Yes, and eventually the market would do what the market is slowing doing to Microsoft. Someone would come out with a line of houses that were considerably less expensive than the houses that came with a car rental. They would probably also come out with a line of inexpensive cars. In more affluent areas people might still buy houses that came with car rentals (especially if there weren't quality control problems with the Ford cars), but more frugal types (and car fiends) would gravitate to the option that allowed for more choice or a lower price.
They can always pull a "software audit" on Massachussetts. All they have to do is ensure the cost of an audit will cost more than it would to force massachussetts to buy microsoft products. They've done it before and they will do it again. It's the ultimate weapon, and it's very effective.
That's a tactic that I hadn't thought of, and it would certainly be a way of putting pressure on Massachussetts. However, it would have to be one heck of an audit to cost the state more than an upgrade to Office 12 (estimated cost $50 million for 50,000 desktops). My guess is that such an audit would actually be detrimental to Microsoft's cause, in the same way that an audit of Ernie Ball Inc. prompted a mass migration to Free Software. Massachussetts is already planning on phasing out Microsoft Office. If Microsoft pushes too hard against Massachussetts it could very well decide to switch operating systems as well. I am sure Novell (now headquarted in Massachussetts) would be willing to help Massachussetts make the switch. More importantly, Microsoft knows that it has to sell Windows Vista and Office 12 to 49 other states. If it puts too much pressure on Massachussetts then other states could very well rethink their reliance on Microsoft. No one wants to be in a position where their vendor can dictate terms. Part of the reason that Microsoft was able to garner the marketshare they currently have is that they have been pretty customer oriented. Generally speaking Microsoft solutions have always been a pretty good deal.
And since when has microsoft cared about the law anyway? They got off easily by ordering the bush administration to pull the plug on the antitrust trial.
There is a difference, my friend, between what's legal and what makes economic sense. There's lots of people that have problems with the government interfering in the software industry. I have been an advocate of Free Software forever, and have used Linux as my desktop both at work and at home since 1995. I think that eventually Linux is going to win out for purely economic reasons. However, even being the huge Free Software bigot that I am I still had a problem with the government deciding what could and what could not be bundled with an operating system. Microsoft was able to "pull the plug" on the antitrust trial because there were lots and lots of people that had a fundamental problem with punishing Microsoft simply because it had been successful.
If Massachussetts' move to OpenDocument formats was entirely politically motivated then a software audit would perhaps be successful in getting it to change its mind. However, at least this time it would appear that Microsoft is getting the boot at least in part because its competition is "good enough" at a lower price, and that's very hard to maneuver against. Massachussetts officials can always point out that the switch is a cost savings measure and use that to bash opponents over the head.
It would appear that Microsoft has already let this happen. As of the 22nd the OpenDocument formats are the official formats of the State of Massachussetts, and by the end of next year all office software used by state employees will need to save (by default) in the new format. As I stated in my post a good part of the reason that Massachussetts is switching undoubtedly revolves around cost. The cost difference between a migration to OO.org and a migration to Office 12 was estimated at about $45 million dollars.
How exactly do you suppose Microsoft is going to be able to sweeten their deal to that extent and still stay out of trouble with the Department of Justice?
MS Office really is Microsoft's weak point. Switching to Linux is difficult and expensive, and since it's still difficult to get computers without Windows you aren't even really saving any money. However, switching to OO.org on Windows is pretty straightforward--especially if you are the State of Massachussetts and can simply force people to use whatever document formats you happen to adopt.
Microsoft's next move will undoubtedly be to try its hardest to discredit the decision makers in Massachussetts, and to make the switch seem expensive and troublesome. If Massachussetts can pull the switch off without too much of a hitch then Microsoft is in serious trouble. You see, Microsoft might make a lot of money, but Microsoft employees still have a great deal of their wealth tied up in MSFT stock. Bill Gates, for example, would happily flush Microsoft's entire cash horde down the crapper if it kept MSFT's stock price up. MSFT has been flat for years, but it still has a relatively high P/E ratio, that means that investors expect Microsoft to grow, and not at the measly 8% that it grew last year. Unless Microsoft execs can coax out some growth the stock price has nowhere to go but down. Huge defections to OO.org and Linux like the State of Massachussetts are going to put downward pressure on MSFT's price.
Of all of the OpenOffice.org family Writer is far and away the best piece of software. In fact, due to the fact that it makes it much easier to use styles in your document than MS Word I actually like Writer better than Word. The real problem with OO.org has always been file format compatibility with MS Office. I know that I have kept around a copy of MS Office for years now simply to test documents before sending them to MS Office users. For the most part OO.org has worked well, but sometimes there have been issues.
