MS will keep the standard fairly open. Remember, MS are moving towards semi-open standards -.NET is usable by anyone, but MS gets to declare what the standards are.
"...usable by anyone, but MS gets to declare what the standards are..." will eventually play out like this:
1. Microsoft keeps Flash "fairly open," leading to even further adoption of the technology.
2. Flash becomes even more ubiquitous than it is today, basically becoming a fundamental building block of the internet. Since it is found everywhere and is supported by all browsers and ships on every computer with every platform...developers feel they can use it willy-nilly. And they do.
3. Competing technologies all but fade away. With a ubiquitous, well supprted and free solution...who needs them?
4. Things start becoming a little less open. "In order to accomodate their customers" (heh), Microsoft starts with the proprietary hooks. Functionality that only works in Windows (or IE or - insert microsoft product name here -). Or at least it works in their stuff first and or best because of what they are changing.
5. Suddenly other browsers and platforms are using the internet only with permission from Redmond. (Apple: "You'll give us access to last years internet content if we bundle Windows Media Player instead of Quicktime? Sure thing, boss! Whatever you say!" Linux community: "If only the stupid sheep of the world would download, compile, configure and use -insert name of open source scalable vector graphics widget with % 0.00145 marketshare here - instead of that proprietary shit! Then our open source browser would have a chance. By the way, anyone get MSFlash plugin 7.2 to work in Mozilla yet? Yes I know the current version is 9.6. Shut up already!"
5. Somewhere Steve Balmer pets a hairless cat and grins because he knows he now has one more big lever to lean on in order to keep Windows and Microsoft on top.
Or on the other hand, it could be that Microsoft is, as you say, actually "becoming a little more honest". But I think the smart money would be on my scenario.
How can the sucess of geeky sysadmin software be translated into open source projects aimed at a wider audience? Put simply, can the open source model work beyond nerdy sysadmin widgets and spill into the world of mass-appeal software?
I think you're missing the point. Those guys' whole reason for being is to be against things like DRM. And god bless them for it. But Apple is out there trying to make a buck in technology. They're under serious pressure from the entertainment and computer industry to comply. And they have refused. So far. Kudos to them.
Yeah, you really gotta watch that sneaky Apple. Introducing new software with bugs that they don't even tell you about beforehand. Nobody else would do that. Those smart Windows users. How I envy them.
Not.
And by the way - people who don't read the "readme" aren't going to read your post either.
You're missing the point. You have to enforce and prosecute all leaks of trade secrets. You don't get to pick and choose. If you fail to prosecute just becausze "nobody was hurt this time" it opens a wide door for future defense lawyers to say "they never enforced it, therefore it holds no legal power as a contract." Regardless of what you or I or anyone else might think of this logic, that's how it'd go.
Noted. My appologies. Pardon this shell-shocked Mac-using slashdotter:)
I think the thing you are missing is the fact that it is precisely the fact that Apple makes the hardware and the software that makes them what they are...that absolutely defines their position in the market..and precisely what gives them the loyal base they have...and precisely what allows them to innovate in the areas they do.
It is at the same time the worst thing about the company and their products. As fascinating as that dicotomy is, however, I think it's for another discussion.
What about shutting down themes sites...the Sorenson fiasco...Apple's memberhip in the BSA...
I confess that I wasn't aware that those were DMCA issues.
Apple is not a "nice" company
I totally agree. Companies are incapable of being nice. This is the nature of companies - they exist to maximize profit.
Apple, does, however, have a great PR department and Mac fanatics believe Apple can't do any wrong. Their support of the DMCA is just one example of how self-serving they are.
I really don't know where to start with that one. The fact that Apple's PR department is irrelevant? The fact that Mac fanatics are just as you describe - by definition - but what about the rest of us? Shall we discuss GNU-Linux "fanatics" and "fanboys" who are totally irrational and won't see the truth even if it is under their noses? Would that be equally fair and accurate? The fact that "self-serving" as a criticism for a company really doesn't go very far?
