't going to be thrown into a kettle of boiling water from the get-go, but rather enticed into an inviting, lukewarm bath, and then the temperature will be slowly raised over several release cycles."

This guy's had a little too much bufotenine. I suspect a frog thrown into boiling water would either be killed either immediately (if the water was hot enough) or shortly thereafter from a scalded epidermis. And I'm pretty certain frogs leave changing environments before they become deadly... most animals are fairly well evolved for that sort of thing.
On the other claw, I think this aphorism aptly demonstrates the attitude both Microsoft and these analysts have towards the computer-using public. They think we're incompetent based on their fantasies of how we behave. What a bunch of maroons.
--Charlie

PS- Who the hell would try to boil a live frog anyway?
--C

ie6 and 404s

[K.]

the story mentions something about ie6
automatically directing the user to msn's search
engine when they get a 404 - is this true? If so,
isn't it a bit presumptuous on their part? 404
responses can after all be used to help people
find whatever they were actually looking for on a
site, and redirecting them would prevent this.
Isn't this pretty much the same issue as the
Smart Tags thing?

Re:ie6 and 404s

[Phroggy]

IE5 displays "Friendly error pages" if the error message returned by the server isn't bloated enough. If the error is big enough that it probably contains useful information, you'll get the error from the server; if not, you'll get a "page could not be displayed" error. Presumably in IE6, it redirects to MSN instead of giving you the "page could not be displayed" error, but only if the error page is simple (like, say, the default Apache error messages, especially the ones that say Apache at the bottom, which Microsoft really hates).

Microsoft Knowledge Base article Q218155

OMG!!

[A_Non_Moose]

No body picked up on this, oddly enough:
(granted this example has been beaten to death, but yet it is so apropos)

Gary Hein, an analyst at Burton Group, said Microsoft has never been shy to influence that evolutionary process where the consumer is concerned.

"It reminds me of the old story about how to boil a frog," he said. "If you throw a frog into a pot of boiling water, it will immediately jump out. But if you put a frog in a pot of warm water and slowly raise the temperature until the water boils, you have frog soup.

"Consumers aren't going to be thrown into a kettle of boiling water from the get-go, but rather enticed into an inviting, lukewarm bath, and then the temperature will be slowly raised over several release cycles."

So, pardon the pun, what it boils down to is:
1)Microsoft is slowly turning up the heat to "boil its customers alive"...those bubbly bits floating at the top are just silly things like, personal freedom, consumer rights et al.
2) If #1 happens, we can no longer tell Microsoft "Sorry, NO soup for you!"
3) The scary part is reading throug the sea of info, you start to realize the people/consumers/revenue streams are (or can be used) interchangably. Neo in the cocoon, anyone?

IMO, XP has the potential to ruin "us", but, as an example, my boss, is so "enamoured" with MS products...however...XP ain't going to happen at all in the future.
(Even after asking my opinion...I said "Oh, HELL NO") Reason? Too many implications and 'Track Record' and the recent worms have hammered the point home of "Every new version of windows == bigger and badder exploits"...heh, maybe that is what MS means by XP(loitable).
And my boss agreed!.

The "pucker factor" is way too high on this one and the cow-nsumers are getting spooked, finally.

Moose.

Re:does not apply..

[rfsayre]

Yeah whatever. The reality for the professional is that you code for every browser the client pays for, and try to make everthing validate too. If the client is using Netscape 4.7 and your site is broken, it's your fault. Sometimes you'll get clients that specify that the site should work for everything, and sometimes they're only worried about IE 6. The fact is, standards compliance in concert with cross-browser compatibility costs money, and not everyone is willing to pay.

Apparently

[wirefarm]

I still give too much credit to your typical slashdot reader - maybe you enjoy flipping between your WebTV and your Saturday Night Live too much to contribute intelligently to this conversation.
Go ahead, flame me - I've got Karma to burn, but all I really proposed that there is an internet that has always existed *in spite* of the commercial offerings of AOL/TW/DoJ/MS-Disney. Don't believe me? Go on IRC and talk to the developers of the latest and greatest Linux software - browse sites like this one.
Listen - You have basically two options:
1.) Contribute
2.) Be ignored
Take your pick...

Cheers,
Jim

Re:does not apply..

[lunatik17]

don't render properly under Mozilla, because the web designers didn't care.

I've compared Mozilla's gecko renderer to IE's html renderer, and I have a hard time telling a difference most of the time. Mozilla is actually one of the few browser that can properly render css2, and IE isn't one of them. The only times Mozilla doesn't render properly is when someone used something like shockwave... and stupidity like that should be punished, OS be damned.

