There is a difference. MS rely on the guidance of marketing analyst PT Barnum ("There's a sucker born every minute"). In the days of ME, this was a fair analysis - most ME users had never seen a computer before. Not only you could sell them most anything, they had no one to turn to who knew better until win2k came out, and then the migration path was obvious.
Unfortunately for MS, virtually the entire world's population now has Windows experience. It was not a great experience.
Some are cretins, and could not interface with a 4x2, but enjoy blaming windows
Some are experienced IT people who have seen Linux/Unix and know how it could be.
Most are now in a position to ask the professionals "Is this as good as it gets?" and being told - no, there IS another way.
Some are migrating to Vista, and realising that if it can get worse, sure as hell it could get better somehow. They know who to ask for advice, and its not the guy in PC world.
Someone who obtains a bank account number via spyware is ethically (and should be legally) no different than someone who obtains a credit card number by picking someone's pocket.
next you will be suggesting that the US gvernment should arrest the people doing the phishing, or the companies selling stuff through spam.
This will never happen - they are far to busy figthing the war on drugs and the war on terror to actually olve real life problems.
Spam could be stopped overnight if the US owned credit card companies (ie all credit card companies) were threatened with the same sanctions for processing payments for spam-promoted products that thwere threatened for internet gambling.
The "follow the money" approach ahs been proven to work, and lack of applying it is wholely due to lack of interest by the UK and US governments.
That's part of the reason why anybody with half a brain uses a credit union.
We had building societies, but the government allowed the banks to buy them, because they were being nice to customers, and that was something the banks could not tolerate.
Don't say services because services don't provide real cash flow.
You might want to tell IBM's management, as they think most of their revenue comes from services, much of
it derived from open sourse related activities.
in which business school they teach students to ditch successful products and to only use them to prevent competitors from getting a slice of some low cost market
You obviously have limited experience of flying chairs!
I am in the UK too, and given the news in the past year, I think we can all be quietly confident that everything that could be known about all of us can be obtained on a DVD for a few rupees in any market in Bangalore or a couple Naira in Mushin market in Lagos or $1.98 in Red Square, Moscow. There is certainly no need to be spending billions to gather this data.
Of course some of you will know that Sun have had 8/16/32 cores for quite a while, and that Solars, *BSD, and probably even Linux support this stuff just fine.
Its only you peasants that persist in using old-hat Wintel stuff that are so last-year. Get with it people! You too could be runningNetBSD on your toaster (it will probably out perform Windows Vista in a 4-core Pentium anyway). Hell it might even eat Nandos peri-peri Vista for breakfast!
The term "Nanny State" refers to government treating its citizens like children. A Nanny State is one that is overly protective.... assert that adults are too immature to run their own lives and that government must run their lives for them.
A better description of the present UK government would be hard to find.
The problem arises when people in authority take away a parent's right to teach their kid to use a power tool or a gun altogether.
Its not the only problem. Here in the UK, no one needs to learn how to use a gun unless they are in the army. I know some people like to shoot peasants/pheasants or rodents, but there is no actual need for it.
Also some pareents are complete idiots, and not safe with a power tool. A cretin managed to saw himself up with a chainsaw while up a tree only last week. It was in our national newspapers.
But essentially I agree with you - I myself drilled my own thumb while using a power drill at the age of 13 while unsupervised. Ever since then I have been careful with power tools!
Here in London, you are in more danger of being accidentally shot by the police than killed by a terrorist.
We should be figuring out the right way to integrate rather than constantly stratifying.
Well the tiny amount of actual investigation of the learning process in childen (involving study, measurement, etc, as per rigorous scientific methods) suggests that you are wrong on this. (Google "xone of proximal") Children learn best by leaning one strata fully, and are then in a position to leap to the next.
Where schools fail is if they have no adequate mechanism to allow pupils to move or stay as required, and deliver huge social pressure for them to move with their age-mates regardless of ability. This seriously damages at least 50% and probably more, and leads to the situation were its frowned on to be intelligent.
When I was in Nigeria, there were adults studying in the primary schools, because they had missed out on education when they were young. Your level of education is not connected with your age (which is often a random number in Nigeria anyway). The attitude to education in Nigeria is very different to the attitude in the UK. (But then again, in the UK you are unlikely to end up selling fish from a basket on your head by the side of a motorway in the tropical sun).
If you make everything a crime, then everyone is a criminal.
But then you can fine them for committing an unlimited number of offences - a limitless revenue stream!
This is precisely the present UK government's strategy.
They even have a second string to their bow: requiring you to fill out huge numbers of forms of such mind-boggling complexity that even the people that designed them have no idea how to fill them in, and then fining you for submitting them late or filled incorrectly. The corporate versions are longer, more complex, and the fines are higher. Perhaps that is why we no longer have any manufacturing industry?
IBM's decline was entirely because they had a pricing strategy of "squeesing till the pips squeek" and a CEO called Jackass
(OK, he spelled it J Akass, but it was a fair discription of his attitude to the nerd community)
IBM recovered because they realised that, not only the customer is king, but the nerd is the chief adviser to the king.
No matter how nice MS is to nerds, it can never be as nice as open source, and Open Source Windows would make exactly $0 for MS.
