Patrons are what IMO have to come to "solve" current "digital issue or whatever we dare to call it(TM)" so artists and other creative people wont die of hunger and keep create but if my knowledge of history is correct, it is not new concept: Mozarts, Michelangelos,... of the past were living in palaces of their patrons, eaten their food, drank their wine, etc. (so I agree with you)
Maybe now we do not know the names of those patrons (i.e. those patrons are not famous because of their patronage) or maybe they do not recouple money invested (i.e. from purely financial point of view they lost money). But on the other hand we are not that fortunate to know personaly those great people like Mozart, we can't see/hear/... their creations as a first person on Earth and so on.
Patrons paid (and maybe pay and maybe will pay) while essentialy (at the end) everybody gets to enjoy wonderfull creations of great people (sooner for some form of payment or later for free) but patrons got (get and wil get) something more (in exchange for support).
So we can skip this topic and jump to the next one: We can start speculate about the impact of some Windows HPCs infected with some worm on the Internet. And then speculate further and compare that impact on what we alredy experienced with those hacked Solaris and Linux clusters.
Call me paranoid, but this is an attempt by the Chinese government to take up what they see as their rightful place in the world.
Or maybe Chinese are (logicaly) not willing to be pushed by U.S. trying to get past their rightfull place in the world. In other words: Chinese are maybe just trying not to be ripped off by all the bad things (bad from consumer point of view, like overpriced but buggy software, overpriced licenses for stupid patents,...) coming from abroad.
Essentialy it looks to me like they are acting as a sane consumer - they feel they are abused so they do something about it. That's maybe bad for some (non Chinese) companies or some other countries but why should Chinese care about those?
If some business pushes consumers (or some regime pushes people,...) too far, it have to at least count with possibility of revolt. There is the choice between short-term (abusing policy) and long-term (honest and fair policy) with the long-term option being more difficult but... I'm geting long and drifting OT so I leave the rest unfinished.
The whole argument in our discussion starts to remind me of arguments about guns. And this argument IMO comes down to who is responsible for shot people: shooter or gun manufacturer? I think shooter, except of specific cases when death has been caused by something like production fault of the gun, etc.
"Microsoft caused the security holes in Windows."
That's true.
But Microsoft did not connect machines of those users to the Internet. Nor did they installed their faulty OS on those machines. Nor did they powered on those PCs.... Microsoft may be monopoly, but current situation is not that much bad as that MS is responsible for every PC on Earth. (which is of course not argument for dissasembly of anti-monopoly government bodies:)
"In fact, I'd bet that the average person who has pirated Windows XP has more technical skill and knowledge than the average Windows XP user."
That we can agree upon too.
But such supperior technical skils does not give them the right to steal nor to free them from responsibility they bear by using the stolen product.
"And what right does Microsoft have to inflict harm on you, me, or others who are not pirates?"
None. But none of us has any right to require them to cover the costs of faults which are not covered in their warranty. We can argue of what warranty they give (IMO essentialy none), but that's another problem.
You mentioned Ford. Ford partialy because of warranty they give, partialy voluntarily (to keep good relationships with their customers so future business wont be hurt) proactively distribute "patches" for their faulty cars. It's a shame forces of free market have no such effect on Microsoft.
So (I'm partialy repeating myself again):
If you buy something, it's yours. If you use it, you are responsible for effects, be they good or bad.
To protect yourself from responsibility for bad effects you require warranty for the products. While all parties of the "tool trade" wants to be happy, trade should be fair: good tool, appropriate warranty and appropriate price. Essentialy you should get warranty for all production faults of the produts plus info about how to use it and how not to use it as to minimize unwanted sideffects - so that at least you wont be required for damage caused by mistakes for which manufacturer is responsible. Fair for you, fair for manufacturer.
If somebody else did you damage, sue (or what appropriate in your country) him and try to extract damages from him. If he is "user" as you, he will try to use his warranty to compensate you thus (if covered by warranty) shifting the costs to the manufacturer. If he is "thief" he wont have any warranty and will have to cover the cost just by himself and (in the proces also stand criminal charges for what he stole).