95% of all online purchases are made from Windows machines, then from a business point of view it doesn't make sense to worry about the other 1%

Who cares about the online ordering sites that don't work? Most do, so just buy from somewhere else. It's really no big deal. And commerce sites aren't the reason the Internet is cool in the first place. If that's all people wanted they'd just stick with AOL.

Re:does not apply..

[Nater]

Until open source realizes this, they'll never make headway.

Many have realized this, but it's a case of "damned if you do, damned if you don't"

If free software follows spec and not Microsoft, then IE takes the cake because it can handle more of the code that's actually found in the wild and users might not understand the details, but they will notice this fact.

If free software follows Microsoft and not spec, then IE takes the cake because we've effectively handed the standards process to Microsoft and they'll do whatever they damn well please with it.

The only real solution is to convince web developers to develop sites to spec, and yes, in many cases that is a very steep uphill battle.

Re:does not apply..

[Junks Jerzey]

But why in the hell would you turn away paying customers based on arbitrary things such as choice of operating system or browser?

From a business standpoint it's about the same as turning away people who have a credit card that isn't Visa, Mastercard, American Express, or Discover. Does it _really_ make sense for most businesses to accept other cards? It's just an extra headache for an all but irrelevant market. Sure, turning down Linux-using customers is throwing away money. But losing five sales a day doesn't matter when you're getting 5,000 sales a day anyway.

It's disappointing to see Linux users responding with the sadly predictable "Well we don't want their stuff anyway."

What you missed.

[mindstrm]

I agree with all your points but the last. Or at least, with regards to microsoft, I disagree.

Although you are technically 'purchasing' software right now.. it becomes outdated quickly as everyone moves to whatever microsoft tells them is next. This means yearly upgrades, expensive, even though you 'purchased' the previou software. Microsoft has done this to get poeple used to think this is 'normal'. Now they come along and offer to rent software instead.. which, at this moment, is cheaper than upgrading every year with outright purchases. Why buy when it's outdated every year anyway? A car or a house, you can keep for 10 years, or a lifetime, respectively.
You can't do that with Microsoft software. (I say microsoft. .becuase you certainly COULD do this with some software)

Microsoft WANTS Open Source .NET development

[MagicM]

According to the second article:

Chairman Bill Gates told CNET News.com earlier this year that building demand for new products by seeding developer interest "is the Microsoft strategy. We have bet our future on that."

The more development is done on .NET-related projects, the bigger the chance that Microsoft will get away with it's evil plans. So drop your ideas of "competing" with Microsoft in the .NET-world, because it will just attract consumer interest to Microsoft.

Huh? LLBean and Mozilla work fine

[Ars-Fartsica]

I have made purchases from LLBean using Mozilla 0.9.4 on FreeBSD without any problem whatsoever.

Re:does not apply..

[Rob Kaper]

WINE was made because Linux users needed Windows apps, why can't Mozilla or Konqueror be made to impersonate IE's functionality?

KHTML's policy is to render valid HTML with a strict parser and quirky HTML with hacks that allow IE-only HTML. Konqueror's user agent can be set to IE for sites that actually check browser version instead of capabilities.

If sites seriously don't work, report a bug for KDE or Mozilla.

Re:Already looks Like AOL

[Rob Kaper]

Or better. If you have constructive ideas, please go to the websites of KDE or GNOME and join a development, artist or UI design team.

If you don't want Linux to look like XP, create your own theme/style/icons and behavior configuration ruleset. If you do want Linux to look like XP, do the same.

Corporate reaction

[Animats]

What to tell your management:

Do you want Microsoft to have a list of all our employees? With the right to resell it?
Do you want Microsoft to have a list of all our computers and all our software?

Clearly, many corporate firewalls are going to have to block Microsoft's registration sites, to keep XP installations from "accidentally" leaking information out.

Re:does not apply..

[silicon_synapse]

it costs money to hire more competant developers or let them take the time to redesign a site to make it viewable on less popular browsers. When the cost of redesigning the site is higher than the likely profit from the target group, it doesn't make sense to invest in a redesign. Of course reputation needs to be taken into account, but honestly how many people do you know that have any idea what mozilla is or even care?

Re: Frog in hot water

[No Such Agency]

The "boil a frog" metaphor is a _metaphor_. It may or may not literally be true, but more importantly, it describes people's tendency to ignore a worsening situation until they are well and truly f*cked. This is NOT a "fantasy about how people behave" but is pretty close to a ubiquitous behavoiur. I sure do it - I have f*cked myself this way soooooo many times :-)
I suspect that Passport becoming a paid service would turn a lot of people off using it (people are cheap, as stated in several other posts) UNLESS M$ waits until Passport is required to make almost any purchase or financial transaction on the Internet. Then people will have no choice but to shell out, or go back to mail order catalogues and "allow 4-6 weeks for delivery"...

