Why does IE control 80% of the market then? Nearly every web browser is lightyears ahead of IE in terms of security, features, standards, speed, etc., yet IE continues to be dominant. Maybe it's because Microsoft leveraged their desktop monopoly to gain a new one in web browsers? Did you know that web browsers used to cost money before Microsoft distributed IE for free (with your copy of Windows of course) to kill off Netscape?
Yes, I know they used to cost money, I grew up while this was happening. Do you realize that at the time this was happening IE was actually the better browser? I remember waiting for updates for IE to be released so it could do new, cool things and make browsing the web more fun. I tried netscape for a while and it was decent but it was not "lightyears" ahead at the time.
Another point I need to make is a web browser, especially at the point in time where IE was battling Netscape, basically did NOTHING else but render web pages, one at a time. IE was, and still is, a basic tool (web browser) that should be included with any modern OS. Browsing the web is a modern convienience, do you really think the world would be a better place if you had to pay for the browser you wish to use to accomplish such a trivial task?
The reason Opera, Firefox, etc are so much better than IE nowadays is because IE has been developed to just be a bare minimum tool to allow people to surf the web. People who want more features such as myself use other browsers that don't suck like IE does.
Like I have said many times before, MS releases basic homebrew versions of software that people who are not power users may find useful. The market still exists for the people who want something that has all the bells and whistles such as MS Paint vs. Adobe Photoshop. MS including this extra software may suck for businesses that like not having any competition and not doing much to improve their current applications but for other companies they take it as an opportunity to make sure their product is actually "lightyears" ahead of MS's version and they stay in business without a problem (Adobe, Nero, WinAMP, Zone Alarm, Kerio, AVG, Cyberlink, Symantec, Norton,etc).
So basically quit your bitching and if MS killed off your business then you should have done a better job innovating your software so that MS's version did not render your software irrelevant.
Also, could you get me a copy of BeOS, OS/2, and all the other vastly superior programs that MS has nevertheless managed to kill, since they apparently still exist there?
First of all these are not programs, they are operating systems, they died because MS did a better job of marketing. I was only referring to software that runs on Windows the MS makes similar versions of such as MS Paint compared to Adobe Photoshop. Most of the time MS just makes a "lite" version of something that people just need some functionality of and by doing so it is good for consumers because they get something with the OS instead of having to make another purchase on top of buying the OS and it also helps because it makes the developer of the similar application to add more features, etc, to make it more attractive than MS's version.
How is this bad? If all I need to do with pictures is some cropping and resizing MS Paint works ok, why should I have to buy photoshop which currently costs $649? The people who need the bells and whistles of Photoshop will still keep Adobe in business while I will get a simple tool to use without having to spend any extra money.
Do you see the difference? MS usually creates similar products that people will find useful, but they keep them very simple and basically they are good for the casual user to finish simple tasks while the original developer still will get business from the "power" users.
I am a software developer and if MS were to come up with their own version of my software and include it with their latest OS I wouldn't bitch and moan like a lot of slashdotters do, I would sieze it as an opportunity to improve my application so that even a mediocre user would realize it would be worth paying the extra money for it. I would then still get business from most of the people who would have purchased my software before MS's version came out while the people who wouldn't have bothered to purchase it still have a useful tool to get basic things done with.
But, isn't burning a CD or DVD essentially I/O? (OK, maybe just O.) IANASA, but that sounds a lot like a basic OS function to me. Yeah, I know it's a direct competitor to existing "products". Existing products that exist because a basic OS function was... overlooked?
I'm trying not to be a smart-ass about this (but I was never very good at restraint). So, is it ok for MS to bundle basic OS functions with their OS?
I had the exact same thought at first too, "why should MS be stopped from including basic I/O functionality just because it is an optical disc?". I looked into it and found out Vista may include what is called DVD Maker and it is a very bare bones application that allows a person to very easily create a DVD video disc that will play in a standalone DVD player. You can read more about it at the following link where one of the developers talks about it in his blog:
These are the types of tools that I think MS should be allowed to include. Basic tools that let a user easily accomplish something that a full featured application may make too difficult. It forces the makers of the full featured app to innovate more while also giving the "average" user (or someone who doesn't need a bunch of bells and whistles) some added functionality right away when they boot up their new computer.
That's the whole point of forcing MS to make seperate products and not bundle them together with the OS, to make sure that the people who are innovating and making a better product have a fair shot at getting enough market share to stay in business.
