Well I suppose we had this one coming. Although we do promote the idea of "Remove Windows and install Linux" - but this is simple common sense;)
I mean what else did you expect from M$ on this. Like everything else M$ seems to relise it will be incompatible with all technology but their own, even at this you will be lucky. Anyone remeber the patch from M$ for the Microsoft Network Client - worked but shafted the Novell Client in the process.
So in their words "You see our technology works while the rest of yours don't".
Although I haven't seen Win2K (not WinY2K) yet I bet that it shafts Samba in the first release patch... or something.
I think its more important to remeber the roots of science than who actually came up with what. i.e. The Atomic Bomb and curing cancer through exospure both have their origins in Nuclear Physics. Antibotics and chemical weapons - Biochemistry. I have always found that so much emphasis is put on who discovered what and what kind of person they were. Rather than the actual content of their work. Two cases come to find, both of which come from documentaries run by the BBC. The first one was about Einstein. The documentary spent most of its time talk about his personal life and how he wasn't a good husband, also it talked about his politcal views. This is all very well and good and it did give an insight into what he was thinking. But how much of it was dedicated to explaining what his work was about and what the implications of his work did. About 5%. Mind you this is better than the second one which was about Bletchy Park, used by the British Goverment during the WWII for code breaking. This was a four-part documentary about code-breaking and I was keen to watch it. What actually rambled on about was the personal lives of the people who worked there. When it came to talking about Alan Turing all they talked about was how he was a martar to the homosexual cause. It didn't discuss anything about why this man is considered to be one of the greatest computer scienctists who ever lived. I think its more important to remember the scientific content and not who came up with the idea. Don't get me wrong credit is due where it is deserved. Also on the mention of the invention of the Atomic Bomb lets have a closer analysis of what it has done. When the Atomic Bomb was invented America was at war with Japan. There were two alternatives. Use the bomb or continue a war that would have cost more lives on both sides. I think using the bomb was the better of the two. For one it ended the war very quickly and stopped it tragging out and costing more lives than the bomb took. Also it hammered the message home about how horrible war is and it has shown that we cannot afford to go to war as a species anymore. Basically it now acts as a basic understanding between even the most hated enemies in that actually going ahead using it is so terrible that one can only imagine. It acts as a lease. What does scary me is the person who has no care for life anymore and only wants to hurt. Or the person who believes so frantically in his religious belief that they must carry out apocoliptic prophecy that they are choicen to carry out these acts getting their hands on one of these devices. Basically anyone who is not afraid dieing doesn't give a damn that the rest of us want to live. Sorry for the off subject ramble. But the point remains science is science, and it doesn't matter who discovered what, in the end science is about the persute of truth and it will be the correct theory that will survive regardless of what people think about how rediculous it sounded when it was first discovered. How we apply our scientific knowledge as a race is matter of thought (poltics, debate, etc) and not science. Sorry for the ramble which is way off topic.
Technology is really a double-edged sword in that can usually be deployed for both good and bad. Case in point the genetic engineering. On the good side it will probably be used to create new treatments for all sorts of, presently, uncurrable diseases. On the bad side it can be used to create or enhance new forms of viruses and bacteria for use in germ warfare. And of course there is a very large shade of varying grey between the two extremes.
I think having a healthy fear of technology is actually a positive thing. Because it makes you step back and look at what the technology is being devised for, its applications and the consequences of its use. More or less you have to come to respect it so that when it comes to humans actually using the technology then they are aware of the risks and can take proper steps to lessen them.
However fear based on ignorance, rumour, speculation or because it is politically correct to be afraid of a technology is definitly not a good thing.
Another case in point comes from the UK, where I live. A couple of months ago there was a huge knee gerk reaction to genetically modified food. The foundation for this was the confirmation that a professor's results that a particular strain of genetically modified tomato might cause a slight supression in the bodies immune system. (I am sighting this from what I remeber so may not be quite accurate). As this was a great story for the media to pick up on it allowed for the creation of a mass hysteria that all genetically modified food is evil and should be removed from the face of the Earth. Some of the results of this have been a large number of test crops of genetically modified food have been destroyed either from protestors, peer pressure from farmers. A common arguement being used is that the genetically modified substances could cause irreversible damage to the natural enviorment - hmm never mind the that we are constantly using mass tonnes of chemicals to make are food look good. Several large supermarket chains have removed all products with any G.M. ingredients in them. There is a barage of legislation being prepared against G.M. foods. This has not been contained to G.M. foods but really to any application of genetic engineering research within the UK. In short the progress of genetic research and its possible applications has been set back god knows how many years. Also it should be notied that any logically sound arguement for genetic engineering has to be shown as if it were the devils own words.
So in respect I think a respect for technology is a good thing. But unfounded or over-hyped paranoia against will usually result in a witch-hunt that will only set us back as a species when need to be moving forward.
Let me see - so should we be thanking M$ for making an endless stream of flawed products and then haveing to accept in the licence agreement that any bugs, flaws and downright errors in their products is our responsiblity and not theirs?
And after that be charged for the correction to their mistakes ownly to be given a new set of bugs which only make the product worse?
Should we thank M$ for stamping out some great inovations and creativity, buy threating, FUDding, buying and abosing their monolopy position?
As a professional developer should I be grateful when using the MSDN documentation only to find that the API does not work as specified and then spend hours of wasted time in trying to find the solution that works?
Certainly my answer to all these questions would be NO.
Slashdot Mirror
I may have missed the point of the patent.
But does anyone remeber the line -
"How much were you look to spend?"
What is this a patent on an age old question?
Well I suppose we had this one coming. Although we do promote the idea of "Remove Windows and install Linux" - but this is simple common sense ;)
... or something.