So again: Users should ask fair warranty from manufacturer, if they are buying from him so they want have to be responsible for mistakes manufacturer has done.
If you've done all above and want to do even more, that make pressure to manufacturers (in this case to Microsoft) so they will minimize amount and seriousness of faults in their products.
In case of Microsoft you should write to them, call them,... If it does not work, stop buying their produtcs. If it does not work either, give advice to others not to buy from them. If it does not work either, they are convinced monopolist, so persuade Justice Department, Commissioner of EU for competitivnes or whoever is appropriate, to make pressure on them too.
If, in the process, you encounter problems with interoperability between MS Windows, MS Office,... and other products, then also start to make pressure as to make Microsoft use realy open (not "looks like open" or totaly closed) data formats. But that's for different story and different duscussion.
So to close that up: Current situation with malware outbrakes is after all respons
Based on your opinion, my answer is "not smart" and I'm experiencing "lack of understanding of computer security" but I'll still try to make your "gas leak" analogy more consistent with the situation of users running illegal (and unpatched) copies of products of Microsoft corp.
Your analogy:
"What you're advocating is analogous to companies refusing to fix natural gas leaks because the consumer is behind on his gas bill. Explain that to the neighbors when his house blows up and takes out their homes, cars, or family members."
Should IMO be:
"What you're advocating is analogous to companies refusing to fix natural gas leaks because the consumer is stealing gas from them using black-pipe illegaly connected to some official company's pipe. Explain that to the neighbors when his house blows up and takes out their homes, cars, or family members."
(and I also provide explanation for neighbours: "He is/was using our property illegaly without contract with us or permission from us. What's more, he did it without necessary technical skills and knowledge. His actions harmed you. His actions harmed also us. We should join forces and and sue him to hell. Or, if he's alredy dead, at least try to sue/educate/... other's who are like him to at least prevent such accients in future.")
From such (IMO more precise analogy) comes also maybe good advice to Microsoft, what to do with such users: If gas company discovers some illegal connection to their pipe system, they (I'm quite sure) try to
1) immediately disconnect it (or at least additionaly certify and legalize it) and then
2) sue entity responsible for it (or make them pay for work required for additional certification and legalization).
Microsoft cofounded BSA for what I undestand "pirates hunting" so they should use it to hunt down users of illegal copies of their products trying to get security patches with nice side-effect to others: less infected PCs on the Net.
As I alredy wrote: "For sure, there will be short-range benefits in allowing [them] to use those patches". That means that if patches are not provided, there is immediate harm done to innocent people. I'm experiencing that harm too. But providing those patches to those people we're talking about is (I'm repeating) not best longterm solution.
should users with pirated copies of Windows be allowed to download security updates?
My answer: No.
As much as I do not like the price of Windows (too high for what one gets for the money) you have to either try to restore competition in this particular market (which will lover the price of Windows to some real numbers) or change your demands and use something else (Mac, Linux,...) or something else. It's maybe unfair there is no alternative producer of Windows but stealing does not make that better, quite contrary (helps Microsoft keep the monopoly while they have 90%+ market share also thanks to those users with illegal copies).
If users of illegal copies (they) get (with permission from Microsoft) those patches, they wont be stealing (patches) from Microsoft. But they will have screwed comparison tables "Windows vs. ProductX" in a way as "Windows are for free (0 monetary cost)". It will make them unwiling to switch (either to legal copy of Windows or legal copy of some other product be it free or commercial). Thus it'll help Microsoft to keep their unfairly acquired monopoly much longer and screw the market/economy/people/... much more. If Microsoft is going to give permissions to users of illegal copies of their products to use patches, I'll consider it anticompetitive and illegal move from them.
If [they] will be allowed to use those patches, market/economy/people may mistakenly see it as a move to the right direction (from security point of view) while the true right move - more OS diversity on desktop PCs - will be pushed away. Security will hurs, market/economy/people will hurt.
For sure, there will be short-range benefits in allowing [them] to use those patches, but in the long term I do not see it as good decision (good for market/economy/people).