If you are making a product that kicks MS's versions ass then you most likely will succeed and not get forced out of business. Sure, it might be tougher to get a market share but if your product is vastly superior you should not have any major problems.
Two quick examples I can think of are WinAMP and Cyberlink Power DVD player. Both of those must compete with Windows Media Player (a piece of shit) and they are still widely used and in business. Another example is MS Paint, do you think Adobe has an issue with MS including MS Paint since it is "good enough" for 90% of the people who bought a Windows machine?
In my opinion MS including bare bones implementations of useful tools is not an issue, it forces other companies to innovate and make a better product while still giving basic functionality to people who don't need a full featured application.
Oh, so if I were to own a huge "monopoly" company that makes say motorcycles and I wanted my motorcycles to be easily used as a jet ski and even say some type of saw if you removed the back wheel and put on the "saw" attachment that should be banned for me to do but the little shop down the road should be allowed to market the same thing I am banned from marketing? How would that be fair?
All that would be occurring is more functionality is added to the base product. As a consumer I welcome this, I would prefer to have an OS that includes a bunch of cool "extras" to one that is bare bones.
Why should it be wrong to include DVD maker? The DVD maker that you mentioned looks like a bare bones application that has almost no bells and whistles, it just lets you create a DVD video disc with a simple menu. For anyone else who wants to be able to do anything beyond that there will be a market for applications that provide that ability.
I think there is nothing wrong with including this utility. It is a cheap, easy way for grandma to make a DVD and it forces DVD authoring software makers to add functionality to make their software more desirable. Maybe you would prefer an OS that has no extras but I along with many others think all the extra gadgets they can include the better (as long as they can be easily uninstalled if I don't want/need them).
Instead of a gambling business he is selling access to child pornography to people (as well as American's) which is not illegal in his country for some reason. He decides to visit the US and the FBI knows about his business and while he is here they know American's are actively purchasing access to child pornography through his business and they have proof of it. Would you argue they should not arrest him even though while he is here his business is committing US crimes?
That is exactly the same thing that happened to this guy. While I don't think he should have been arrested if he shut down his business then came here I do think he should be arrested if his business is actively breaking US laws while he is here.
I totally think the law that allows him to be arrested is bullshit, people should be able to gamble if they want to, but that does not change the fact that the law currently makes what his business does illegal and while he was here that illegal activity was still going on.
If the US is so hell-bent on prohibiting access to such facilities as are available elsewhere in the world via the internet then they should fully sign up to the ranks of the oppressive regimes (rather than just dabbling, as of late!) and just prevent access from their end.
No, actually it is up to the businesses to make sure the business they do in other countries is legal. If you want to accept money from country X then make sure you are allowed to conduct business there.
Someone along the money trail should be able to access what country the customer is from by checking credit card information or something like that. If I sell handguns I may be able to fly almost anywhere within the US and sell handguns to people but I could not fly to many European countries and do the same thing since there are many laws that prohibit ordinary citizens from selling/owning them.
And I think you're forgetting how engrained MSFT truly is. Yeah, sure it's nice to say "just stop using it." that's something I bring up often with my fellow co-workers. Doesn't seem to change anything. Even when we sneak a OSS OS on our workstations we still have to scramble to read the latest PPT from our PHBes.
I am not forgetting anything, I KNOW they are engrained and I know it would be very difficult to not use their products but that is just the way it is, not everything in life can/need to be fair.
oh wait, Office exists to sell Windows. That's about it.
It doesn't exist to sell Windows, it exists Windows only to get more OS sales. If I was them I would probably do the same thing, try to make the most money possible. If you don't like how it is then make your own office alternative that can compete with it and provides the same as well as more functionality. Until you do that quit bitching about the situation.
This is a discussion about Nintendo, so talking about how I am excited about the Wii may not add a whole lot of value to the conversation but at least it was relevant.
The point of my post was to make fun of you, in a humourous way, and to waste a little time at work. I achieved all of this, so thanks.
Wow, you are awesome, I wish I could be as cool as you are and attempt to make fun of people unsuccesfully. I can tell how hilarious your comment was by how fast it got modded up and labeled funny... or not.
Have a good time kicking your dog and beating your wife to waste time once you get home from work at McDonalds!
The argument is that they purposefully swindle their customers into using software that is designed to lock them into using a sole vendor [without otherwise good justification]. That they are abusing their POSITION as a large market share holder to FURTHER their lock in.
