Slashdot Mirror
States Claim There is No Match for Microsoft
Bergkamp10 writes "State antitrust regulators have dismissed companies such as Google and Mozilla Corp, and software technologies such as AJAX and SaaS as "piddling players that pose no threat to Microsoft's monopoly in the operating system and browser markets".
According to the report ten US states, including California, New York and the District of Columbia have called for an extension of monitoring of Microsoft's business practices until November 2012.
They claim that little has changed in the OS and browser spaces since the 2002 antitrust case ruled against Microsoft. In their most recent brief, the states countered Microsoft's contention that Web-based companies — Google, Salesforce.com, Yahoo, eBay and others — and new Web-centric technologies constitute what Microsoft dubbed a "competitive alternative to Windows."
Not even close, said the states, claiming that while these companies' products provide functionality for users they still rely on Operating Systems and browsers — the two spaces where Microsoft dominates.
Experts were apparently even more damning, claiming competition in the market has not been restored since 2002 and that the collective powers of Google, Firefox and Web 2.0 are about as effective as a one legged man in a butt-kicking contest when it comes to unsettling Microsoft's monopoly of the market."
TTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTT , X ._.-' X / X /_ X
/ O O\ }} \ ,'---'\___\ X
/ \ X
T T
X I Like Ponies!!!111! X
X
X })`-=--. X
X }/
X _.-=-...-'
X {{| , | X
______ X {{\ | \
/ _ \ \ LLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL
I\____\ \ TT
I I I I\__/ II
\I_I_I/_ _II
\ _ _ _ i IIo
\----- i_IIO
\ LL
Please control the human population, have sex with ponies!
01001000 01100101 01101100 01110000 01100011 01101111 01101110 01110100 01110010 01101111 01101100 01110100 01101000 01100101 01101000 01110101 01101101 01100001 01101110 01110000 01101111 01110000 01110101 01101100 01100001 01110100 01101001 01101111 01101110 00101100 01101000 01100001 01110110 01100101 01110011 01100101 01111000 01110111 01101001 01110100 01101000 01100001 01110000 01101111 01101110 01111001 00100001
When I think of dirty old men, I think of Ike Thomas and when I think about Ike I get a hard-on that won't quit.
Sixty years ago, I worked in what was once my grandfather's greenhouses. Gramps had died a year earlier and Grandma, now in her seventies had been forced to sell to the competition. I got a job with the new owners and mostly worked the range by myself. That summer, they hired a man to help me get the benches ready for the fall planting.
Ike always looked like he was three days from a shave and his whiskers were dirty white, shaded by the brim of his battered felt fedora.
He did not chew tobacco but the corners of his mouth turned down in a way that, at any moment, I expected a trickle of thin, brown juice to creep down his chin. His bushy, brown eyebrows shaded pale, gray eyes.
The old-timer extended his hand, lifted his leg like a dog about to mark a bush and let go the loudest fart I ever heard. The old fellow then winked at me, "Ike Thomas is the name and playing pecker's my game."
I thought he said, "Checkers." I was nineteen, green as grass. I said, "I was never much good at that game."
"Now me," said Ike, "I just love jumping men ..."
"I'll bet you do."
"... and grabbing on to their peckers," said Ike.
"I thought we were talking about ..."
"You like jumping old men's peckers?"
I shook my head.
"I reckon we'll have to remedy that." Ike lifted his right leg and let go another tremendous fart. "He said, "We best be getting to work."
That summer of 1941 was a more innocent time. I learned most of the sex I knew from those little eight pager cartoon booklets of comic-page characters going at it. Young men read them in the privacy of an outside john, played with themselves, by themselves and didn't brag about it. Sometimes, we got off with a trusted friend and helped each other out.
Under the greenhouse glass, the temperature some times climbed over the hundred degree mark. I had worked stripped to the waist since April and was as brown as a berry. On only his second day on the job and in the middle of August, Ike wore old fashioned overalls. Those and socks in his high-top work shoes was every stitch he wore. When he bent forward, the bib front billowed out and I could see the white curly hairs on his chest and belly.
"Me? I just love to eat pussy!" Ike licked his lips from corner to corner then sticking his tongue out far enough that the tip could touch the end of his nose. He said, A man's not a man till he knows first hand, the flavor of a lady's pussy."
"People do that?"
He winked. "Of course the taste of a hard cock ain't to be sneezed at neither. Now you answer me, yes or no. Does a man's cock taste salty or not?"
"I never ..."
"Well, old Ike's willing to let you find out."
"No way."
"Just teasing," said Ike. "But don't give me no sass or I'll show you my ass." He winked. "Might show it to you anyway, if you was to ask."
"Why would I do that?"
"Curiosity, maybe. I'm guessing you never had a good piece of man ass."
"I'm no queer."
"Now don't be getting judgmental. Enjoying what's at hand ain't being queer. It's taking pleasure where you find it with anybody willing." Ike slipped a hand into the side slit of his overalls and I could tell he was fondling and straightening out his cock. "Now I admit I got me a hole that satisfied a few guys."
I swallowed, hard.
Ike winked. "Care to be asshole buddies?"
We worked steadily until noon. Ike drew a worn pocket watch from the bib pocket of his loose overalls and croaked, "Bean time. But first its time to reel out our limber hoses and make with the golden arches before lunch."
I followed Ike to the end of the greenhouse where he stopped at the outside wall of the potting shed. He opened his fly, fished inside, and finger-hooked a soft white penis with a pouting foreskin puckered half an inch past the hidden head.
"Yes sir," bre
Since when is the District of Columbia a state? Last time I checked, they have 0 senators. Losers.
Microsoft is no match for the dread pirate Elaine Roberts!
I agree. I used to get really exercised about M$, but then I started reading about Monsanto. M$ is greedy and unethical, but their behavior doesn't usually kill or maim people. Monsanto is another story.
You might a$ well $ay that every company i$ ju$t a$ evil a$ MS becau$e every per$on i$ ju$t a$ greedy a$ Bill Gate$ and a$ craven a$ $teve Ballmer. That make$ a$ much $en$e a$ MS'$ unnatural $oftware monopoly.
A free $oftware market will favor many vendor$ of free $oftware. A free market adopt$ open $tandard$ that lower the co$t of commerce. It'$ amazing that MS ha$ pulled off it'$ goofey 1980'$ file format and O$ game for $o long. The co$t$ of upgrading from one barely adequate O$ and Office $uit to it'$ $ucce$$or ha$ alway$ been much larger than the upfront co$t of $oftware and forklift hardware replacement. It'$ been blood $weat and tear$ wa$ted moving and converting everything or lo$ing it forever. Market rejection of Vi$ta $how$ that both home and bu$ine$$ u$er$ are getting $mart. Given the choice of Vi$ta or the highway, people have cho$en to limp along with what they have and are looking for another ride. Free $oftware i$ ju$t what they are looking for becau$e u$er$ who write $oftware make $ure $oftware doe$ not $crew u$er$. Another plu$ i$ a great choice of vendor$ becau$e $oftware that ha$ no owner$ can be fixed by anyone. Many winner$, $uch a$ IBM, will emerge but none will have the kind of advantage$ MS ha$ now: complete owner$hip of a platform full of $ecret$ and booby trap$. Red Hat can not run Novel out of bu$ine$$ though dirty trick$, they can only compete fairly. The world will be a better place without that kind of wa$te and the billion dollar$ a month MS wa$te$ in adverti$ing to convince people that nothing could be better.