That's why government deals with OO.org are so important. They essentially represent Microsoft's worst nightmare because it puts the whole file format compatibility issue on the other foot. The government is big enough that it can mandate changes. Everyone deals with the government to some extent, and now dealing with the state of Massachussetts requires that you have OO.org installed (or something compatible). I wouldn't be one bit surprised to see OO.org usage grow to the point in Massachussetts where the OpenDocument formats become ubiquitous. Despite what Microsoft says most people don't really want to pay hundreds of dollars for MS Office, they just considered that a cost of doing business. If people can share documents without paying for MS Software then that's precisely what will happen.
Massachussets stated reason for switching to the OpenDocument format is that it allows them to guarantee access to important state documents. However, my guess is that this is just a fancy sugar coating over the real reason for switching, and that reason is the cost of migrating to Office 12. There is a very interesting exchange in the MP3 of the recent meeting that the state officers had with various software companies in which, after nearly an hour of saying that the state didn't want to talk about procurement, one of the Mass. officers let the Microsoft team have it right between the eyes. Basically he laid out the costs that Massachussetts would incur in a switch to MS Office 12, and it was clear that the costs were much higher than a switch to OO.org.
Massachussets is going to have to switch document formats no matter what they do. The new version of MS Office 12 is going to have a completely new set of document formats that won't be backwards compatible. Yes, Microsoft has promised plugins for some of the older versions of MS Office that will read and write these new formats, and yes Microsoft has tools that allow for batch conversion of documents, but OpenOffice.org has this as well. The state of Massachussetts has an estimated 50,000 desktops, primarily running Windows 2000. In order to use MS Office 12 Massachussetts would have to upgrade the operating system on all of these boxes, and in many cases it would need to purchase new hardware to boot. Not only that, but Office 12 also has an entirely redesigned user interface which would require additional user training.
Do you see where this is going? Massachussetts estimates (using past knowlegde of similar Microsoft updates) that a move to Office 12 would cost $50 million dollars. A move to OpenOffice.org is estimated to cost an order of magnitude less ($5 million dollars). Heck, if Microsoft is going to force their customers to a new set of file formats, with a new UI, and a new operating system then its almost certain that OO.org on their existing operating system and using existing hardware will be less expensive. OO.org also forces you to use a new file format and it will require training, but Massachussetts won't have to throw an OS upgrade into the mix.
The reason that Massachussetts can get away with the switch is that they are big enough that they can simply mandate a file format and expect people that deal with them to make the switch. You don't argue with the bureaucrats. If they want their documents in OpenDocument formats then you simply find a way to send them OpenDocument formats. The fact that the software necessary to deal with the state government is going to be a free download is just a bonus. If Massachussetts required MS Office 12, or WordPerfect, or even LaTeX that's what people would send them.
One thing is certain, a lot of businesses and individuals in Massachussetts are going to find it necessary to download and install OpenOffice.org, and many of them are going to like what they find. It's almost certainly going to become much more difficult to sell new versions of MS Office in Massachussetts. After all, unless you are some sort of MS Office power user you are not even likely to be able to tell the difference between the two programs, and OO.org is going to be required for dealing with the government.
I guarantee you that Bill doesn't want a bigger personal investment in Microsoft. In fact, at Microsoft's current rate of growth and share price I bet that even Microsoft doesn't want a bigger investment in MSFT.
And that's assuming that switching Windows out for OS X would be good for business, and personally I think that's a very BIG assumption.
Yeah, his comment was way funnier than mine too. I am pretty sure that I started my post before his went up, but I was working on something else and it took me a long time to post.
Right you are. I was a Disney addict when I was a kid, but as soon as I grew up I realized that Walt and all his heirs are evil. What put me over the edge was seeing Fantasia and realizing that he'd neutered all the satyrs!
You probably wonder why mainstream media doesn't seem to cater to your tastes. Here's a little clue, only lunatics want their children's movies with visible genitalia. Please go get yourself some counseling--preferrably somewhere far away from my children.
I was a little concerned when the first response to my post was an endurance weenie. It's good to see that there is at least one other/. member that understands the joy of lifting something heavy over their head.
Aerobic exercise is great for your back too, but you aren't going to build the muscles that protect your back to any great extent walking (or even jogging).
You aren't going to hurt yourself doing overhead squats with a broomstick, but you are going to teach yourself a ton about correct posture. Heck, get up out of your chair, throw your hands up over your head and squat a few times maintaining your chest pushed out and an upright upper body. You'll see exactly what I mean.
I ran for two years at least three times a week before taking up a bit of weight training, and adding in some overhead squats and other compound weight training lifts made all of the difference.