Re:does not apply..

[A coward on a mouse]

You make the assumption that it costs the same to design for the 20th visitor as it does for each of the first nineteen. I can tell you, it probably costs more to design for the non-IE users than it does to design for all of the IE users put together. If the cost of reaching that last five percent of the market is so high that it eliminates any profits made by selling to them, it makes better sense just to leave them out.

Meat-space businesses do the same thing all the time by not requiring all customer service people to speak Spanish, Vietnamese, Hindi, etc. Not offering customer service in foreign languages may cost them a few sales, but the cost of hiring multi-lingual service reps is so high that it makes better sense to just say "Non-english speakers not welcome here".

see that's what I mean

[streetlawyer]

This is the attitude. You'd rather have a little badge from the W3C that proves it's "not your fault", than have your users able to view half the Web. You don't care.

Re:see that's what I mean

[reverius]

As an outside observer to this quickly-heating discussion, and a former web designer, i'll contribute my $0.02.

Personally, I do care about my users.

That's why I code to standards, and encourage them to get a better browser if the page doesn't render properly. ;)

Wouldn't want people that I care about to be using a bad browser, now would I?

Re:see that's what I mean

[GlassUser]

Hey, this is slashdot, you're not allowed to make sense!

Re:see that's what I mean

[tempest303]

eh!? I think the W3C badge is a clear sign that a developer DOES care. When browser developers don't code to the W3C standards, it's THEY that do not care. That's why standards are there - for everyone to use and reference. Anyone who breaks that standard is the one who "doesn't care".

Re:Is it time for Linux marketing? - not really

[pubjames]

Products that are free don't need the same type of marketing as products that you have to pay for.

Look how far Linux has gone with hardly anyone spending a cent on marketing it. It really is quite increadible when you think about it.

The other day, I was talking to a client about Linux. He said that he thought his company would never use it. I was able to tell him that he did use it already - his company web site runs on it. He didn't realise that. The point is, he's a Linux user without any Linux marketing ever getting anywhere near him.

There will be more and more products with Linux embedded - people won't know it, and that's the way it should be. I don't know who manufacturers the spark plugs in my car. Why should I care?

Hmmm

[einhverfr]

"If successful, Microsoft could challenge AOL Time Warner and other media giants for control of the Internet and entirely new industries"

OK. But I thought that a company with market power (in this case the market is the destop OS) was not allowed to use that market power to secure new markets (My Services/Magic Carpet/Dot GNU). At least that is what case law seems to indicate.

I am all for giving AOL/Time Warner competition but, I don't think that this will settle well with courts, and I don't think that it is right.

OT: I had a strange experience when I called MS Press and discovered that their clearinghouse was owned by Time Warner....

Vice President Glortho

[Alien54]

Redmond, WA - Microsoft, in what is being regarded as a bold move, has hired Vince Glortho, Keymaster of Gozer the Gozarian as Vice President in Charge of Keeping the Internet Gateway.

I can see the next ghostbuster movie running in my head as I read this.

God, the boys in the research labs...

snooze

[sulli]

Oh, come on. MS has been trying to get a monthly billing relationship with its customers since MSN was introduced with Windows 95 way back in the day. So what? Every vendor would like to have such a relationship, but whether or not it is realistic is quite another question.

Sure, MS would like to have everyone pay for Windows by subscription. And they would like for everyone to have a Passport account, et cetera. But they will only succeed if they can make this attractive for their customers - and recent history shows that they have not been able to do so.

As long as I can get email and web services from another of the 5,000 or so ISPs operating, and I can use Yahoo, and I can use a Mac, I'm really not worried that much about this particular threat of Microsoft monopoly.

The guy on the plane...

[phillymjs]

...was ZDnet columnist David Coursey, and it was Office XP that was demanding insertion of its install CD so it could re-activate itself on his laptop. Unfortunately, Coursey was just starting out on a lengthy business trip (during which he would presumably need to use Word to write his articles) and had left his Office CD at home. (The link attached to his name goes to part 2 of the article, part 1 was posted in June and doesn't seem to be available in ZDNet's archives).

~Philly

Re:The guy on the plane...

[infiniti99]

part 1 was posted in June and doesn't seem to be available in ZDNet's archives

Do you mean this? :)

Part 2 links back to it.

-Justin

Re:does not apply..