While we're on the subject of how ethical Apple is, where is the outcry of support for Apple as they stand virtually alone resisting DRM? Surely the freedom-loving open source community is all over that, right? Perhaps I missed it. The criticism that people like myself are "fanatics who don't see the truth" is a dangerous one that can easily be turned back on the likes of the GNU-Linux community in spades. In the end, however, I think it gets us nowhere. Let's skip that part next time, shall we?
Give us a break too. If Apple didn't have enormously fat profit margins on hardware it'd be dead tomorrow.
I must confess that I don't understand your point. What I'm trying to say here is that expecting Apple to do the "moral thing" (according to some GPL "fanboys" [yeah how do you guys like it?]) and open source their entire software product line would be a tough sell business-wise to the shareholders. Basically it would be collosally stupid from a business perspective and anyone can see that. Suicide even. Whether they do or don't make most - or all - of their money on hardware is irrelevant as far as I can see.
And I think it's about time that the open source community give credit where credit is due. Apple is one of the biggest commercial entities in the industry to have embraced large portions of your way of thinking to date. Five years ago we might have been discussing what Apple would have to do to earn some of that respect and it might have sounded something like "Yeah well, if they were to open source some of their OS, that would be cool..." and "it would rock if they used some of the open source software that's out there, participated in the development, and gave back to the community..."
Well guess what? Here we are. And some folks still insist that Apple is on the "bad side" because they don't kill their entire business by adopting the GPL and bringing their revenues down to Redhat levels. Give me a fucking break.
As far as Apple and the DMCA, the only time I can think that they did anything shitty there was to go after Other World Computing who was basically making a patch for iDVD allowing it to work with 3rd party DVD burners. The thing that most people never realized, however, was that the only people who would ever want to do such a thing were people who were ripping off the software. Think it through - the iDVD software was free when you bought Apple's DVD-burning Mac. It was not legally acquireable in any other way. Therefore, those who owned a legal license to use the software already had an Apple-branded DVD-burner.
I cringe when I reflect that Apple's legal department used this crappy law to do anything, it's true. I think that was clearly a mistake and deserves to be widely criticized. But let's be clear - going after OWC in general was the right thing to do.
There are two sides to this licensing issue. There is the GPL side in which commercial software is the devil and should eventually go extinct. Then there is the commercial software industry's position that open source is evil and will be the death not only of their business but of the software industry.
Clearly both of these positions are wrong. In order for the industry to go forward someone has to develop means of getting along...and middle-roads to take. Apple is standing at that meeting point, taking risks, putting their money where their mouth is, giving to the community, getting something back... They may not get everything right, but jesus, give them a little credit and stop insisting that the militant open source dogma is the only acceptable way.
Who say's.Mac isn't making money? I mean I don't know that it is, but who says it isn't?
So, when is Steve going to realize he made a mistake
My guess is that the only "mistake" involved is that many of the services within.Mac aren't very high demand like email. I would rather have seen it be half the price and only the highest demanded services. But I'm not a very good armchair CEO so only time will tell.
When will slashdotters learn? The vast majority of that great big world out there has no freakin' idea that this is going on. They may frown when you explain that some new CD might not play in their computer but I can guarantee you when they are holding that new Britney CD in their hands at Best Buy they won't give a shit and they will choose to have the crippled disk over not having one at all. These people are not geeks and they are not, how shall I say..."politically active"?
I don't believe this move will cause the world to stop buying to any significant degree. I find any discussion that assumes there will be some significant "consumer uprising" absolutely ludicrous. As much as I'd love to see it, it won't happen.
Specialized software is just that: specialized. Thus not widely used so I don't think there is much to be learned there.
I think what this company is doing is very smart. Ordinary people do agonize over this issue. "New computer? What will I do with my old stuff?" Even when they got a new machine many of these people never moved their documents over because they didn't know how. They end up having a "legacy box" sitting there which only gets used for Quicken (version 2 possibly) or some such thing. Migrating data is a huge worry for average folks.
And that's going from a Windows box to another! This product just greases the wheels - it's one less thing for the reluctang buyer to worry about so they can go ahead and make the purchase they want. Smart.