Arguing for MSFT is akin to saying "Yes MFST, release another product that I can't use as I choose, on the platform of my choosing with the tools of my choosing. I like being forced to use your tools, through out security and inefficiency problems because choice is bad."
They are not abusing shit, this has just been an easy way for the European governments to try and get a shitload of money out of Microsoft. MS is not FORCING any Europeans to use their tools, if you don't like the tools they have and the fact that they don't run on the platform of your choice then thats your problem. Stop using the damn software then.
There are no technical reasons why [for instance] the Office file formats are not well documented in the public. The *value* of Office is the connectivity and interface of the software. Not the file format. [hint: that's a big reason why people hate OpenOffice]. Releasing the file formats means that you can use third party tools to do things to your documents that you can't with Office [like edit them in GNU/Linux].
Yes, there are no technical reasons they are not publically documented but I don't think they should be forced to do so. It is THEIR software and I don't think they should be forced to "help out" other developers. I think it would great if they did decide to do that on their own but forcing them into it is downright ridiculous. The EU also needs to make things more clear for them, from what I have heard I agree with MS that the EU has not been clear.
At first I thought he was talking about how the console wars are over and the Wii would win since I didn't catch that he meant IBM was the one to win since they are making the CPU's for all 3 new consoles. So I talked about how in my mind the console wars were over and instead of getting a 360 or PS3 I would get a Wii.
What was the point of your post? It added nothing to the discussion and your attempt at looking smart than me failed. Basically, you are a moron.
I overlooked that in my excitement. My bad. I still think the Wii will be the winner this time around, especially for the price it is supposed to be released at as well as the other points I made.
I agree, I considered a 360 but then didn't get one due to the fact I was too busy with other stuff. I am very glad I waited.
For one, I am a HUGE Zelda fan, so being able to play Twilight Princess will be AWESOME. Another big selling point for me is the virtual console since I can access NES, SNES, N64 (as well as other consoles of the past) games. I love retro gaming so having the ability to access games from all those older consoles kicks ass. I wish it could play HD-DVD's or Blu-Ray DVD's but since that war still has to be fought I do not mind waiting. Another thing I like is it has the Opera web browser for cruising the internet.
Oh trust me, I agree that it is. I am just saying if they decided and found a way to make cheap, healthy/good quality, easy to make food that people would buy that too. It doesn't have to be garbage, that just is what it currently is.
No, you shouldn't if hiring a hitman to kill me is legal in your juristiction.
This would be like hiring a hitman to do the killing and then visiting the US while he is doing the killing you paid him for. While Peter Dicks was inside the US his company was still conducting business that is illegal within the US, so he was breaking the law.
Do I agree that the law he broke should exist? No. But there is no doubt about it that his arrest was justified by what the law currently is.
No, that was not his point. He responded to me after I responded to his comment: You act as if suddenly everyone with XP will instantly have Vista. It will take years to replace even half the machines running XP."
So the issue we were talking about was not about the current amount of ipv6 users, it was how many and how fast people will switch over to Vista.
You act as if suddenly everyone with XP will instantly have Vista. It will take years to replace even half the machines running XP.
The OP never said it wouldn't take years either, he said "Because Vista is going to be used by about a couple hundred million more people than Linux/OSX."
I don't know if his figure of 100's of millions will ever surface, but definitely 10's of millions is feasable.
Now, if you found bugs in a proprietary program from some company and sent them a breakdown of problems, you'd get one of two responses. 1) No response and 2) A charge that you are reverse engineering their product and in violation of many anti-piracy laws. If the company still didn't address the issues and you published the bugs, then you're nothing but a software terrorist.
I take it you don't work anywhere that has proprietary software otherwise you would not make such a claim. While some companies may have responses like that I doubt they would stay in business too long without their customers jumping ship. At the company I work at we review EVERY bug report sent in and then make sure the problem is fixed as soon as possible.
Maybe where I work is a fluke, but I highly doubt that. Most developers worth a damn love to have people find bugs so they can fix them and make their software that much better.
Slashdot Mirror
Why does IE control 80% of the market then? Nearly every web browser is lightyears ahead of IE in terms of security, features, standards, speed, etc., yet IE continues to be dominant. Maybe it's because Microsoft leveraged their desktop monopoly to gain a new one in web browsers? Did you know that web browsers used to cost money before Microsoft distributed IE for free (with your copy of Windows of course) to kill off Netscape?
Yes, I know they used to cost money, I grew up while this was happening. Do you realize that at the time this was happening IE was actually the better browser? I remember waiting for updates for IE to be released so it could do new, cool things and make browsing the web more fun. I tried netscape for a while and it was decent but it was not "lightyears" ahead at the time.