[irktruskan]

There's another face to this argument, although it has conspiracy theory written all over it. A good deal of sites are created with software, not hand coded- mostly because the people creating the site do not understand HTML any more than I understand the minute details of quantum physics. Too bad HTML editors rarely output W3C certifiable code. Anyone that has seen the code some of those pieces of software put out understands the horrors within. Certainly not compliant by any definition of the word- and hence browsers striving for that compliance end up not rendering them right. Opera and Mozilla are both doing everything in their power to try to adhere to the standards set down by the W3C, and bully for them. I can name one other browser, however, that could really care less about the standards, and doesn't hesitate to render bad code as if nothing is whack. (hint: ... do you even need a hint?)

I'm beyond assessing blame- that is a buck that can be tossed indefinitely and incur a lot of energy expenditure doing so. I'm just observing that browsers that render bad code as if it was good code allow designers to continue writing bad code.

-irk

Its a business plan....

[Kailden]

The way I figure, this isn't all that unusual unless you are a non-M$ user.

For instance, take "Quicken" Ever notice how it encourages you to connect to the internet, get an id at www.quicken.com, tells you all about Quicken loans, etc etc etc.

Then AOL, they send a cd to your house every month, spread crap all over your desktop if you use thier messengers etc etc etc.

Then the x10 camera popups. It goes on and on, and its a side effect of capitalism and marketing.

Credit card companies send you envelops full of ads. You get spam directed toward your emails.

And it works, because its annoying...its works, because people will sign up for passport, people will upgrade to XP.

But luckily there's plenty of people who won't, for different reasons. That's what's so great FREE as in No $$ software, it takes the marketing out...so no big need to advertise (although it isn't stomped out completely, since people always want recognition or a link to thier site, or continued recognition through all future developments (thank goodness all licensing isn't like that))

I'm not saying its a great thing---but hey paying for cable and still getting commercials isn't FAIR either---try petitioning you local big business congressman on that :)

Sure Which is good if...

[einhverfr]

Suppose you want to steal someone's identity, credit card info, bank statements, ad nauseum. Passport is the IDEAL way of doing this and one does not even have to involve directly attacking the servers. For instance see the following site:

http://www.passport.com@www%2elinuxdoc%2eorg...

Because that URI is standards compliant, it will work in any browser. Furthermore, any of the letters in the hostname can also be substituted using the %hex hex notation. So call me paranoid when I see this as being a great benefit to computer criminals...

Unfortunately, not nearly as secure as one wishes

[einhverfr]

Oh yes, I and millions of others really want to hand over my credit card and other details to a reasonably secure system, just like I want to be running ISS and get hit with CR or Nimda. Of course Passport will store more than just CC details so expect there to be cases of identity theft, can you imagine tens of thousands, or hundreds of thousands of people having to cope with having their identities stolen and used in fraudulent activities? How much might this cost the economies of the world? More than the WTC bombing? Ten times more?

A system like Passport is only as secure as:
1: the users (can they be tricked into giving up their credentials?)
2: The users' computers (Can the cookies be stolen?)

But with that already in place, the fact that all the information is IN ONE PLACE means that the incentive to attack and breech it is greater than it ever has been in the past. Dot GNU resolves this problem but does not resolve the above two issues will remain unresolved.

Re:does not apply..

[spectecjr]

Opera and Mozilla are both doing everything in their power to try to adhere to the standards set down by the W3C, and bully for them. I can name one other browser, however, that could really care less about the standards, and doesn't hesitate to render bad code as if nothing is whack. (hint: ... do you even need a hint?)

Wouldn't be Netscape Navigator, would it?

Just for the record... before shooting your mouth off, check out the latest version of IE6.

Simon

Re:does not apply..

[jejones]

That will put us in a perpetual game of catch-up, and MS has played that one before. If MS gets its way with apps sitting on the net and automated updates, it will be that much easier to propagate new versions designed to break Linux apps...and modifying code with the sole purpose of breaking competitors' software is a famous MS technique as well.

Both MS and AOL hate the net & want to co-opt

[gdyas]

I'm sure some others have thought of this, but I want to see if /.ers in general might agree with this theory.

Before the open, take all comers internet rose from the DARPA labs to worldwide prominence, all previous efforts at such a wide-spanning network were controlled, pay at the gate affairs that had always planned to remain strictly private. We all remember the early days of AOL, Compuserve, Prodigy, MSN, etc. The idea of a free, open network that anyone can get on & use at relatively low cost is anathema to companies like AOL is and MS wants to be, whose bread & butter consists of (or is seen to be consisting of in the future) running networks. As long as the internet remains an open system where anyone can get on & protocols are laid out for all to see, it's going to be a threat to their business. What's needed above all in their eyes is some sort of control of the exchange of information, of how business is conducted, and how money changes hands so they can create and maintain an ongoing revenue stream, making this free network profitable for them since their owned networks & software are fast meeting obsolesence. They wish to be the Visa / MC of the net, only more. They want to interject themselves as a middleman between consumer & retailer and between friends & strangers, between you and information itself, collecting micro or perhaps not so micro payments along the way. In this light, AOL & MS aren't evil as much as they're both cut-throat competitors fighting over which of them is going to eat our lunch.