On the other hand, back pain is the single biggest cause of chronic pain in adults. I had a nasty little spell of it a few years ago when I wasn't sitting right, and at one point I had trouble just walking - I was literally hobbling. My fiancée has a very bad back, and occasionally it goes - then she's in intense pain for a couple of days until it eases, then merely a lot of pain for a week or two.
The cure to back pain isn't a fancy schmancy chair. If you want your back pain to go away you need to Deadlift and Overhead Squat. Start with just the bar (or a broomstick) at first, and concentrate on maintainig a health arch in back.
Back pain isn't prevalent in today's society because our chairs are harder than in years past. Back pain is prevalent in today's society because we spend all of our time on our asses. Even 20 minutes 3 times a week can make a big difference.
Believe it or not, I know who you are. I have even played with rosegarden a bit. I would also agree that ESR doesn't hack as much now as he in the 90's. I would also admit that part of my fan-boyism is almost certainly due to the fact that I really like Emacs and Python. Just because he's not as active any more doesn't make his software go away.
I am not saying that ESR is the world's best hacker, but you'd have a hard time convincing me that he's not far better than average. Microsoft could almost certainly find a spot where he would be useful, assuming, of course that he would actually work for them.
What rock have you been living under, Mr. Troll. Let's go over this step by step.
Between his oversized ego
I would maybe grant you that one. ESR has become a PR man for Open Source software, and you can't do that in the shadows.
his misperception of himself as a highly skilled programmer, his mostly outdated skills, and the fact that when he did try to collaborate to a team (with his kernel build system) he failed by committing a typical beginner's mistake (forgetting the requirements and getting caught in adding new "cool" features)
Ok, now that's just ridiculous. I did mention that ESR was a Python committer, has piles of credits in the Linux kernel (yes, his kernel build system didn't get accepted because of its dependency on Python, but he has done plenty of other things in the kernel), and lots of other work. You can't tell me that Python is a "mostly outdated" skillset. That doesn't even include somewhat less hackerish pursuits like the Jargon file, CATB, etc.
I can see how you might have a problem with ESR's public persona, but calling out his skills is just ridiculous.
You can say what you want about ESR, but I use a pile of that guy's software everyday. He's one of the Python committers, he's written more of Emacs than anyone save RMS, and that's literally the tip of the iceberg. Not to mention the fact that he's fairly well spoken, a published author, and a pretty competent PR hack. In short, he would probably make a good addition to just about any team.
If ESR would have labored his entire life on proprietary software he would probably still be skilled, but no one would have a clue other than the few people he worked with (and some of them would probably overlook his talents). Similarly, when Linus wrote Linux he was an undergraduate student in the frozen wastelands of Europe. Free Software gave Linus the opportunity to argue with Andrew Tannenbaum in a public forum and then prove that Andy was *wrong* and that a humble undergrad CS student was right (if you haven't read the comp.os.minix flamewars about Linux you really should). That sort of thing can only happen in a system where working code is more important than credentials. Linus could get a job *anywhere* and it's entirely because he was able to prove his skills with Free Software.
Any tricks that Microsoft plays with the Oasis document format are only going to rebound against loyal MS Office users. The only reason for Microsoft to include support for the format at all is so that they have some chance of keeping Massachusetts government workers (and those that have to communicate with them) from jumping ship en masse. Microsoft can try and change this decision, but if the Oasis document formats become the playing field then Microsoft had better play nice. After all, the last thing that you want when you send that important document to a government employee is for the document to crash their office suite (or look bad). If Microsoft Office is difficult to use in an environment that has standardized on the Oasis formats then Microsoft Office will get the boot.
Microsoft has been able to get away with tricks for years because they controlled the de-facto document format. In fact, Microsoft uses inconsistencies in the way documents are formatted as one of the primary ways to get people to upgrade to newer versions. Among Massachusetts government workers that's no longer going to be the case. The standard is almost certainly going to be OO.org. Officially the standard will be anything that can read/write the Oasis document formats, but you can bet that any application that doesn't play well with OO.org and StarOffice won't be welcomed, even if it does supposedly adhere to the standard.
Massachusetts can do that because they are big enough to force standards down everyone else's throats. If enough other organizations follow this lead then Microsoft is going to have a very very hard time getting people to buy new copies of MS Office.
In 2007 those few lifers that do use computers will have computers that are set up to use the Oasis document formats by default. Heck, it will probably happen even sooner than that for most Massachusetts state employees. That means that if you are forced to deal with a state employee you'd better download a copy of OO.org, because the government employee receiving your file is looking for a reason to send it to/dev/null.
Nobody in their right mind tries to explain why they sent a non-standard document format to a government worker.
OO.org is likely to become very popular in Massachusetts.