My guess, however, would be that the product itself is an utter waste of time for anyone who knows the difference between applications and documents, where each can typically be found, and who knows how to use removable storage media of any kind.
There is a big difference between wanting to rip and burn your cd collection and what MS is doing to it's competition..[snip]..that is much different than allowing MS to continue it's practices while other superior products mature enough to dominate the market.
If MS is allowed to "continue it's practices" - and my guess is they will - there won't be much of a chance that superior products will dominate anything, let alone survive long enough to become viable. (Or just that it will take an extremely fortuitous set of events for it to happen and that we'll all wait years upon years for it to occur, superior quality of the competitor notwithstanding.) That is the whole point.
...what do you suggest? It seems to me that the leading opinion is to take a hatchet to the bastards and cut MS into either two or three companies.
I think that's a minority opinion, to be sure. I admit it was an interesting one simply because it was the only one that a) found MS guilty as charged and b) didn't require some new level of continual "government regulation" of Microsoft and it's industry. If a structural remedy had been imposed, then the goverment could have just walked away saying "have a nice day" sans continuing regulation. Or so it seemed to me.
The new Windows company can still decide to only realease intimate details of how their OS works to New Company #1 and New Company #1 will still have a distinct advantage and will only write New Company #1 Word 2010 for Windows 2010.
I'm not sure I agree with the likelihood of that scenario. Provided that the entities were truly split, including management and ownership and boards of directors...the whole enchillada...then I think there's no reason to think that "New Company #1" would be at any long-term advantage than anyone else with regard to having it's software run well on and/or bundled with Windows. Nor would Windows be in the same position to ensure that New Company #1" wrote Word only for Windows (and Macintosh) - they could do as they pleased and write a Linux suite. Why the hell not? Everyone knows the only reason MS doesn't do it is because it's "strategically un-sound" with regard to Windows.
I would prefer if my tax dollars were spent on items that can be benneficial to the nation as a whole
Like protecting citizens from price gouging and other forms of manipulation and control by corporations with very deep pockets who like to play dirty? But rather than wishing the goverment had done nothing at all, I find myself wishing that they weren't so easily bought and that they might have had the spine to do the job correclty instead of half-assed. It wouldn't have cost an extra dime to prosecute them with the intent to impose a meaningful remedy should they be found guity. That will never happen now, I gave up on that ages ago.
not a damn thing has come of it yet, I'm assuming that nothing ever will.
I'm inclined to agree with that. Except that I'm still glad they got found guilty. I truly believe they are a very dirty company.
If one half of the energy that has went into trying to defeat MS from a legal standpoint had went into trying to make Linux mature faster, we would be a lot farther along than we are.
Making Linux mature faster isn't the issue at all. (It does still have some distance to go before becoming a true desktop contender, but that's besides the point.) No matter how "mature" Linux becomes, it will never have Office and it will never have top-shelf games and it will never have the sweetest OEM deals. Not ever. Microsoft can and will prevent these things from happening should it ever begin to look like they might.
I think eventually superior products and services will be widely adopted and MS will lose it's stranglehold on the industry.
That kind of reminds me of people who shrug and say "eventually people will wake up and realize that they want to be able to rip thier CDs into MP3s. The content distributors will then have to accomodate them." What they fail to realize is that if action isn't taken now it could take another decade for the issue to be righted because of all the crazy laws being put into place. Similarly, if MS isn't held in some kind of check now (read: a couple of years ago) then sure, eventually superior products will be widely adopted and MS will lose it's stranglehold on the industry"...
77% of consumers believe they should be allowed to copy CD's for personal use
Yeah but 99% of consumers will be totally unaware whether the CD in their hot little hands at Best Buy is "crippled" or not. Nor will they care enough to put it back if you pointed out the warning label. It's one thing to ask a question and to have people agree in principle...and quite another to gague the extent to which such an agreement might influence actual behavior. My guess is that it won't influence it enough to deter the RIAA from making a good go of crippled CDs.