The problem is, of course, that it's OUR lunch! The internet isn't an MS or AOL invention, it's OUR invention as much, if not more, than it is theirs. Our government funded companies and academics to invent this beautiful thing, and they're looking hard for a way to use software to make it their own.

How can we stop this? I'm not sure.

Perhaps we should seek laws mandating all standards & protocols for internet communication be open, so that no company may control the exchange of information. I'm not sure. But no company should have even partial control of how anyone else uses the internet.

Microsoft wants to be like AOL?

[rnturn]

I left AOL years ago (seems like nearly a decade ago now). I even got a letter from Steve Case (which I'm just positive was personally written :-) ) wanting to know what they could do to get me to come back. Ha ha ha. A lot of people I know left AOL when they couldn't gain access for days at a time and never went back. It wasn't worth the hassle so many switched to smaller ISPs.

Sure, Microsoft, be just like AOL and experience the feeling of having your customers leave in droves. My prediction is that your new XP release will convince a lot of people that using Microsoft products just isn't worth the hassle.

But can they? The world is Office 97...

[SuperKendall]

I'm not sure how widespread this is, but I think the corperate world seems to be stuck at the level of Office 97 documents - in our company at least, Word and Excel documents are supposed to be in 97 format even if you have a newer version...

So, if Star Office and the like all read and write Word 97 documents I see no reason why they cannot interoperate well in any company.

What it comes down to is will they be able to add features that people need taht cannot be contained in a Word97 document? I know they will try, but I'm not sure they can come up with something compelling.

Ugh!

[da3dAlus]

"...Recently renamed .Net My Services". Wow, is that to match the My Network Places, My Computer, My Briefcase? I'd like M$ to kiss .Net My Ass and suck .Net My Cock. There's just so many ways I could rant about this, about how it's just wrong in so many ways. But what the hell good would it do?

But if software is a recurring cost...

[SuperKendall]

In the new Microsoft world though, software is no longer an asset but a recurring cost, just like employees - in a way it becomes an employee of a sort.

If a company has a position that can be eliminated, it just makes good fiscal sense to eliminate that position and reduce overhead. I think that's part of why the original poster is claiming Microsoft is doomed - by making thier software a constant liability instead of a one-time cost, from an accounting view MS looks much less appealing to use.

In a way that was already true as companies ended up having to upgrade every few years, but people never really thought about it like that before, Microsoft is just making that more obvious.

MS: Quit being so unfair to us!

[unitron]

We didn't invent the internet, we didn't develop it, we didn't see it coming until it was almost to late to keep from being run over instead of jumping on the bandwagon, but it involves computers and a chance to make money so obviously it's only fair and just that it should belong to us and no one else.

Sincerely,
Bill G.

Wrong!

[sulli]

Renting whatever is always a lose-win situation for the customer and the renter

I sound like John McLaughlin today, but: WRONG!

Renting can be a good deal, depending on your situation. If you aren't keeping it for a very long time, renting an apartment or a car is a lot better than buying it and selling it later: you have certainty of cost through the term of the lease, and you don't have to worry about routine maintenance. Your landlord or rental car agency takes care of all that.

Software is a little bit different because it's really a consumable. If the version gets old, you can't really resell it for much (forget for a moment the licensing issues) - but it's easy to extend its useful life beyond the 3 years normally planned. (I still use Office 97 for Windows, for example.) For this reason, I do think that renting desktop, OS, and so on SW is a bad idea.

But people gladly pay annual support ("rent") for other things - e.g. anti-virus software. It all depends on how much service you're getting from the vendor during the "rental" period.

Re:does not apply..

[irktruskan]

My apologies, I was not aware that I was wielding large caliber weapons with the intent to rearrange my jawline.

As for IE6, I just left Windows XP land completely several days ago because of massive incompatibilities. (lets not get into XP bashing/defending please) Objectively though, what little surfing I did within it was alright, save the fact that IE6 does break the search abilities of www.pricewatch.com. (at least it appears to- happens on multiple XP systems but only in IE)

To clarify, I was infact referring to varying versions of Internet Explorer. In an attempt to give Microsoft some credit (this goes against my nature) I imagine IE's ability to render horrid code accurately stems from their wish to have IE render FrontPage pages without hitch.