In such case also Windows apps written based on such documentation will be broken and either:
MS implementation will have to be fixed or
apps will code around the "bugs" but information about such "bugs" will spread so Wine project will have some difficulties but it'll be still better then missing API documentation.
There is something in what ergo98 wrote but also there is something in what you wrote.
I'm also the one who considers $150 for Microsoft Windows an unreasonably high price (even more if it means half of average monthly income in our country). But I'm also programmer so I also do not like the idea of putting hard work into something and then geting nothing back because of others copying my work without my permission.
But we live in physical universe so physical laws rules: if we live on our own, sitting on chair thinking about something does not bring us food.
So we (mentaly working) have to consider it a very lucky coincidence that there are some people who are willing to give us some amout of physical goods (results of physical work: food, clothing, housing,...) for just thinking. We should be gratefull for that - if we are lucky enought, we do not have to touch dipper or hammer our whole life thinking all the time and still we will have food (and clothing, and house,...).
If we start to ask too much (for just thinking), well those kind (physicaly working) people will let us starve and we will have to stop thinking and start really working - with our hands.:)
Well, we can agree that one side's result of tree counting will be higher than that of other's side: While business may get higher count (see how many trees there are? why we cant't cut few of them down?), environmentalists may get lower count (see how few trees there are? we have to guard each one of them).
While maybe all the vocal groups are exaggerating, we "in the middle" are doing nothing being content that one those "vocal group" is fighting "for me". Or we are just doing nothing because we are too puzzled by all those misleading data. But in the mean time our environment is changing.
Our children will have final judgment on wherher it is changing for goood or for bad.
IMO for bad. You...
I think those who like to have house with garden with grass, bushes and trees in it have to do something - it is not that easy to have those if land outside "my property" is spoiled.
its possible to get rich without robbing somebody.
I'm optimist so I tend to agree with your statement.
While it may be possible to get ritch without robbing somebody (I hope it is), I think this is not the case with a lot of rich people today (by rich I mean for example almost everybody living in USA, EU, Japan,... and also myself). Why?
Well, in a lot of cases such wealth has been produced with a lot of side-effects like poisoned air, poisoned water, died-out species, irreversibly consumed resources,... thus robbing our children of such wonderfull things like fresh water, clean air, walk in a country, study of wild animals,... thus making their life more dull. And also a lot more difficult than ours or our parents.
PS: What on EARTH is up with IE's css support? is it intentionally designed to be completely broken?
IMO yes, it is broken intentionaly, but I did not saw the source code nor question the programers of that software so... as alredy written: IMO [In My Opinion].
So maybe in future we'll see MD5 checksums or fingerprints (or something other, still strong but more easily "visualy comparable") presented in the page along with the link and also UA (user agen a.k.a. broser) will display somewhere the checksum of link the mouse howers upon.
Note: Anybody is free to use this idea as long as he does not patent it and than abuses this patent for extorting money from others who actualy do something (other than employing just some lawyer and maybe also secretary and accountant).
Note: I do not claim I'm the first one to have such idea, but in case I am, that see the previous note.
And final note: Do not be very serious. We should have also some fun while we're alive.:)
Try that virus under Wine: If it works, Wine is good. If it does not work, Wine developers should work harder, otherwise Wine users wont be able to get "the right eXPerience".:)
I've bought Dell Precission 650 last summer with FreeDOS thus saving about 2'500 SKK (at that time about 60 EUR) thus not buying something I'm not going to use (i.e. Windows XP Professional which was defaul OS choise for that machine).
Comparing that to the price of machine, I saved about 2% but for ussual business (ussual office PC) it may be something above 6%.
2-6% maybe are not that much money, but 2'500 represented about 27% of average income of Slovak citizen at that time so it was (and still is) substantial amout of money for a lot of people here.
Difficulty of cracking process of a given DRM scheme is IMO negatively proportional (sorry, I can't remember whether this is right mathematical term in english) to number of experts responsible for creating the scheme.:)
Wi-Fi equipment is also "cripled" in such a way. Reason? Realy "silly": So users of such equipment does not cook up their heads or heads of some neighbours.