So you believe that Microsoft will compete with a fully functional OO.org that is available for Free, and comes with source code, by crippling MS Office.
Somehow I doubt it.
This is especially the case since Microsoft's new XML format was specifically denied "open" status because it isn't a truly open standard. You'll notice that Microsoft's new XML format didn't make the approved list (PDF and XHTML did). Massachusetts has basically told Microsoft that it is big enough to force everyone that deals with the Massachusetts state government to use a truly open document format. Microsoft can either play ball, or they can sell their office suite to someone else.
Those sorts of tricks have worked fine for Microsoft in the past because the de-facto standard was Microsoft's Office formats. However, now the target has shifted. If you want to communicate with Massachusetts government employees then you will have to assume that they are using OO.org. If documents created in MS Office don't look at least as good when exported to the Oasis formats as they would if they were created in OO.org then people that have to deal with the Massachusetts government are likely to simply use OO.org.
You'd be a fool to expect government employees to go out of their way to use your document formats when the obvious solution is for you to download a free program. If Microsoft's import and export of Oasis document formats isn't flawless then a lot of folks in Massachusetts are going to be forced to use OO.org.
This is a big deal to Microsoft because lots of people in Massachusetts deal with the government, and it is very likely that the Oasis document formats will become ubiquitous. If that becomes the case then Microsoft's ace in the hole, Microsoft Office document compatibility, flies right out the window. All of a sudden Microsoft will have the office suite with compatibility problems.
When push comes to shove most people use MS Office not because they need its added functionality, but rather because they want to be able to share documents with other people. If Oasis document formats become popular then Microsoft is likely to have a lot of trouble selling people new versions of MS Office.
That would actually be counterproductive for Microsoft. Let's imagine for a moment that you are a private company that does a great deal of business with Massachusetts and you have to send documents to Massachusetts government employees using Oasis OpenDoc formats. So you fire up MS Word (your company standard) and you create an important document that you are sending to your important government contact. At the last moment you remember that it needs to be in OpenDoc format and so you choose "Save As" before sending the document. Your government contact opens the file, it looks like crap, and so he gives the contract to some other company. Your boss finds out why you lost the contract and you get fired.
If Microsoft decides to create filters so that it can read and write Oasis formats then those filters better be at least as good as what's available for free in OO.org. Otherwise people will be forced to use OO.org and it will be Microsoft that is on the wrong side of the format wars.
The bit that you are missing is that this is inevitably going to put either StarOffice or OpenOffice.org on MA government desktops. In fact, it is very likely that the new Oasis document formats are going to become the lingua franca of MA government work. The real blow to Microsoft will be that people wanting to do business with MA government employees are going to either A) send documents in PDF form that can't be editted, or B) download OpenOffice.org. All of us have dealt with government employees at one time or another, and one thing is as certain as the sunrise. If the government employees that you have to deal with are using OO.org as their office suite then you'd be a fool to send them documents in any other format. Sure, the government workers might have a copy of MS Office lying around somewhere, but it's far more likely that they will simply try and open the document using OO.org's MS Office document filters, and if this makes your document look like someone hit it with a Mack truck then that's not their problem.
This puts the whole document compatibility shoe on the other foot. The state of Massachusetts is big enough that it can essentially force people to adopt its standards. Once the Oasis document formats (and OO.org) become ubiquitous then the ability to read MS Office document formats becomes a lot less critical.
The fact of the matter is that no one really wants to pay for MS Office. If OO.org gains any sort of critical mass then it's going to be that much harder for Microsoft to sell upgrades of MS Office.
i've never bought into the absurd notion that a company or organization doing things that the other people in the said groups don't know about.
Then you've never worked in an organization with more than 3 people in it. In a real business there are generally all sorts of politics going on. I have lost track of the amount of times I have seen Linux or BSD boxes put into production without approval up the corporate ladder. Heck, I have been involved several times with a project at the division level that was formed to fill the gap of a company wide software program that the division guys could see was doomed to failure. The division guys simply waited for a spectacular failure and then forwarded an skunkworks project that did more or less the same thing (but usually on a much less ambitious scale).
Microsoft is no different. There are thousands of ultra-competitive hackers there all trying to make their mark. In the business sector there are even teams that compete for essentially the same business. My personal guess is that Microsoft is stalling this paper because it knows that Windows is the only implementation of Trusted Computing that people actually care about. If Microsoft can force Apple, Sun, and the rest to wait for a paper before rolling out software then Microsoft will get the jump on them with Vista. That being the case there's almost certainly a wide ranging difference of opinion about Trusted Computing inside Microsoft.
Reach, my friend, reach. XAML will be available on Windoxs XP and Longhorn and AJAX is available everywhere, and while AJAX has some problems it's available today.