Just for the record, two questions for ya. How am I shooting my mouth off? This I am truly curious to know. Also, how did you manage to fill in the blank I left with Navigator? I referred to Mozilla distinctly outside the "certain other browser" motif.

-irk

.NET WILL win.

[BitwizeGHC]

IANA1AD (I Am Not A 1337 Analyst D00d) but here is my summary of what I, a humble little developer, see coming over the next several years:

It doesn't matter what you think of .NET. If you're a Java developer you're probably laughing it off. If you work with more robust languages like LISP or Smalltalk, .NET is probably something of a running joke to you, much like Daikatana is to the Penny Arcade guys.

But all that doesn't matter. Because .NET will win, and it will become the default programming environment for the 21st century, marginalizing everything else into niche markets.

The reason why is it will be built into Windows XP, and sooner or later, everyone will have to upgrade to XP (or later) to fit into Microsoft's new licensing plan. Suits will rub their chins and think, "Hmm, why waste so many hours of development time trying to integrate our software services over the network when Microsoft's .NET tools do all we need?" The result is near-instant domination of the network's infrastructure at the application level, on a scale so staggering as to make the browser wars seem like a limited skirmish.
Unfortunately, not even free software will solve this problem, as Miguel "Unix Sucks 'Cuz It Don't Work Like Windows" de Icaza has done a lot of crowing as of late about Mono. If Mono catches on it will effectively make the non-Microsoft free software world a tributary to the Microsoft-dominated infrastructure. We'll be forever chasing taillights.

The executive summary is that Microsoft has the power to force developers into using whatever they want, and it will affect programmers everywhere, even if they don't (currently) write for the Windows platform.

Re:GNOME IS SEXY

[BitwizeGHC]

Gnome apps cannot seem to get off the ground. They lack orignality, sophistication that OSX brings to the table. Even the enlightenment develeper Raster apps run 15 times better and more efficiently, I might add, than Gnomr's rendering libraries. One wonders if the Gnome developers lack the know-how to build applications that work.

My experience with GNOME 1.x bears this out. I do not like the slow, bloated feeling that comes with GNOME. KDE is both easier on my eyes and snappier but I much prefer a basic WM with assorted xterms lying about to any sort of pointy-clicky "desktop". :)

Re:.NET WILL win- oh really?

[Chris Johnson]

Um- 'Microsoft will march on a road of bones!' isn't exactly a new concept. You will indeed find many people to confirm this: most of whom work for Microsoft Marketing. By that logic, Microsoft Bob long ago became the dominant user interface of the 21st century (some would say it _has_ ;) )

It's nice to insist that Microsoft will always win, but you also need a dose of reality. It isn't simply that Microsoft is fighting it out with fellow software developers like Sun, or that they are trying to force people into a highly proprietary version of e-business that IS NOT PROVEN TO WORK using software that has been an enormous reliability headache (Peter Principle for software?)... though this by itself would be a strong argument that they are going to fail.

The trouble is, the degree of control and influence they are seeking puts them in a dominant position to actual governments. They want to be able to shut you off if you haven't paid your bills no matter _who_ you are- and there are people out there who do not define themselves as 'consumers' or take such threats lightly. For instance, the military- if not the US military, then that of other countries. Not to mention the EU taking a very dim view of XP and .NET in general- not to mention the fact that they are consistently losing in the US courts and betting everything on the somewhat strange notion that, if only they delay and commit greater and greater crimes as fast as they possibly can, by the time they are to be punished they will be more powerful than the government and will have to be let go.

That's very childish: governments don't take challenges to their power lightly.

So: I contradict you. .NET _cannot_ win, except in a vacuum with certain set rules (that MS has infinite money, that the ground rules everywhere in the world are totally unrestricted Chicago School free-market capitalism, that there can be no reaction to their aggression except economic reactions). And _none_ of those rules even apply! Microsoft burns through horrible sums of money and there's no telling how much they _really_ have- even they might not know. They're not honest people, why would you trust them to tell you the true state of their resources? They're faced with situations all over the world that defy Chicago School capitalism, even in the USA. And they have already been targeted with anthrax mailings- clearly not everyone in the world is prepared to just 'compete in the free market' with them, after all this talk of war on Microsoft it seems at least somebody out there is identifying them (and not unreasonably) with Western Capitalism, and launching terror attacks on them specifically.

The problem here is hubris: it's better if .NET _does_ fail, and I mean better for Microsoft. It would do them enormous damage, but they'd be able to re-adjust, as IBM did when they were in Microsoft's position. Pursuing their expansion strategy to the uttermost limit only guarantees a harder fall.

Re:.NET WILL win- oh really?