If you do not put some keywords into the document or put it in appropriate directory, how is computer going to find it?
Say you created note "Meet Bill here at 11:00". Computer saves it for you (say in "/" along with other thousands of similar memos) and also notes, that it has been saved "Tue Oct 28 11:42:58 CET 2003". Maybe it can also note, that according to GPS you are in New York and while you have currently running 5 concurent project (or maybe more but computer can't be sure you werent lazy and dit not withold info about some project from it), it is probable that this note is related to one of them.
Say one year later you are compiling analysis about your business with CompanyX (where Bill works). How is computer going to correctly either include or exclude above mentioned memo from statistical data? You were lazy to put it in "CompanyX" directory, you did not specify "CompanyX" keyword so you will either have to sort throught a lot of such "uncategorizied" memos/files/documents or use just incomplete analyses.
So either you do not forget about file categirization or you have to have some advanced AI (with inteligence comparable to inteligence of good human secretary) which will also either figure out missing data for you (so to take that great burden from you) or asks for them right away (when you dictated the note, it will ask: "Is that Bill from CompanyX?") and so on...
I wote: "... "New" does not always means "better"....".
You wrote: "... you are going to attempt to argue that old technology is consistently better than new technology...".
So the answer to your question: No, I'm not going to argue (or attemtpt to argue) that old technology is consistently better than new technology. I repeat: "New" does not always means "better".:)
p.s.: AC hinted on what I have in mind from another perspective. But there are also a lot of other examples but that's for another discussion.
But because Apache developers (it seems) are not making "politics" like Microsoft, we do not see things like "all users of MS IE 6.0 and earlier are not able to access Apache web servers with latest 'sevice pack'" (where by 'sercice pack' I mean some bundle of a critical bugfix and also some tweak which breaks the interoperability of MS IE with Apache). Goal may be good (to get all those known security holes in MS IE get fixed and also all those realy bad incompatibilies - say CSS - resolved) but...
... as a "good guys" Apache developers have smaller range of "weapons" in "competition wars".
I've noticed that admins with 30 years of unix experience seem to be about 15 years behind the rest of the world.
Maybe that's why they are ussualy happier?
(at leat with "their" computers)
:)
"New" does not always means "better". Say "new disease", "new environment pollutant", "new way to produce even more pollution", "new software with new bugs to make new worms made-easy",...
Slashdot Mirror
Patrons are what IMO have to come to "solve" current "digital issue or whatever we dare to call it(TM)" so artists and other creative people wont die of hunger and keep create but if my knowledge of history is correct, it is not new concept: Mozarts, Michelangelos, ... of the past were living in palaces of their patrons, eaten their food, drank their wine, etc. (so I agree with you)
Maybe now we do not know the names of those patrons (i.e. those patrons are not famous because of their patronage) or maybe they do not recouple money invested (i.e. from purely financial point of view they lost money). But on the other hand we are not that fortunate to know personaly those great people like Mozart, we can't see/hear/... their creations as a first person on Earth and so on.
Patrons paid (and maybe pay and maybe will pay) while essentialy (at the end) everybody gets to enjoy wonderfull creations of great people (sooner for some form of payment or later for free) but patrons got (get and wil get) something more (in exchange for support).
Alredy happened: Ongoing Linux/Solaris Compromise Epidemic.
So we can skip this topic and jump to the next one: We can start speculate about the impact of some Windows HPCs infected with some worm on the Internet. And then speculate further and compare that impact on what we alredy experienced with those hacked Solaris and Linux clusters.
:) or better :| ?
Call me paranoid, but this is an attempt by the Chinese government to take up what they see as their rightful place in the world.
Or maybe Chinese are (logicaly) not willing to be pushed by U.S. trying to get past their rightfull place in the world. In other words: Chinese are maybe just trying not to be ripped off by all the bad things (bad from consumer point of view, like overpriced but buggy software, overpriced licenses for stupid patents, ...) coming from abroad.