So while the idea behind XAML might be nicer now, you can't really use it yet, and even when you can use it too many of your customers will be unable to use it. Give AJAX another year and it will be polished to the point where it isn't so clunky anymore. Heck, it's really not that bad now as long as you have Mozilla's Venkman around. That's what should really scare Microsoft. Most of the folks that I know of that are designing Ajax apps develop for Firefox first (because it has better debugging tools).
My favorite part is that my designer buddy can lay out the interface using tools that he is comfortable with, and I just have to make it work.
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Yes, and eventually the market would do what the market is slowing doing to Microsoft. Someone would come out with a line of houses that were considerably less expensive than the houses that came with a car rental. They would probably also come out with a line of inexpensive cars. In more affluent areas people might still buy houses that came with car rentals (especially if there weren't quality control problems with the Ford cars), but more frugal types (and car fiends) would gravitate to the option that allowed for more choice or a lower price.
That's a tactic that I hadn't thought of, and it would certainly be a way of putting pressure on Massachussetts. However, it would have to be one heck of an audit to cost the state more than an upgrade to Office 12 (estimated cost $50 million for 50,000 desktops). My guess is that such an audit would actually be detrimental to Microsoft's cause, in the same way that an audit of Ernie Ball Inc. prompted a mass migration to Free Software. Massachussetts is already planning on phasing out Microsoft Office. If Microsoft pushes too hard against Massachussetts it could very well decide to switch operating systems as well. I am sure Novell (now headquarted in Massachussetts) would be willing to help Massachussetts make the switch. More importantly, Microsoft knows that it has to sell Windows Vista and Office 12 to 49 other states. If it puts too much pressure on Massachussetts then other states could very well rethink their reliance on Microsoft. No one wants to be in a position where their vendor can dictate terms. Part of the reason that Microsoft was able to garner the marketshare they currently have is that they have been pretty customer oriented. Generally speaking Microsoft solutions have always been a pretty good deal.
There is a difference, my friend, between what's legal and what makes economic sense. There's lots of people that have problems with the government interfering in the software industry. I have been an advocate of Free Software forever, and have used Linux as my desktop both at work and at home since 1995. I think that eventually Linux is going to win out for purely economic reasons. However, even being the huge Free Software bigot that I am I still had a problem with the government deciding what could and what could not be bundled with an operating system. Microsoft was able to "pull the plug" on the antitrust trial because there were lots and lots of people that had a fundamental problem with punishing Microsoft simply because it had been successful.
If Massachussetts' move to OpenDocument formats was entirely politically motivated then a software audit would perhaps be successful in getting it to change its mind. However, at least this time it would appear that Microsoft is getting the boot at least in part because its competition is "good enough" at a lower price, and that's very hard to maneuver against. Massachussetts officials can always point out that the switch is a cost savings measure and use that to bash opponents over the head.
It would appear that Microsoft has already let this happen. As of the 22nd the OpenDocument formats are the official formats of the State of Massachussetts, and by the end of next year all office software used by state employees will need to save (by default) in the new format. As I stated in my post a good part of the reason that Massachussetts is switching undoubtedly revolves around cost. The cost difference between a migration to OO.org and a migration to Office 12 was estimated at about $45 million dollars.
How exactly do you suppose Microsoft is going to be able to sweeten their deal to that extent and still stay out of trouble with the Department of Justice?
MS Office really is Microsoft's weak point. Switching to Linux is difficult and expensive, and since it's still difficult to get computers without Windows you aren't even really saving any money. However, switching to OO.org on Windows is pretty straightforward--especially if you are the State of Massachussetts and can simply force people to use whatever document formats you happen to adopt.
Microsoft's next move will undoubtedly be to try its hardest to discredit the decision makers in Massachussetts, and to make the switch seem expensive and troublesome. If Massachussetts can pull the switch off without too much of a hitch then Microsoft is in serious trouble. You see, Microsoft might make a lot of money, but Microsoft employees still have a great deal of their wealth tied up in MSFT stock. Bill Gates, for example, would happily flush Microsoft's entire cash horde down the crapper if it kept MSFT's stock price up. MSFT has been flat for years, but it still has a relatively high P/E ratio, that means that investors expect Microsoft to grow, and not at the measly 8% that it grew last year. Unless Microsoft execs can coax out some growth the stock price has nowhere to go but down. Huge defections to OO.org and Linux like the State of Massachussetts are going to put downward pressure on MSFT's price.
Of all of the OpenOffice.org family Writer is far and away the best piece of software. In fact, due to the fact that it makes it much easier to use styles in your document than MS Word I actually like Writer better than Word. The real problem with OO.org has always been file format compatibility with MS Office. I know that I have kept around a copy of MS Office for years now simply to test documents before sending them to MS Office users. For the most part OO.org has worked well, but sometimes there have been issues.