Actually reading your response gives me pause and make me step backward off of my admittedly somewhat knee-jerk reaction. Forgive a jittery Mac user for being a bit shell-shocked due to having endured one too many ill-informed Mac bashing posts here.
Still, one wonders - as an example - if anyone ever complains that the front page is way too littered with Linux-related stories. But I guess Linux doesn't have a "section"... I wonder why not?
Further question: can a "section" sometimes function as a ghetto of sorts?
Rumor has it that Apple is not only the purveyor of shiny things but that they are an actual technology company. In fact, according to recent reports Apple is an innovator, which admittedly is a term many people are confused about, after having heard it from the lips of Microsoft lawyers while they were defending the right to rob us all blind.
Let's recap:
Apple = technology innovator technology = nerdy slashdot = news for nerds
You following me? Whining because there's yet another article on slashdot about a company who's products you don't own is just that...whining.
And besides, the article isn't about Apple. It's about Nomad. Sheesh.
I can scarcely believe I am replying to this discussion...I'm sure to get modded down. But here goes...
The way I heard it, Apple entered into a bona fide agreement with Xerox and that Apple didn't do anything illegal or immoral by using the ideas they saw at Xerox PARC to create the original Mac GUI. Xerox had no plans to use what had been developed at the PARC and so peddled it off to someone who was interested...which turned out to be Apple. The part of the story that I don't know is what Apple gave to Xerox in exchange. ANyone know? And can anyone confirm this version of events?
If I am right about the above I do hope that one day the technology crowd realizes that "Microsoft is to as Apple is to Xerox PARC" is a false analogy. Apple and Xerox PARC are more like MS and that has-been company who sold them the original DOS operating system. They bought the freakin' thing, no crime was comitted.
I think it's because you're radically over-estimating the number of sales that such support would garner. I don't see any reson to doubt that the manufacturers do their homework and weight out whether adding such support would be a financial gain, a loss, risky, etc. A bunch of nerds on slashdot don't have access to the kind of market data that these guys have.
Or at least one would think that they are doing their homework. Is there reason to believe that they haven't? I mean besides a bunch of slashdot nerds claiming that the first manufacturer to build in Ogg support would be rocketed to the top of the heap through the sheer volume of previously untapped sales?
Re:Any comments of ipod?
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New MP3 Portables
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· Score: 3, Insightful
If only Apple released a version of iTunes for Windows. Surely it couldn't be that hard! I think they made a big mistake by not doing so.
I keep hearing that exact sentiment and I don't know if it's really true or not but at the very least there could be another way of looking at it. In the first scenario Apple made a huge mistake when not making a "Windows version" of iPod because that's just plain lost sales! Similarly, Apple makes a huge mistake when not porting iTunes because the bundled Windows software sucks ass and will impact sales of Windows iPods...again, lost sales.
The second way of looking at it goes a bit like this. Apple doesn't hurry to port the iPod because the lure of using one is enough to drum up some computer sales. Maybe not the same number of computer sales as the lost iPod sales, but computers are higher ticket items and presumably Apple makes more money on them. Similarly, Apple doesn't bother porting iTunes because it's one of those things that make the Mac look really good compared to the PC - again, more computer sales.
Which scenario is closer to the truth? Only Apple knows and even they don't know for sure because you can't count sales you didn't get. We can assume, however, that they are the most interested party when it comes to Apple sales and revenues...and thus they probably did their homework before deciding how to play it.
Which brings me to my final point: why are there an endless stream of second-guessers who figure they know that Apple would have made more sales/money if they had done differently?
Yes! A Real Operating System. Windows! Windows is cool; and by cool, I mean totally sweet. There are no updates for it today! That's what I call Real Ultimate Power!!! In fact Windows is sooooo sweet I want to crap my pants.
Slashdot Mirror
Meaning what, exactly? That OpenOffice has the same level of sucess that Nagios has? I really don't see it that way.
MS will keep the standard fairly open. Remember, MS are moving towards semi-open standards - .NET is usable by anyone, but MS gets to declare what the standards are.