[Chris Johnson]

Additional note that I came across since posting this: you'd think they'd meet estimates, right? Not. Microsoft missed Wall Street estimates this last time around by as much as _twenty_ cents a share. That is serious hurting. To some extent they've gotten themselves into an absolutely impossible position- even if they fail immediately it's still gonna be a brutally hard lesson, and the longer they hang in there the worse the crunch will be.

Bear in mind that _while_ they are missing estimates they are also shoveling cash into X-Box, into .NET, all these projects. Their burn rate is incalculable. I will risk a guess and say, just as a hunch, that Microsoft is probably going to go broke _before_ any of the other dooms catch up to them. By the time the DoJ comes around with an elaborate and paranoid rulebook for Microsoft to play by, it may already be too late. Had they been broken up they could have done wonderful things with their finances in the process, and continued to thrive as much as ever- but that opportunity is lost to them now, most likely.

Re:does not apply..

[geekoid]

Thinking of Mozilla just adds pressure because then we also have to start thinking of how to fit a website in a 640x480 window. Don't get me started on that.
I hear this kind of crap a lot.
I have designed a Major web site for a financial orginization, and the only thinf that make it difficult is the ignorance of the designers.
When I was first put in charge of the project I heard the same crap from my "developers" and"web masters".
They had been spending a a month grousing about how netscape wouldn't work on the net, and how difficult getting the sizing was. I sat down, coded the site to work in Netscape, Mozilla, and opera in a day. Then fired the "web master"
I know I should let it get to me, but these damn morons think they know it all, but most of them can't write an app to parse a phone number.
When I first started doing GUI, I would have been laughed at if I tried to create 3 boxs to enter a phone number , instead of proper parsing.
Bottom Line, never higher someone who doesn't have engineering experience.

On the off-chance this is not a troll...

[D Anderson n'Swaart]

• This is the most ridiculous thing I have ever heard!! Whatever company you say you are running is obviously NOTHING close to a real company. Ridle me this, batman, when you write up company standard procedure documents, do you really pitch AMD with "Not as evil, as Intel (although they are technically superior)"?

Perhaps he doesn't pitch it with "Not as evil, [sic] as Intel" but something more along the lines of "More friendly to small consumers; more emphasis on performance, less on marketing" and the like. I'd fairly say that a company that uses marketing and market domination to succeed is more evil than a company that creates good products at the expense of their marketing department.

• You any-microsofties [sic again] are so silly the way you keep deluding and trying to convince yourself that Windows is no good.

To some extent, they are. Windows 2000 is a reasonable operating system that meets most users' needs. Windows 98 is a low-end home system. Windows 95 is too old to mention. Windows ME, on the other hand, is extremely unstable; and Windows NT has required seven service packs (including 6a as a separate one) I believe. That doesn't say "reliable operating system" to me.

• Just stick to your own beans, and stop trying to convince the world and yourselves that your beans are better. Fact of the matter is that they're NOT. Microsoft's popularity and the HUGE support they get from corporations is proof alone.

Assuming that you're not a fourteen year old with no idea what he's talking about, and that you're not trolling (two pretty big assumptions), could you please cite some more reliable "proof"? OSS bigots are annoying, yes, but that doesn't change the fact that the previous poster didn't sound particularly bigoted, and that in general *nix systems are better than Windows ones. If one compares Linux (the kernel, not a specific distro) and Windows, one discovers certain things:

• Linux has a huge number of independent programmers capable of contributing to its development, because it is open source. Windows has a select few (relatively), working for a corporation whose primary goal is to make money. This means that
• there is no way for anyone except those at Microsoft, or people constricted by a Microsoft eula, to check the code for errors, bugs or holes, and subsequently hold Microsoft accountable for them. Compare to Linux, where the code can be freely changed by anyone with the necessary skills, and is under constant review and improvement by a huge community of programmers
• Windows is based on the belief that, provided it does the job well enough to bring in revenue, there is no need to improve it. Compare to Linux, which is based on the belief that everyone should be able to have a say in what software they use, and what that software does
• all Linux distributions are potentially more secure and stable than Windows ones. This can be seen in the huge number of Linux-flavour boxen used by small corporations who require reliable server operating systems that don't need to be patched or upgraded frequently, and in the number of Linux worms/viruses compared to Windows ones

Your assertion that Microsoft "must be better because they're more popular" is naive at best. Marketing has played a large part in Microsoft's continued dominance of the market, but more than this, their existing manopoly, built on anti-competitive business practices, is the real reason that their software is popular. From the time that DOS was engineered to deliberately cause competing software to be unstable, Microsoft has taken the market through unfair business practices, and held it by the same means, and through creating software that is "good enough". Their continued popularity is a snowball effect, enhanced by such things as license agreements that prevent oems from dual-booting other operating systems on machines that ship with Windows. I could answer your assertion more fully, but it would require an essay that would take up more than its fair share of space in this thread, and get me modded down anyway. It would be far easier if you read the article linked at the top of this thread for a very comprehensive description of exactly what I am talking about. This isn't even about which OSen are better; it's about business ethics and restricting the consumers' choice.