That's why government deals with OO.org are so important. They essentially represent Microsoft's worst nightmare because it puts the whole file format compatibility issue on the other foot. The government is big enough that it can mandate changes. Everyone deals with the government to some extent, and now dealing with the state of Massachussetts requires that you have OO.org installed (or something compatible). I wouldn't be one bit surprised to see OO.org usage grow to the point in Massachussetts where the OpenDocument formats become ubiquitous. Despite what Microsoft says most people don't really want to pay hundreds of dollars for MS Office, they just considered that a cost of doing business. If people can share documents without paying for MS Software then that's precisely what will happen.
Massachussets stated reason for switching to the OpenDocument format is that it allows them to guarantee access to important state documents. However, my guess is that this is just a fancy sugar coating over the real reason for switching, and that reason is the cost of migrating to Office 12. There is a very interesting exchange in the MP3 of the recent meeting that the state officers had with various software companies in which, after nearly an hour of saying that the state didn't want to talk about procurement, one of the Mass. officers let the Microsoft team have it right between the eyes. Basically he laid out the costs that Massachussetts would incur in a switch to MS Office 12, and it was clear that the costs were much higher than a switch to OO.org.
Massachussets is going to have to switch document formats no matter what they do. The new version of MS Office 12 is going to have a completely new set of document formats that won't be backwards compatible. Yes, Microsoft has promised plugins for some of the older versions of MS Office that will read and write these new formats, and yes Microsoft has tools that allow for batch conversion of documents, but OpenOffice.org has this as well. The state of Massachussetts has an estimated 50,000 desktops, primarily running Windows 2000. In order to use MS Office 12 Massachussetts would have to upgrade the operating system on all of these boxes, and in many cases it would need to purchase new hardware to boot. Not only that, but Office 12 also has an entirely redesigned user interface which would require additional user training.
Do you see where this is going? Massachussetts estimates (using past knowlegde of similar Microsoft updates) that a move to Office 12 would cost $50 million dollars. A move to OpenOffice.org is estimated to cost an order of magnitude less ($5 million dollars). Heck, if Microsoft is going to force their customers to a new set of file formats, with a new UI, and a new operating system then its almost certain that OO.org on their existing operating system and using existing hardware will be less expensive. OO.org also forces you to use a new file format and it will require training, but Massachussetts won't have to throw an OS upgrade into the mix.
The reason that Massachussetts can get away with the switch is that they are big enough that they can simply mandate a file format and expect people that deal with them to make the switch. You don't argue with the bureaucrats. If they want their documents in OpenDocument formats then you simply find a way to send them OpenDocument formats. The fact that the software necessary to deal with the state government is going to be a free download is just a bonus. If Massachussetts required MS Office 12, or WordPerfect, or even LaTeX that's what people would send them.
One thing is certain, a lot of businesses and individuals in Massachussetts are going to find it necessary to download and install OpenOffice.org, and many of them are going to like what they find. It's almost certainly going to become much more difficult to sell new versions of MS Office in Massachussetts. After all, unless you are some sort of MS Office power user you are not even likely to be able to tell the difference between the two programs, and OO.org is going to be required for dealing with the government.
I guarantee you that Bill doesn't want a bigger personal investment in Microsoft. In fact, at Microsoft's current rate of growth and share price I bet that even Microsoft doesn't want a bigger investment in MSFT.
And that's assuming that switching Windows out for OS X would be good for business, and personally I think that's a very BIG assumption.
That's beautiful.
Yeah, his comment was way funnier than mine too. I am pretty sure that I started my post before his went up, but I was working on something else and it took me a long time to post.
You probably wonder why mainstream media doesn't seem to cater to your tastes. Here's a little clue, only lunatics want their children's movies with visible genitalia. Please go get yourself some counseling--preferrably somewhere far away from my children.
Thank you.
I was a little concerned when the first response to my post was an endurance weenie. It's good to see that there is at least one other /. member that understands the joy of lifting something heavy over their head.
Aerobic exercise is great for your back too, but you aren't going to build the muscles that protect your back to any great extent walking (or even jogging).
You aren't going to hurt yourself doing overhead squats with a broomstick, but you are going to teach yourself a ton about correct posture. Heck, get up out of your chair, throw your hands up over your head and squat a few times maintaining your chest pushed out and an upright upper body. You'll see exactly what I mean.
I ran for two years at least three times a week before taking up a bit of weight training, and adding in some overhead squats and other compound weight training lifts made all of the difference.