"...usable by anyone, but MS gets to declare what the standards are..." will eventually play out like this:
1. Microsoft keeps Flash "fairly open," leading to even further adoption of the technology.
2. Flash becomes even more ubiquitous than it is today, basically becoming a fundamental building block of the internet. Since it is found everywhere and is supported by all browsers and ships on every computer with every platform...developers feel they can use it willy-nilly. And they do.
3. Competing technologies all but fade away. With a ubiquitous, well supprted and free solution...who needs them?
4. Things start becoming a little less open. "In order to accomodate their customers" (heh), Microsoft starts with the proprietary hooks. Functionality that only works in Windows (or IE or - insert microsoft product name here -). Or at least it works in their stuff first and or best because of what they are changing.
5. Suddenly other browsers and platforms are using the internet only with permission from Redmond. (Apple: "You'll give us access to last years internet content if we bundle Windows Media Player instead of Quicktime? Sure thing, boss! Whatever you say!" Linux community: "If only the stupid sheep of the world would download, compile, configure and use -insert name of open source scalable vector graphics widget with % 0.00145 marketshare here - instead of that proprietary shit! Then our open source browser would have a chance. By the way, anyone get MSFlash plugin 7.2 to work in Mozilla yet? Yes I know the current version is 9.6. Shut up already!"
5. Somewhere Steve Balmer pets a hairless cat and grins because he knows he now has one more big lever to lean on in order to keep Windows and Microsoft on top.
Or on the other hand, it could be that Microsoft is, as you say, actually "becoming a little more honest". But I think the smart money would be on my scenario.
How can the sucess of geeky sysadmin software be translated into open source projects aimed at a wider audience? Put simply, can the open source model work beyond nerdy sysadmin widgets and spill into the world of mass-appeal software?
I think you're missing the point. Those guys' whole reason for being is to be against things like DRM. And god bless them for it. But Apple is out there trying to make a buck in technology. They're under serious pressure from the entertainment and computer industry to comply. And they have refused. So far. Kudos to them.
Yeah, you really gotta watch that sneaky Apple. Introducing new software with bugs that they don't even tell you about beforehand. Nobody else would do that. Those smart Windows users. How I envy them.
Not.
And by the way - people who don't read the "readme" aren't going to read your post either.
You're missing the point. You have to enforce and prosecute all leaks of trade secrets. You don't get to pick and choose. If you fail to prosecute just becausze "nobody was hurt this time" it opens a wide door for future defense lawyers to say "they never enforced it, therefore it holds no legal power as a contract." Regardless of what you or I or anyone else might think of this logic, that's how it'd go.
Thank you for the most thought provoking response to my blatherings so far.
I'm hardly a GPL fanboy btw.
:)
Noted. My appologies. Pardon this shell-shocked Mac-using slashdotter
I think the thing you are missing is the fact that it is precisely the fact that Apple makes the hardware and the software that makes them what they are...that absolutely defines their position in the market..and precisely what gives them the loyal base they have...and precisely what allows them to innovate in the areas they do.
It is at the same time the worst thing about the company and their products. As fascinating as that dicotomy is, however, I think it's for another discussion.
What about shutting down themes sites...the Sorenson fiasco...Apple's memberhip in the BSA...
I confess that I wasn't aware that those were DMCA issues.
Apple is not a "nice" company
I totally agree. Companies are incapable of being nice. This is the nature of companies - they exist to maximize profit.
Apple, does, however, have a great PR department and Mac fanatics believe Apple can't do any wrong. Their support of the DMCA is just one example of how self-serving they are.
I really don't know where to start with that one. The fact that Apple's PR department is irrelevant? The fact that Mac fanatics are just as you describe - by definition - but what about the rest of us? Shall we discuss GNU-Linux "fanatics" and "fanboys" who are totally irrational and won't see the truth even if it is under their noses? Would that be equally fair and accurate? The fact that "self-serving" as a criticism for a company really doesn't go very far?