• Get out of your bubles and realize that Microsoft has played a HUGE key role in the popularity of the PC which in turn has had huge economical impacts that filter down to almost everything. If it wasn't for Microsoft, the PC may still be a hobby of the socially-challenged.

That's a pretty big leap of logic. I think it was IBM, actually, who played the key role in the popularity of the PC, by opening the standards on the ISA bus, and other hardware companies that either opened their standards or created clones of the standards opened. Windows played a key role in making the PC more user friendly, yes, but it would be unfair to assert that this was due to Microsoft innovation. It was due to their opportunism, and nothing more. Windows 3.x was merely a bad copy of the existing gui already created by Apple, but because it ran on the IBM-PC, and because there was no immediate competition, it was successful. I don't think you can seriously make out that if it weren't for Microsoft the PC wouldn't be popular. That's simply ridiculous, since IBM's OS/2 would have filled the gap if Windows hadn't.

• Maybe if your Linuxes/Unixes every rose up to support as much software/hardware as Windows does, maybe then it too would have some flaws in it's security.

Apart from wondering where you learned to speak English (since you could be foreign), I'm wondering what you mean by "support software/hardware". Operating systems don't support software; the software supports them. As for hardware, it may be true that Windows supports more than Linux, but that is beginning to change. Your idea that either of these factors has anything to do with security except very indirectly demonstrates a fundamental lack of understanding of how an operating system is built. In fact, for the most part, it is not Windows (speaking of Windows 2000) that is insecure specifically, but the programs that run on top of it. Running IIS on Windows 2000 is a bad idea, because it has been demonstrated repeatedly to be a security nightmare (and yes, it is Microsoft's flagship web server, which hardly says a lot about the company's priorities), but running Apache (as I do) is pretty safe, because Apache is quite simply a more secure and superior product. You forget that when people say that Microsoft produces inferior software, they are not necessarily talking about Windows. In general, they are probably talking about the software that runs on Windows just as much as the OS itself, and this software has been repeatedly demonstrated, in one way or another, to either leave something to be desired, or be simply very badly designed.

• Many of you individualize all Microsoft/Windows problems but Fail to realize EVERYTHING around them.

I presume by this comment you mean that people focus on the problems and not the bigger picture, or that people focus on the problems while forgetting about the good things. This is somewhat foolish considering you have already demonstrated that Microsoft is so popular, and that their "beans" are better. If their beans were better, surely there would be no problems to focus on? I can't think of any Linux problems I've seen lately. And assuming there were, wouldn't it be fair to call attention to problems with Microsoft software, since it has so much more potential for damage due to market share? I don't think you even understand what you just wrote there. Perhaps you meant generalise. If that's the case, then yes, attention is being called to the general trend displayed in most Microsoft products for either poor design, limited features or bad security.

• Bottom line: Stop putting other people's success down because your Boat isn't floating that high.

I think I've already addressed this. The thing that people resent is that the Microsoft boat (cruiseliner? aircraft carrier?) isn't floating higher for the right reasons. I'll carry that aircraft carrier analogy: Microsoft is a stagnant company without any real innovation (see most of the features emerging in their products that have been available in others for months/years) that uses its mass and power (read: manopoly and money) to stay afloat, crushing the other wee boats if necessary.

Nonetheless, I am forced to ask, which sea are you referring to? Because Linux is floating a lot higher on the sea of freedom, choice, stability and security.

disclaimer I am a Windows user who has never even installed Linux. That doesn't mean I know nothing about open source software

They already have.

[Balinares]

They can (and most likeliy will) also try to control the content.

They already have. Remember the Frontpage license?

you are insane

[streetlawyer]

I'm sorry, I have to regard this as insanity while fearing something worse. Half these people seem to think that a broswer is better, the fewer sites it can render properly! Surely to God the objective ought to be to make things as smooth as possible for the user, not to arbitrarily punish them for other people's coding mistakes by stopping them from viewing popular sites. These are W3C standards, for fuck's sake, not the teachings of the Prophet Mohammed.

Re:"Gate"keeper

[xmedar]

We are survived by hiding from them by running from them. But they are the gatekeepers. They are guarding all the doors. They are holding all the keys, which means that sooner or later, someone is going to have to fight them. - Morpheus, The Matrix