The cure to back pain isn't a fancy schmancy chair. If you want your back pain to go away you need to Deadlift and Overhead Squat. Start with just the bar (or a broomstick) at first, and concentrate on maintainig a health arch in back.
Back pain isn't prevalent in today's society because our chairs are harder than in years past. Back pain is prevalent in today's society because we spend all of our time on our asses. Even 20 minutes 3 times a week can make a big difference.
That was beautiful.
Believe it or not, I know who you are. I have even played with rosegarden a bit. I would also agree that ESR doesn't hack as much now as he in the 90's. I would also admit that part of my fan-boyism is almost certainly due to the fact that I really like Emacs and Python. Just because he's not as active any more doesn't make his software go away.
I am not saying that ESR is the world's best hacker, but you'd have a hard time convincing me that he's not far better than average. Microsoft could almost certainly find a spot where he would be useful, assuming, of course that he would actually work for them.
What rock have you been living under, Mr. Troll. Let's go over this step by step.
I would maybe grant you that one. ESR has become a PR man for Open Source software, and you can't do that in the shadows.
Ok, now that's just ridiculous. I did mention that ESR was a Python committer, has piles of credits in the Linux kernel (yes, his kernel build system didn't get accepted because of its dependency on Python, but he has done plenty of other things in the kernel), and lots of other work. You can't tell me that Python is a "mostly outdated" skillset. That doesn't even include somewhat less hackerish pursuits like the Jargon file, CATB, etc.
I can see how you might have a problem with ESR's public persona, but calling out his skills is just ridiculous.
You can say what you want about ESR, but I use a pile of that guy's software everyday. He's one of the Python committers, he's written more of Emacs than anyone save RMS, and that's literally the tip of the iceberg. Not to mention the fact that he's fairly well spoken, a published author, and a pretty competent PR hack. In short, he would probably make a good addition to just about any team.
If ESR would have labored his entire life on proprietary software he would probably still be skilled, but no one would have a clue other than the few people he worked with (and some of them would probably overlook his talents). Similarly, when Linus wrote Linux he was an undergraduate student in the frozen wastelands of Europe. Free Software gave Linus the opportunity to argue with Andrew Tannenbaum in a public forum and then prove that Andy was *wrong* and that a humble undergrad CS student was right (if you haven't read the comp.os.minix flamewars about Linux you really should). That sort of thing can only happen in a system where working code is more important than credentials. Linus could get a job *anywhere* and it's entirely because he was able to prove his skills with Free Software.
Any tricks that Microsoft plays with the Oasis document format are only going to rebound against loyal MS Office users. The only reason for Microsoft to include support for the format at all is so that they have some chance of keeping Massachusetts government workers (and those that have to communicate with them) from jumping ship en masse. Microsoft can try and change this decision, but if the Oasis document formats become the playing field then Microsoft had better play nice. After all, the last thing that you want when you send that important document to a government employee is for the document to crash their office suite (or look bad). If Microsoft Office is difficult to use in an environment that has standardized on the Oasis formats then Microsoft Office will get the boot.
Microsoft has been able to get away with tricks for years because they controlled the de-facto document format. In fact, Microsoft uses inconsistencies in the way documents are formatted as one of the primary ways to get people to upgrade to newer versions. Among Massachusetts government workers that's no longer going to be the case. The standard is almost certainly going to be OO.org. Officially the standard will be anything that can read/write the Oasis document formats, but you can bet that any application that doesn't play well with OO.org and StarOffice won't be welcomed, even if it does supposedly adhere to the standard.
Massachusetts can do that because they are big enough to force standards down everyone else's throats. If enough other organizations follow this lead then Microsoft is going to have a very very hard time getting people to buy new copies of MS Office.
If you can use it to copy music from your computer to the car's stereo, then it's probably just a bog-standard USB drive.
In 2007 those few lifers that do use computers will have computers that are set up to use the Oasis document formats by default. Heck, it will probably happen even sooner than that for most Massachusetts state employees. That means that if you are forced to deal with a state employee you'd better download a copy of OO.org, because the government employee receiving your file is looking for a reason to send it to /dev/null.
Nobody in their right mind tries to explain why they sent a non-standard document format to a government worker.
OO.org is likely to become very popular in Massachusetts.
So you believe that Microsoft will compete with a fully functional OO.org that is available for Free, and comes with source code, by crippling MS Office.
Somehow I doubt it.
This is especially the case since Microsoft's new XML format was specifically denied "open" status because it isn't a truly open standard. You'll notice that Microsoft's new XML format didn't make the approved list (PDF and XHTML did). Massachusetts has basically told Microsoft that it is big enough to force everyone that deals with the Massachusetts state government to use a truly open document format. Microsoft can either play ball, or they can sell their office suite to someone else.