Essentialy it looks to me like they are acting as a sane consumer - they feel they are abused so they do something about it. That's maybe bad for some (non Chinese) companies or some other countries but why should Chinese care about those?
If some business pushes consumers (or some regime pushes people, ...) too far, it have to at least count with possibility of revolt. There is the choice between short-term (abusing policy) and long-term (honest and fair policy) with the long-term option being more difficult but ... I'm geting long and drifting OT so I leave the rest unfinished.
The whole argument in our discussion starts to remind me of arguments about guns. And this argument IMO comes down to who is responsible for shot people: shooter or gun manufacturer? I think shooter, except of specific cases when death has been caused by something like production fault of the gun, etc.
"Microsoft caused the security holes in Windows."
That's true.
But Microsoft did not connect machines of those users to the Internet. Nor did they installed their faulty OS on those machines. Nor did they powered on those PCs. ... Microsoft may be monopoly, but current situation is not that much bad as that MS is responsible for every PC on Earth. (which is of course not argument for dissasembly of anti-monopoly government bodies :)
"In fact, I'd bet that the average person who has pirated Windows XP has more technical skill and knowledge than the average Windows XP user."
That we can agree upon too.
But such supperior technical skils does not give them the right to steal nor to free them from responsibility they bear by using the stolen product.
"And what right does Microsoft have to inflict harm on you, me, or others who are not pirates?"
None. But none of us has any right to require them to cover the costs of faults which are not covered in their warranty. We can argue of what warranty they give (IMO essentialy none), but that's another problem.
You mentioned Ford. Ford partialy because of warranty they give, partialy voluntarily (to keep good relationships with their customers so future business wont be hurt) proactively distribute "patches" for their faulty cars. It's a shame forces of free market have no such effect on Microsoft.
So (I'm partialy repeating myself again):
So again: Users should ask fair warranty from manufacturer, if they are buying from him so they want have to be responsible for mistakes manufacturer has done.
In case of Microsoft you should write to them, call them,
If, in the process, you encounter problems with interoperability between MS Windows, MS Office,
So to close that up: Current situation with malware outbrakes is after all respons
Based on your opinion, my answer is "not smart" and I'm experiencing "lack of understanding of computer security" but I'll still try to make your "gas leak" analogy more consistent with the situation of users running illegal (and unpatched) copies of products of Microsoft corp.
Your analogy:
"What you're advocating is analogous to companies refusing to fix natural gas leaks because the consumer is behind on his gas bill. Explain that to the neighbors when his house blows up and takes out their homes, cars, or family members."
Should IMO be:
"What you're advocating is analogous to companies refusing to fix natural gas leaks because the consumer is stealing gas from them using black-pipe illegaly connected to some official company's pipe. Explain that to the neighbors when his house blows up and takes out their homes, cars, or family members."
(and I also provide explanation for neighbours: "He is/was using our property illegaly without contract with us or permission from us. What's more, he did it without necessary technical skills and knowledge. His actions harmed you. His actions harmed also us. We should join forces and and sue him to hell. Or, if he's alredy dead, at least try to sue/educate/... other's who are like him to at least prevent such accients in future.")
From such (IMO more precise analogy) comes also maybe good advice to Microsoft, what to do with such users: If gas company discovers some illegal connection to their pipe system, they (I'm quite sure) try to
1) immediately disconnect it (or at least additionaly certify and legalize it) and then
2) sue entity responsible for it (or make them pay for work required for additional certification and legalization).
Microsoft cofounded BSA for what I undestand "pirates hunting" so they should use it to hunt down users of illegal copies of their products trying to get security patches with nice side-effect to others: less infected PCs on the Net.
As I alredy wrote: "For sure, there will be short-range benefits in allowing [them] to use those patches". That means that if patches are not provided, there is immediate harm done to innocent people. I'm experiencing that harm too. But providing those patches to those people we're talking about is (I'm repeating) not best longterm solution.
should users with pirated copies of Windows be allowed to download security updates?
My answer: No.