Another point I need to make is a web browser, especially at the point in time where IE was battling Netscape, basically did NOTHING else but render web pages, one at a time. IE was, and still is, a basic tool (web browser) that should be included with any modern OS. Browsing the web is a modern convienience, do you really think the world would be a better place if you had to pay for the browser you wish to use to accomplish such a trivial task?
The reason Opera, Firefox, etc are so much better than IE nowadays is because IE has been developed to just be a bare minimum tool to allow people to surf the web. People who want more features such as myself use other browsers that don't suck like IE does.
Like I have said many times before, MS releases basic homebrew versions of software that people who are not power users may find useful. The market still exists for the people who want something that has all the bells and whistles such as MS Paint vs. Adobe Photoshop. MS including this extra software may suck for businesses that like not having any competition and not doing much to improve their current applications but for other companies they take it as an opportunity to make sure their product is actually "lightyears" ahead of MS's version and they stay in business without a problem (Adobe, Nero, WinAMP, Zone Alarm, Kerio, AVG, Cyberlink, Symantec, Norton,etc).
So basically quit your bitching and if MS killed off your business then you should have done a better job innovating your software so that MS's version did not render your software irrelevant.
Also, could you get me a copy of BeOS, OS/2, and all the other vastly superior programs that MS has nevertheless managed to kill, since they apparently still exist there?
First of all these are not programs, they are operating systems, they died because MS did a better job of marketing. I was only referring to software that runs on Windows the MS makes similar versions of such as MS Paint compared to Adobe Photoshop. Most of the time MS just makes a "lite" version of something that people just need some functionality of and by doing so it is good for consumers because they get something with the OS instead of having to make another purchase on top of buying the OS and it also helps because it makes the developer of the similar application to add more features, etc, to make it more attractive than MS's version.
How is this bad? If all I need to do with pictures is some cropping and resizing MS Paint works ok, why should I have to buy photoshop which currently costs $649? The people who need the bells and whistles of Photoshop will still keep Adobe in business while I will get a simple tool to use without having to spend any extra money.
Do you see the difference? MS usually creates similar products that people will find useful, but they keep them very simple and basically they are good for the casual user to finish simple tasks while the original developer still will get business from the "power" users.
I am a software developer and if MS were to come up with their own version of my software and include it with their latest OS I wouldn't bitch and moan like a lot of slashdotters do, I would sieze it as an opportunity to improve my application so that even a mediocre user would realize it would be worth paying the extra money for it. I would then still get business from most of the people who would have purchased my software before MS's version came out while the people who wouldn't have bothered to purchase it still have a useful tool to get basic things done with.
But, isn't burning a CD or DVD essentially I/O? (OK, maybe just O.) IANASA, but that sounds a lot like a basic OS function to me. Yeah, I know it's a direct competitor to existing "products". Existing products that exist because a basic OS function was ... overlooked?
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I'm trying not to be a smart-ass about this (but I was never very good at restraint). So, is it ok for MS to bundle basic OS functions with their OS?
I had the exact same thought at first too, "why should MS be stopped from including basic I/O functionality just because it is an optical disc?". I looked into it and found out Vista may include what is called DVD Maker and it is a very bare bones application that allows a person to very easily create a DVD video disc that will play in a standalone DVD player. You can read more about it at the following link where one of the developers talks about it in his blog:
http://blogs.msdn.com/ericgu/archive/2006/01/03/5
These are the types of tools that I think MS should be allowed to include. Basic tools that let a user easily accomplish something that a full featured application may make too difficult. It forces the makers of the full featured app to innovate more while also giving the "average" user (or someone who doesn't need a bunch of bells and whistles) some added functionality right away when they boot up their new computer.
That's the whole point of forcing MS to make seperate products and not bundle them together with the OS, to make sure that the people who are innovating and making a better product have a fair shot at getting enough market share to stay in business.
If you are making a product that kicks MS's versions ass then you most likely will succeed and not get forced out of business. Sure, it might be tougher to get a market share but if your product is vastly superior you should not have any major problems.
Two quick examples I can think of are WinAMP and Cyberlink Power DVD player. Both of those must compete with Windows Media Player (a piece of shit) and they are still widely used and in business. Another example is MS Paint, do you think Adobe has an issue with MS including MS Paint since it is "good enough" for 90% of the people who bought a Windows machine?