Those sorts of tricks have worked fine for Microsoft in the past because the de-facto standard was Microsoft's Office formats. However, now the target has shifted. If you want to communicate with Massachusetts government employees then you will have to assume that they are using OO.org. If documents created in MS Office don't look at least as good when exported to the Oasis formats as they would if they were created in OO.org then people that have to deal with the Massachusetts government are likely to simply use OO.org.
You'd be a fool to expect government employees to go out of their way to use your document formats when the obvious solution is for you to download a free program. If Microsoft's import and export of Oasis document formats isn't flawless then a lot of folks in Massachusetts are going to be forced to use OO.org.
This is a big deal to Microsoft because lots of people in Massachusetts deal with the government, and it is very likely that the Oasis document formats will become ubiquitous. If that becomes the case then Microsoft's ace in the hole, Microsoft Office document compatibility, flies right out the window. All of a sudden Microsoft will have the office suite with compatibility problems.
When push comes to shove most people use MS Office not because they need its added functionality, but rather because they want to be able to share documents with other people. If Oasis document formats become popular then Microsoft is likely to have a lot of trouble selling people new versions of MS Office.
That would actually be counterproductive for Microsoft. Let's imagine for a moment that you are a private company that does a great deal of business with Massachusetts and you have to send documents to Massachusetts government employees using Oasis OpenDoc formats. So you fire up MS Word (your company standard) and you create an important document that you are sending to your important government contact. At the last moment you remember that it needs to be in OpenDoc format and so you choose "Save As" before sending the document. Your government contact opens the file, it looks like crap, and so he gives the contract to some other company. Your boss finds out why you lost the contract and you get fired.
If Microsoft decides to create filters so that it can read and write Oasis formats then those filters better be at least as good as what's available for free in OO.org. Otherwise people will be forced to use OO.org and it will be Microsoft that is on the wrong side of the format wars.
The bit that you are missing is that this is inevitably going to put either StarOffice or OpenOffice.org on MA government desktops. In fact, it is very likely that the new Oasis document formats are going to become the lingua franca of MA government work. The real blow to Microsoft will be that people wanting to do business with MA government employees are going to either A) send documents in PDF form that can't be editted, or B) download OpenOffice.org. All of us have dealt with government employees at one time or another, and one thing is as certain as the sunrise. If the government employees that you have to deal with are using OO.org as their office suite then you'd be a fool to send them documents in any other format. Sure, the government workers might have a copy of MS Office lying around somewhere, but it's far more likely that they will simply try and open the document using OO.org's MS Office document filters, and if this makes your document look like someone hit it with a Mack truck then that's not their problem.
This puts the whole document compatibility shoe on the other foot. The state of Massachusetts is big enough that it can essentially force people to adopt its standards. Once the Oasis document formats (and OO.org) become ubiquitous then the ability to read MS Office document formats becomes a lot less critical.
The fact of the matter is that no one really wants to pay for MS Office. If OO.org gains any sort of critical mass then it's going to be that much harder for Microsoft to sell upgrades of MS Office.
Then you've never worked in an organization with more than 3 people in it. In a real business there are generally all sorts of politics going on. I have lost track of the amount of times I have seen Linux or BSD boxes put into production without approval up the corporate ladder. Heck, I have been involved several times with a project at the division level that was formed to fill the gap of a company wide software program that the division guys could see was doomed to failure. The division guys simply waited for a spectacular failure and then forwarded an skunkworks project that did more or less the same thing (but usually on a much less ambitious scale).
Microsoft is no different. There are thousands of ultra-competitive hackers there all trying to make their mark. In the business sector there are even teams that compete for essentially the same business. My personal guess is that Microsoft is stalling this paper because it knows that Windows is the only implementation of Trusted Computing that people actually care about. If Microsoft can force Apple, Sun, and the rest to wait for a paper before rolling out software then Microsoft will get the jump on them with Vista. That being the case there's almost certainly a wide ranging difference of opinion about Trusted Computing inside Microsoft.
Reach, my friend, reach. XAML will be available on Windoxs XP and Longhorn and AJAX is available everywhere, and while AJAX has some problems it's available today.
So while the idea behind XAML might be nicer now, you can't really use it yet, and even when you can use it too many of your customers will be unable to use it. Give AJAX another year and it will be polished to the point where it isn't so clunky anymore. Heck, it's really not that bad now as long as you have Mozilla's Venkman around. That's what should really scare Microsoft. Most of the folks that I know of that are designing Ajax apps develop for Firefox first (because it has better debugging tools).
My favorite part is that my designer buddy can lay out the interface using tools that he is comfortable with, and I just have to make it work.