As much as I do not like the price of Windows (too high for what one gets for the money) you have to either try to restore competition in this particular market (which will lover the price of Windows to some real numbers) or change your demands and use something else (Mac, Linux, ...) or something else. It's maybe unfair there is no alternative producer of Windows but stealing does not make that better, quite contrary (helps Microsoft keep the monopoly while they have 90%+ market share also thanks to those users with illegal copies).
If users of illegal copies (they) get (with permission from Microsoft) those patches, they wont be stealing (patches) from Microsoft. But they will have screwed comparison tables "Windows vs. ProductX" in a way as "Windows are for free (0 monetary cost)". It will make them unwiling to switch (either to legal copy of Windows or legal copy of some other product be it free or commercial). Thus it'll help Microsoft to keep their unfairly acquired monopoly much longer and screw the market/economy/people/... much more. If Microsoft is going to give permissions to users of illegal copies of their products to use patches, I'll consider it anticompetitive and illegal move from them.
If [they] will be allowed to use those patches, market/economy/people may mistakenly see it as a move to the right direction (from security point of view) while the true right move - more OS diversity on desktop PCs - will be pushed away. Security will hurs, market/economy/people will hurt.
For sure, there will be short-range benefits in allowing [them] to use those patches, but in the long term I do not see it as good decision (good for market/economy/people).
In such case also Windows apps written based on such documentation will be broken and either:
There is something in what ergo98 wrote but also there is something in what you wrote.
I'm also the one who considers $150 for Microsoft Windows an unreasonably high price (even more if it means half of average monthly income in our country). But I'm also programmer so I also do not like the idea of putting hard work into something and then geting nothing back because of others copying my work without my permission.
But we live in physical universe so physical laws rules: if we live on our own, sitting on chair thinking about something does not bring us food.
So we (mentaly working) have to consider it a very lucky coincidence that there are some people who are willing to give us some amout of physical goods (results of physical work: food, clothing, housing, ...) for just thinking. We should be gratefull for that - if we are lucky enought, we do not have to touch dipper or hammer our whole life thinking all the time and still we will have food (and clothing, and house, ...).
If we start to ask too much (for just thinking), well those kind (physicaly working) people will let us starve and we will have to stop thinking and start really working - with our hands. :)
Well, we can agree that one side's result of tree counting will be higher than that of other's side: While business may get higher count (see how many trees there are? why we cant't cut few of them down?), environmentalists may get lower count (see how few trees there are? we have to guard each one of them).
While maybe all the vocal groups are exaggerating, we "in the middle" are doing nothing being content that one those "vocal group" is fighting "for me". Or we are just doing nothing because we are too puzzled by all those misleading data. But in the mean time our environment is changing.
Our children will have final judgment on wherher it is changing for goood or for bad.
IMO for bad. You ...
I think those who like to have house with garden with grass, bushes and trees in it have to do something - it is not that easy to have those if land outside "my property" is spoiled.
Except that Billy is a 300 pound behemoth and will beat the crap out of any kid that complains.
... and complaining adults too.
its possible to get rich without robbing somebody.
I'm optimist so I tend to agree with your statement.
While it may be possible to get ritch without robbing somebody (I hope it is), I think this is not the case with a lot of rich people today (by rich I mean for example almost everybody living in USA, EU, Japan, ... and also myself). Why?
Well, in a lot of cases such wealth has been produced with a lot of side-effects like poisoned air, poisoned water, died-out species, irreversibly consumed resources, ... thus robbing our children of such wonderfull things like fresh water, clean air, walk in a country, study of wild animals, ... thus making their life more dull. And also a lot more difficult than ours or our parents.
What a shame.
The "right" and "wrong" in this situation also geatly depends on morale applied when judging his action.
PS: What on EARTH is up with IE's css support? is it intentionally designed to be completely broken?
IMO yes, it is broken intentionaly, but I did not saw the source code nor question the programers of that software so ... as alredy written: IMO [In My Opinion].
So maybe in future we'll see MD5 checksums or fingerprints (or something other, still strong but more easily "visualy comparable") presented in the page along with the link and also UA (user agen a.k.a. broser) will display somewhere the checksum of link the mouse howers upon.