I mean what else did you expect from M$ on this. Like everything else M$ seems to relise it will be incompatible with all technology but their own, even at this you will be lucky. Anyone remeber the patch from M$ for the Microsoft Network Client - worked but shafted the Novell Client in the process.
So in their words "You see our technology works while the rest of yours don't".
Although I haven't seen Win2K (not WinY2K) yet I bet that it shafts Samba in the first release patch
Does anyone know if Samba works with Win2K?
I think its more important to remeber the roots of science than who actually came up with what. i.e. The Atomic Bomb and curing cancer through exospure both have their origins in Nuclear Physics. Antibotics and chemical weapons - Biochemistry. I have always found that so much emphasis is put on who discovered what and what kind of person they were. Rather than the actual content of their work. Two cases come to find, both of which come from documentaries run by the BBC. The first one was about Einstein. The documentary spent most of its time talk about his personal life and how he wasn't a good husband, also it talked about his politcal views. This is all very well and good and it did give an insight into what he was thinking. But how much of it was dedicated to explaining what his work was about and what the implications of his work did. About 5%. Mind you this is better than the second one which was about Bletchy Park, used by the British Goverment during the WWII for code breaking. This was a four-part documentary about code-breaking and I was keen to watch it. What actually rambled on about was the personal lives of the people who worked there. When it came to talking about Alan Turing all they talked about was how he was a martar to the homosexual cause. It didn't discuss anything about why this man is considered to be one of the greatest computer scienctists who ever lived. I think its more important to remember the scientific content and not who came up with the idea. Don't get me wrong credit is due where it is deserved. Also on the mention of the invention of the Atomic Bomb lets have a closer analysis of what it has done. When the Atomic Bomb was invented America was at war with Japan. There were two alternatives. Use the bomb or continue a war that would have cost more lives on both sides. I think using the bomb was the better of the two. For one it ended the war very quickly and stopped it tragging out and costing more lives than the bomb took. Also it hammered the message home about how horrible war is and it has shown that we cannot afford to go to war as a species anymore. Basically it now acts as a basic understanding between even the most hated enemies in that actually going ahead using it is so terrible that one can only imagine. It acts as a lease. What does scary me is the person who has no care for life anymore and only wants to hurt. Or the person who believes so frantically in his religious belief that they must carry out apocoliptic prophecy that they are choicen to carry out these acts getting their hands on one of these devices. Basically anyone who is not afraid dieing doesn't give a damn that the rest of us want to live. Sorry for the off subject ramble. But the point remains science is science, and it doesn't matter who discovered what, in the end science is about the persute of truth and it will be the correct theory that will survive regardless of what people think about how rediculous it sounded when it was first discovered. How we apply our scientific knowledge as a race is matter of thought (poltics, debate, etc) and not science. Sorry for the ramble which is way off topic.
Technology is really a double-edged sword in that can usually be deployed for both good and bad. Case in point the genetic engineering. On the good side it will probably be used to create new treatments for all sorts of, presently, uncurrable diseases. On the bad side it can be used to create or enhance new forms of viruses and bacteria for use in germ warfare. And of course there is a very large shade of varying grey between the two extremes.
I think having a healthy fear of technology is actually a positive thing. Because it makes you step back and look at what the technology is being devised for, its applications and the consequences of its use. More or less you have to come to respect it so that when it comes to humans actually using the technology then they are aware of the risks and can take proper steps to lessen them.
However fear based on ignorance, rumour, speculation or because it is politically correct to be afraid of a technology is definitly not a good thing.
Another case in point comes from the UK, where I live. A couple of months ago there was a huge knee gerk reaction to genetically modified food. The foundation for this was the confirmation that a professor's results that a particular strain of genetically modified tomato might cause a slight supression in the bodies immune system. (I am sighting this from what I remeber so may not be quite accurate). As this was a great story for the media to pick up on it allowed for the creation of a mass hysteria that all genetically modified food is evil and should be removed from the face of the Earth. Some of the results of this have been a large number of test crops of genetically modified food have been destroyed either from protestors, peer pressure from farmers. A common arguement being used is that the genetically modified substances could cause irreversible damage to the natural enviorment - hmm never mind the that we are constantly using mass tonnes of chemicals to make are food look good. Several large supermarket chains have removed all products with any G.M. ingredients in them. There is a barage of legislation being prepared against G.M. foods. This has not been contained to G.M. foods but really to any application of genetic engineering research within the UK. In short the progress of genetic research and its possible applications has been set back god knows how many years. Also it should be notied that any logically sound arguement for genetic engineering has to be shown as if it were the devils own words.
So in respect I think a respect for technology is a good thing. But unfounded or over-hyped paranoia against will usually result in a witch-hunt that will only set us back as a species when need to be moving forward.
Eh... Yeah! Right.
;)
What is this some kind of Monty Python meets Benny King (I think thats who the comedian was who kept getting chased around by women in underware).
Definitely should get the award for most weird or disturbed posting so far. Deserves the golden padded cell award
However lets try not to encourage this too much.
Let me see - so should we be thanking M$ for making an endless stream of flawed products and then haveing to accept in the licence agreement that any bugs, flaws and downright errors in their products is our responsiblity and not theirs?
And after that be charged for the correction to their mistakes ownly to be given a new set of bugs which only make the product worse?
Should we thank M$ for stamping out some great inovations and creativity, buy threating, FUDding, buying and abosing their monolopy position?
As a professional developer should I be grateful when using the MSDN documentation only to find that the API does not work as specified and then spend hours of wasted time in trying to find the solution that works?
Certainly my answer to all these questions would be NO.