In my opinion MS including bare bones implementations of useful tools is not an issue, it forces other companies to innovate and make a better product while still giving basic functionality to people who don't need a full featured application.
Oh, so if I were to own a huge "monopoly" company that makes say motorcycles and I wanted my motorcycles to be easily used as a jet ski and even say some type of saw if you removed the back wheel and put on the "saw" attachment that should be banned for me to do but the little shop down the road should be allowed to market the same thing I am banned from marketing? How would that be fair?
All that would be occurring is more functionality is added to the base product. As a consumer I welcome this, I would prefer to have an OS that includes a bunch of cool "extras" to one that is bare bones.
Why should it be wrong to include DVD maker? The DVD maker that you mentioned looks like a bare bones application that has almost no bells and whistles, it just lets you create a DVD video disc with a simple menu. For anyone else who wants to be able to do anything beyond that there will be a market for applications that provide that ability.
I think there is nothing wrong with including this utility. It is a cheap, easy way for grandma to make a DVD and it forces DVD authoring software makers to add functionality to make their software more desirable. Maybe you would prefer an OS that has no extras but I along with many others think all the extra gadgets they can include the better (as long as they can be easily uninstalled if I don't want/need them).
Ok, how about this example:
Instead of a gambling business he is selling access to child pornography to people (as well as American's) which is not illegal in his country for some reason. He decides to visit the US and the FBI knows about his business and while he is here they know American's are actively purchasing access to child pornography through his business and they have proof of it. Would you argue they should not arrest him even though while he is here his business is committing US crimes?
That is exactly the same thing that happened to this guy. While I don't think he should have been arrested if he shut down his business then came here I do think he should be arrested if his business is actively breaking US laws while he is here.
I totally think the law that allows him to be arrested is bullshit, people should be able to gamble if they want to, but that does not change the fact that the law currently makes what his business does illegal and while he was here that illegal activity was still going on.
If the US is so hell-bent on prohibiting access to such facilities as are available elsewhere in the world via the internet then they should fully sign up to the ranks of the oppressive regimes (rather than just dabbling, as of late!) and just prevent access from their end.
No, actually it is up to the businesses to make sure the business they do in other countries is legal. If you want to accept money from country X then make sure you are allowed to conduct business there.
Someone along the money trail should be able to access what country the customer is from by checking credit card information or something like that. If I sell handguns I may be able to fly almost anywhere within the US and sell handguns to people but I could not fly to many European countries and do the same thing since there are many laws that prohibit ordinary citizens from selling/owning them.
And I think you're forgetting how engrained MSFT truly is. Yeah, sure it's nice to say "just stop using it." that's something I bring up often with my fellow co-workers. Doesn't seem to change anything. Even when we sneak a OSS OS on our workstations we still have to scramble to read the latest PPT from our PHBes.
I am not forgetting anything, I KNOW they are engrained and I know it would be very difficult to not use their products but that is just the way it is, not everything in life can/need to be fair.
oh wait, Office exists to sell Windows. That's about it.
It doesn't exist to sell Windows, it exists Windows only to get more OS sales. If I was them I would probably do the same thing, try to make the most money possible. If you don't like how it is then make your own office alternative that can compete with it and provides the same as well as more functionality. Until you do that quit bitching about the situation.
This is a discussion about Nintendo, so talking about how I am excited about the Wii may not add a whole lot of value to the conversation but at least it was relevant.
The point of my post was to make fun of you, in a humourous way, and to waste a little time at work. I achieved all of this, so thanks.
Wow, you are awesome, I wish I could be as cool as you are and attempt to make fun of people unsuccesfully. I can tell how hilarious your comment was by how fast it got modded up and labeled funny... or not.
Have a good time kicking your dog and beating your wife to waste time once you get home from work at McDonalds!
Companies unable to upgrade to Vista won't be able to run the latest virus software.
that includes DRM right?
The argument is that they purposefully swindle their customers into using software that is designed to lock them into using a sole vendor [without otherwise good justification]. That they are abusing their POSITION as a large market share holder to FURTHER their lock in.
Arguing for MSFT is akin to saying "Yes MFST, release another product that I can't use as I choose, on the platform of my choosing with the tools of my choosing. I like being forced to use your tools, through out security and inefficiency problems because choice is bad."
They are not abusing shit, this has just been an easy way for the European governments to try and get a shitload of money out of Microsoft. MS is not FORCING any Europeans to use their tools, if you don't like the tools they have and the fact that they don't run on the platform of your choice then thats your problem. Stop using the damn software then.