Note: Anybody is free to use this idea as long as he does not patent it and than abuses this patent for extorting money from others who actualy do something (other than employing just some lawyer and maybe also secretary and accountant).
Note: I do not claim I'm the first one to have such idea, but in case I am, that see the previous note.
And final note: Do not be very serious. We should have also some fun while we're alive. :)
Try that virus under Wine: If it works, Wine is good. If it does not work, Wine developers should work harder, otherwise Wine users wont be able to get "the right eXPerience". :)
I've bought Dell Precission 650 last summer with FreeDOS thus saving about 2'500 SKK (at that time about 60 EUR) thus not buying something I'm not going to use (i.e. Windows XP Professional which was defaul OS choise for that machine).
Comparing that to the price of machine, I saved about 2% but for ussual business (ussual office PC) it may be something above 6%.
2-6% maybe are not that much money, but 2'500 represented about 27% of average income of Slovak citizen at that time so it was (and still is) substantial amout of money for a lot of people here.
Thank you very much.
The actual content is DRMed, of course.
... thus can be cracked.
Difficulty of cracking process of a given DRM scheme is IMO negatively proportional (sorry, I can't remember whether this is right mathematical term in english) to number of experts responsible for creating the scheme. :)
Did any of you read the actual Microsoft patent statement?
Its open, as long as you don't use it.
Sad but IMO true!
Wi-Fi equipment is also "cripled" in such a way. Reason? Realy "silly": So users of such equipment does not cook up their heads or heads of some neighbours.
What a shame. :)
Don't be silly. 1.3 Billion of that R&D money was spent on DRM projects.
How can you possibly say they aren't serious about security?
Logical follow-up question is:
Security of who? And against what?
you won't have to categorize files into folders
IMO you need AI for this.
If you do not put some keywords into the document or put it in appropriate directory, how is computer going to find it?
Say you created note "Meet Bill here at 11:00". Computer saves it for you (say in "/" along with other thousands of similar memos) and also notes, that it has been saved "Tue Oct 28 11:42:58 CET 2003". Maybe it can also note, that according to GPS you are in New York and while you have currently running 5 concurent project (or maybe more but computer can't be sure you werent lazy and dit not withold info about some project from it), it is probable that this note is related to one of them.
Say one year later you are compiling analysis about your business with CompanyX (where Bill works). How is computer going to correctly either include or exclude above mentioned memo from statistical data? You were lazy to put it in "CompanyX" directory, you did not specify "CompanyX" keyword so you will either have to sort throught a lot of such "uncategorizied" memos/files/documents or use just incomplete analyses.
So either you do not forget about file categirization or you have to have some advanced AI (with inteligence comparable to inteligence of good human secretary) which will also either figure out missing data for you (so to take that great burden from you) or asks for them right away (when you dictated the note, it will ask: "Is that Bill from CompanyX?") and so on ...
I wote: "... "New" does not always means "better". ...".
You wrote: "... you are going to attempt to argue that old technology is consistently better than new technology ...".
So the answer to your question: No, I'm not going to argue (or attemtpt to argue) that old technology is consistently better than new technology. I repeat: "New" does not always means "better". :)
p.s.: AC hinted on what I have in mind from another perspective. But there are also a lot of other examples but that's for another discussion.
We already have one. It's called Apache.
But because Apache developers (it seems) are not making "politics" like Microsoft, we do not see things like "all users of MS IE 6.0 and earlier are not able to access Apache web servers with latest 'sevice pack'" (where by 'sercice pack' I mean some bundle of a critical bugfix and also some tweak which breaks the interoperability of MS IE with Apache). Goal may be good (to get all those known security holes in MS IE get fixed and also all those realy bad incompatibilies - say CSS - resolved) but ...
... as a "good guys" Apache developers have smaller range of "weapons" in "competition wars".
Maybe that's why they are ussualy happier?
(at leat with "their" computers)
:)
"New" does not always means "better". Say "new disease", "new environment pollutant", "new way to produce even more pollution", "new software with new bugs to make new worms made-easy", ...