While we're on the subject of how ethical Apple is, where is the outcry of support for Apple as they stand virtually alone resisting DRM? Surely the freedom-loving open source community is all over that, right? Perhaps I missed it. The criticism that people like myself are "fanatics who don't see the truth" is a dangerous one that can easily be turned back on the likes of the GNU-Linux community in spades. In the end, however, I think it gets us nowhere. Let's skip that part next time, shall we?
Give us a break too. If Apple didn't have enormously fat profit margins on hardware it'd be dead tomorrow.
I must confess that I don't understand your point. What I'm trying to say here is that expecting Apple to do the "moral thing" (according to some GPL "fanboys" [yeah how do you guys like it?]) and open source their entire software product line would be a tough sell business-wise to the shareholders. Basically it would be collosally stupid from a business perspective and anyone can see that. Suicide even. Whether they do or don't make most - or all - of their money on hardware is irrelevant as far as I can see.
And I think it's about time that the open source community give credit where credit is due. Apple is one of the biggest commercial entities in the industry to have embraced large portions of your way of thinking to date. Five years ago we might have been discussing what Apple would have to do to earn some of that respect and it might have sounded something like "Yeah well, if they were to open source some of their OS, that would be cool..." and "it would rock if they used some of the open source software that's out there, participated in the development, and gave back to the community..."
Well guess what? Here we are. And some folks still insist that Apple is on the "bad side" because they don't kill their entire business by adopting the GPL and bringing their revenues down to Redhat levels. Give me a fucking break.
As far as Apple and the DMCA, the only time I can think that they did anything shitty there was to go after Other World Computing who was basically making a patch for iDVD allowing it to work with 3rd party DVD burners. The thing that most people never realized, however, was that the only people who would ever want to do such a thing were people who were ripping off the software. Think it through - the iDVD software was free when you bought Apple's DVD-burning Mac. It was not legally acquireable in any other way. Therefore, those who owned a legal license to use the software already had an Apple-branded DVD-burner.
I cringe when I reflect that Apple's legal department used this crappy law to do anything, it's true. I think that was clearly a mistake and deserves to be widely criticized. But let's be clear - going after OWC in general was the right thing to do.
There are two sides to this licensing issue. There is the GPL side in which commercial software is the devil and should eventually go extinct. Then there is the commercial software industry's position that open source is evil and will be the death not only of their business but of the software industry.
Clearly both of these positions are wrong. In order for the industry to go forward someone has to develop means of getting along...and middle-roads to take. Apple is standing at that meeting point, taking risks, putting their money where their mouth is, giving to the community, getting something back... They may not get everything right, but jesus, give them a little credit and stop insisting that the militant open source dogma is the only acceptable way.
Rise above your name, then maybe your criticizms will bite a little harder.
Please tell me that shibbey or pudge...or someone... actually submitted this bug to Apple before posting it here.
It'll be interesting, though, to see how long we wait for a fix. If this is a legit thing. I haven't tested it and don't plan to.
and is still making money!
.Mac isn't making money? I mean I don't know that it is, but who says it isn't?
.Mac aren't very high demand like email. I would rather have seen it be half the price and only the highest demanded services. But I'm not a very good armchair CEO so only time will tell.
Who say's
So, when is Steve going to realize he made a mistake
My guess is that the only "mistake" involved is that many of the services within
When will slashdotters learn? The vast majority of that great big world out there has no freakin' idea that this is going on. They may frown when you explain that some new CD might not play in their computer but I can guarantee you when they are holding that new Britney CD in their hands at Best Buy they won't give a shit and they will choose to have the crippled disk over not having one at all. These people are not geeks and they are not, how shall I say..."politically active"?
I don't believe this move will cause the world to stop buying to any significant degree. I find any discussion that assumes there will be some significant "consumer uprising" absolutely ludicrous. As much as I'd love to see it, it won't happen.
...but a lack of specilized software...
Specialized software is just that: specialized. Thus not widely used so I don't think there is much to be learned there.
I think what this company is doing is very smart. Ordinary people do agonize over this issue. "New computer? What will I do with my old stuff?" Even when they got a new machine many of these people never moved their documents over because they didn't know how. They end up having a "legacy box" sitting there which only gets used for Quicken (version 2 possibly) or some such thing. Migrating data is a huge worry for average folks.