Slashdot Mirror
Unfortunately for MS, virtually the entire world's population now has Windows experience. It was not a great experience.
Some are cretins, and could not interface with a 4x2, but enjoy blaming windows
Some are experienced IT people who have seen Linux/Unix and know how it could be.
Most are now in a position to ask the professionals "Is this as good as it gets?" and being told - no, there IS another way.
Some are migrating to Vista, and realising that if it can get worse, sure as hell it could get better somehow. They know who to ask for advice, and its not the guy in PC world.
A small amount of research will reveal that this lot are more anal than average.
Yes, its true - 14k of clippy source code the EC commissioners will be trolling in their sleep :-{
Currently its -3 degrees in my country. Not what I consider nice and warm, but definitely better than Moscow.
next you will be suggesting that the US gvernment should arrest the people doing the phishing, or the companies selling stuff through spam.
This will never happen - they are far to busy figthing the war on drugs and the war on terror to actually olve real life problems.
Spam could be stopped overnight if the US owned credit card companies (ie all credit card companies) were threatened with the same sanctions for processing payments for spam-promoted products that thwere threatened for internet gambling.
The "follow the money" approach ahs been proven to work, and lack of applying it is wholely due to lack of interest by the UK and US governments.
We had building societies, but the government allowed the banks to buy them, because they were being nice to customers, and that was something the banks could not tolerate.
Yes I did try to use Barclays on-line banking using Firefox on OpenBSD on Sparc64 hardware, and No it doesnt work.
In fact Opera on FreeBSD doesnt either, and Opera on WinXP is barely useable.
In short, Barclays have clearly never tested with anything other than IE on XP.
But they have issued me with a PINSentry device which looks like a fisher-price toy, but is allegedly secure.
I suggest you consult Mr P.T Barnum:
"There's one born every minute"
You might want to tell IBM's management, as they think most of their revenue comes from services, much of it derived from open sourse related activities.
I second that emotion
You obviously have limited experience of flying chairs!
I trained as a truck driver.
Park up in a big rig and you get respect.
a) Old world (Europe, basically, with some debate about parts of Asia, I guess)
b) New World (The Americas, Australia)
c) Third world (The rest)
I am in the UK too, and given the news in the past year, I think we can all be quietly confident that everything that could be known about all of us can be obtained on a DVD for a few rupees in any market in Bangalore or a couple Naira in Mushin market in Lagos or $1.98 in Red Square, Moscow. There is certainly no need to be spending billions to gather this data.
Its only you peasants that persist in using old-hat Wintel stuff that are so last-year. Get with it people! You too could be runningNetBSD on your toaster (it will probably out perform Windows Vista in a 4-core Pentium anyway). Hell it might even eat Nandos peri-peri Vista for breakfast!
When I was in college "augmented data" was a tactful way of saying "faked results"
At $300, it's probably VGA or SVGA res For youtube its probably QVGA (320x240) same as VHS, and good enough for a mobile phone.
Au cointraire, mon frere, students are very representative of people who lie on questionares about sex
This study is not worth the e-paper its not written on. That goes for almost all other questinaires about sex too.
A better description of the present UK government would be hard to find.
Its not the only problem. Here in the UK, no one needs to learn how to use a gun unless they are in the army. I know some people like to shoot peasants/pheasants or rodents, but there is no actual need for it.
Also some pareents are complete idiots, and not safe with a power tool. A cretin managed to saw himself up with a chainsaw while up a tree only last week. It was in our national newspapers.
But essentially I agree with you - I myself drilled my own thumb while using a power drill at the age of 13 while unsupervised. Ever since then I have been careful with power tools!
Here in London, you are in more danger of being accidentally shot by the police than killed by a terrorist.
Well the tiny amount of actual investigation of the learning process in childen (involving study, measurement, etc, as per rigorous scientific methods) suggests that you are wrong on this. (Google "xone of proximal") Children learn best by leaning one strata fully, and are then in a position to leap to the next.
Where schools fail is if they have no adequate mechanism to allow pupils to move or stay as required, and deliver huge social pressure for them to move with their age-mates regardless of ability. This seriously damages at least 50% and probably more, and leads to the situation were its frowned on to be intelligent.
When I was in Nigeria, there were adults studying in the primary schools, because they had missed out on education when they were young. Your level of education is not connected with your age (which is often a random number in Nigeria anyway). The attitude to education in Nigeria is very different to the attitude in the UK. (But then again, in the UK you are unlikely to end up selling fish from a basket on your head by the side of a motorway in the tropical sun).
No one has accused any UK politician of that recently. Inflating their expense claims perhaps.
But then you can fine them for committing an unlimited number of offences - a limitless revenue stream!
This is precisely the present UK government's strategy.
They even have a second string to their bow: requiring you to fill out huge numbers of forms of such mind-boggling complexity that even the people that designed them have no idea how to fill them in, and then fining you for submitting them late or filled incorrectly. The corporate versions are longer, more complex, and the fines are higher. Perhaps that is why we no longer have any manufacturing industry?
IBM recovered because they realised that, not only the customer is king, but the nerd is the chief adviser to the king.
No matter how nice MS is to nerds, it can never be as nice as open source, and Open Source Windows would make exactly $0 for MS.
You are new to America, right?