There are no technical reasons why [for instance] the Office file formats are not well documented in the public. The *value* of Office is the connectivity and interface of the software. Not the file format. [hint: that's a big reason why people hate OpenOffice]. Releasing the file formats means that you can use third party tools to do things to your documents that you can't with Office [like edit them in GNU/Linux].
Yes, there are no technical reasons they are not publically documented but I don't think they should be forced to do so. It is THEIR software and I don't think they should be forced to "help out" other developers. I think it would great if they did decide to do that on their own but forcing them into it is downright ridiculous. The EU also needs to make things more clear for them, from what I have heard I agree with MS that the EU has not been clear.
At first I thought he was talking about how the console wars are over and the Wii would win since I didn't catch that he meant IBM was the one to win since they are making the CPU's for all 3 new consoles. So I talked about how in my mind the console wars were over and instead of getting a 360 or PS3 I would get a Wii.
What was the point of your post? It added nothing to the discussion and your attempt at looking smart than me failed. Basically, you are a moron.
Good day.
I overlooked that in my excitement. My bad. I still think the Wii will be the winner this time around, especially for the price it is supposed to be released at as well as the other points I made.
I agree, I considered a 360 but then didn't get one due to the fact I was too busy with other stuff. I am very glad I waited.
For one, I am a HUGE Zelda fan, so being able to play Twilight Princess will be AWESOME. Another big selling point for me is the virtual console since I can access NES, SNES, N64 (as well as other consoles of the past) games. I love retro gaming so having the ability to access games from all those older consoles kicks ass. I wish it could play HD-DVD's or Blu-Ray DVD's but since that war still has to be fought I do not mind waiting. Another thing I like is it has the Opera web browser for cruising the internet.
What more could a nerd ask for?
Sorry, McDonalds is garbage food. Period!
Oh trust me, I agree that it is. I am just saying if they decided and found a way to make cheap, healthy/good quality, easy to make food that people would buy that too. It doesn't have to be garbage, that just is what it currently is.
No, you shouldn't if hiring a hitman to kill me is legal in your juristiction.
This would be like hiring a hitman to do the killing and then visiting the US while he is doing the killing you paid him for. While Peter Dicks was inside the US his company was still conducting business that is illegal within the US, so he was breaking the law.
Do I agree that the law he broke should exist? No. But there is no doubt about it that his arrest was justified by what the law currently is.
I've only recently figured out how to tweak the registry to allow me to disable automatic updates again.
Umm all that I have to do to disable automatic updates is:
1) Start->Control Panel
2) Click Automatic Updates
3) Select Turn Off Automatic Updates
4) Press OK
No registry tweaking needed. Now I do have XP Pro, do other versions of XP really make you edit the registry? That would really piss me off.
You porchmonkey you haha
So we are in the superior 1% of web browser users!
No, that was not his point. He responded to me after I responded to his comment: You act as if suddenly everyone with XP will instantly have Vista. It will take years to replace even half the machines running XP."
So the issue we were talking about was not about the current amount of ipv6 users, it was how many and how fast people will switch over to Vista.
McDonalds has a lot of money and customers. It just shows the masses consume garbage.
Not necessarily garbage, just what is fast, easy, cheap, and convenient for a consumer which both McDonalds and Windows are most of the time.
There are also already 100's of millions of Windows users, so what is your point?
You act as if suddenly everyone with XP will instantly have Vista. It will take years to replace even half the machines running XP.
The OP never said it wouldn't take years either, he said "Because Vista is going to be used by about a couple hundred million more people than Linux/OSX."
I don't know if his figure of 100's of millions will ever surface, but definitely 10's of millions is feasable.
"Que" is an easy typo for coders, I don't think you are an idiot but previewing definitely is good to do! :-)
Now, if you found bugs in a proprietary program from some company and sent them a breakdown of problems, you'd get one of two responses. 1) No response and 2) A charge that you are reverse engineering their product and in violation of many anti-piracy laws. If the company still didn't address the issues and you published the bugs, then you're nothing but a software terrorist.
I take it you don't work anywhere that has proprietary software otherwise you would not make such a claim. While some companies may have responses like that I doubt they would stay in business too long without their customers jumping ship. At the company I work at we review EVERY bug report sent in and then make sure the problem is fixed as soon as possible.
Maybe where I work is a fluke, but I highly doubt that. Most developers worth a damn love to have people find bugs so they can fix them and make their software that much better.