And that's going from a Windows box to another! This product just greases the wheels - it's one less thing for the reluctang buyer to worry about so they can go ahead and make the purchase they want. Smart.
My guess, however, would be that the product itself is an utter waste of time for anyone who knows the difference between applications and documents, where each can typically be found, and who knows how to use removable storage media of any kind.
That is to say, millions of people will love it.
There is a big difference between wanting to rip and burn your cd collection and what MS is doing to it's competition..[snip]..that is much different than allowing MS to continue it's practices while other superior products mature enough to dominate the market.
...what do you suggest? It seems to me that the leading opinion is to take a hatchet to the bastards and cut MS into either two or three companies.
If MS is allowed to "continue it's practices" - and my guess is they will - there won't be much of a chance that superior products will dominate anything, let alone survive long enough to become viable. (Or just that it will take an extremely fortuitous set of events for it to happen and that we'll all wait years upon years for it to occur, superior quality of the competitor notwithstanding.) That is the whole point.
I think that's a minority opinion, to be sure. I admit it was an interesting one simply because it was the only one that a) found MS guilty as charged and b) didn't require some new level of continual "government regulation" of Microsoft and it's industry. If a structural remedy had been imposed, then the goverment could have just walked away saying "have a nice day" sans continuing regulation. Or so it seemed to me.
The new Windows company can still decide to only realease intimate details of how their OS works to New Company #1 and New Company #1 will still have a distinct advantage and will only write New Company #1 Word 2010 for Windows 2010.
I'm not sure I agree with the likelihood of that scenario. Provided that the entities were truly split, including management and ownership and boards of directors...the whole enchillada...then I think there's no reason to think that "New Company #1" would be at any long-term advantage than anyone else with regard to having it's software run well on and/or bundled with Windows. Nor would Windows be in the same position to ensure that New Company #1" wrote Word only for Windows (and Macintosh) - they could do as they pleased and write a Linux suite. Why the hell not? Everyone knows the only reason MS doesn't do it is because it's "strategically un-sound" with regard to Windows.
I would prefer if my tax dollars were spent on items that can be benneficial to the nation as a whole
Like protecting citizens from price gouging and other forms of manipulation and control by corporations with very deep pockets who like to play dirty? But rather than wishing the goverment had done nothing at all, I find myself wishing that they weren't so easily bought and that they might have had the spine to do the job correclty instead of half-assed. It wouldn't have cost an extra dime to prosecute them with the intent to impose a meaningful remedy should they be found guity. That will never happen now, I gave up on that ages ago.
not a damn thing has come of it yet, I'm assuming that nothing ever will.
I'm inclined to agree with that. Except that I'm still glad they got found guilty. I truly believe they are a very dirty company.
If one half of the energy that has went into trying to defeat MS from a legal standpoint had went into trying to make Linux mature faster, we would be a lot farther along than we are.
Making Linux mature faster isn't the issue at all. (It does still have some distance to go before becoming a true desktop contender, but that's besides the point.) No matter how "mature" Linux becomes, it will never have Office and it will never have top-shelf games and it will never have the sweetest OEM deals. Not ever. Microsoft can and will prevent these things from happening should it ever begin to look like they might.
I think eventually superior products and services will be widely adopted and MS will lose it's stranglehold on the industry.
...in a decade or two.
That kind of reminds me of people who shrug and say "eventually people will wake up and realize that they want to be able to rip thier CDs into MP3s. The content distributors will then have to accomodate them." What they fail to realize is that if action isn't taken now it could take another decade for the issue to be righted because of all the crazy laws being put into place. Similarly, if MS isn't held in some kind of check now (read: a couple of years ago) then sure, eventually superior products will be widely adopted and MS will lose it's stranglehold on the industry"...
77% of consumers believe they should be allowed to copy CD's for personal use
Yeah but 99% of consumers will be totally unaware whether the CD in their hot little hands at Best Buy is "crippled" or not. Nor will they care enough to put it back if you pointed out the warning label. It's one thing to ask a question and to have people agree in principle...and quite another to gague the extent to which such an agreement might influence actual behavior. My guess is that it won't influence it enough to deter the RIAA from making a good go of crippled CDs.
Actually reading your response gives me pause and make me step backward off of my admittedly somewhat knee-jerk reaction. Forgive a jittery Mac user for being a bit shell-shocked due to having endured one too many ill-informed Mac bashing posts here.
Still, one wonders - as an example - if anyone ever complains that the front page is way too littered with Linux-related stories. But I guess Linux doesn't have a "section"... I wonder why not?
Further question: can a "section" sometimes function as a ghetto of sorts?
Rumor has it that Apple is not only the purveyor of shiny things but that they are an actual technology company. In fact, according to recent reports Apple is an innovator, which admittedly is a term many people are confused about, after having heard it from the lips of Microsoft lawyers while they were defending the right to rob us all blind.
Let's recap:
Apple = technology innovator
technology = nerdy
slashdot = news for nerds
You following me? Whining because there's yet another article on slashdot about a company who's products you don't own is just that...whining.
And besides, the article isn't about Apple. It's about Nomad. Sheesh.
I can scarcely believe I am replying to this discussion...I'm sure to get modded down. But here goes...
The way I heard it, Apple entered into a bona fide agreement with Xerox and that Apple didn't do anything illegal or immoral by using the ideas they saw at Xerox PARC to create the original Mac GUI. Xerox had no plans to use what had been developed at the PARC and so peddled it off to someone who was interested...which turned out to be Apple. The part of the story that I don't know is what Apple gave to Xerox in exchange. ANyone know? And can anyone confirm this version of events?
If I am right about the above I do hope that one day the technology crowd realizes that "Microsoft is to as Apple is to Xerox PARC" is a false analogy. Apple and Xerox PARC are more like MS and that has-been company who sold them the original DOS operating system. They bought the freakin' thing, no crime was comitted.
Why not Ogg Vorbis?
I think it's because you're radically over-estimating the number of sales that such support would garner. I don't see any reson to doubt that the manufacturers do their homework and weight out whether adding such support would be a financial gain, a loss, risky, etc. A bunch of nerds on slashdot don't have access to the kind of market data that these guys have.
Or at least one would think that they are doing their homework. Is there reason to believe that they haven't? I mean besides a bunch of slashdot nerds claiming that the first manufacturer to build in Ogg support would be rocketed to the top of the heap through the sheer volume of previously untapped sales?
If only Apple released a version of iTunes for Windows. Surely it couldn't be that hard! I think they made a big mistake by not doing so.
I keep hearing that exact sentiment and I don't know if it's really true or not but at the very least there could be another way of looking at it. In the first scenario Apple made a huge mistake when not making a "Windows version" of iPod because that's just plain lost sales! Similarly, Apple makes a huge mistake when not porting iTunes because the bundled Windows software sucks ass and will impact sales of Windows iPods...again, lost sales.
The second way of looking at it goes a bit like this. Apple doesn't hurry to port the iPod because the lure of using one is enough to drum up some computer sales. Maybe not the same number of computer sales as the lost iPod sales, but computers are higher ticket items and presumably Apple makes more money on them. Similarly, Apple doesn't bother porting iTunes because it's one of those things that make the Mac look really good compared to the PC - again, more computer sales.
Which scenario is closer to the truth? Only Apple knows and even they don't know for sure because you can't count sales you didn't get. We can assume, however, that they are the most interested party when it comes to Apple sales and revenues...and thus they probably did their homework before deciding how to play it.
Which brings me to my final point: why are there an endless stream of second-guessers who figure they know that Apple would have made more sales/money if they had done differently?
Yes! A Real Operating System. Windows! Windows is cool; and by cool, I mean totally sweet. There are no updates for it today! That's what I call Real Ultimate Power!!! In fact Windows is sooooo sweet I want to crap my pants.
(Just ask Mark!)