I simply refuse to return to a discussion of the MS issue unless you acknowedge the error of these earlier statements:
* There is no implication there, there is merely a statement of an unknown.
* Even if your cigarette example were accurate it is irrelevant (baseless impilcation of inaccuracy)
* your definition of shill seems to be anyone who upsets you world view (I have been using the correct definition here)
* Unlike you, I don't automatically consider anyone who argues that the government made an error to be a shill, (see above)
Better, but that troll is only about a C. The out of context quotes where you distort the original meaning and/or insert meanings that are not there is marginally stronger than your last attempt. The main problem with the above is that it is trivially proven to be a self-serving misrepresentation with the simple reubttal that I've stated several time that I don't know if your portrayal of the cigartette article accurate or not, or if the article is based on junk science or not, the article's truth or falsehood is an unknown to me, and that even if true it is irrelevant as the author is not the MS book author. Furthermore your troll suffers in that anyone bored enough to still be reading would already know this.
It's dissappointing that you can't admit when you're proven wrong. It also means there's little point in continuing to discuss the original issue.
You simply lack integrity.
I've not been proven wrong. I've never taken a position on your smoking misdirection, I don't know if your opinion on the matter is correct or erroneous, I don't know if the article is good science or junk science, and I have not bothered to look into it as it is irrelevant to the real topic, the Microsoft case. I've made this clear in several posts. I've even pointed out that your misdirection is useless, even if it is true it is irrelevant. The author of the smoking article is not the author of the Microsoft book. I've pointed this out several times. Yet you avoid the real topic Microsoft and keep attempting to divert to irrelevancies. I think the integrity angle is well defined by now, but it has not defined as you suggest.
Overall I grade your trolling at C-. It started out promissing, an authoratative facade with DOJ citations and all, but when arguments are shot full of holes you have to come up with something new. Your sticking to the same failed argument was not very interesting. I was hoping you would attempt a new one eventually.
I never implied other are lying, I said they were irrelevant
You lie. You implied it WHILE saying they were irrelevant.
Here's the quote:
"Even if your cigarette example were accurate it is irrelevant"
Thank you for proving my case. There is no implication there, there is merely a statement of an unknown. You are reading things into the text that are not there.
If you can admit that Cato is a questionable source...
Even if Cato were a questionable source it is irrelevant, they were not the source of the argument. They summarized an argument found elsewhere, in a book, by a full professor at the University of California who was investigating the "network effect" for a graduate economics class. This book is the source of the arguments, not Cato. Cato was merely a messenger, and your focus on the messenger rather than the argument is telling.
"I just don't see where the data states that the poor are going to WalMart in numbers where they are not severely outnumbered by the middle class, more so than their representation in the overall population."
This is due to your own lack of comprehension.
"60% of Americans receive only 26.8% of America's income."
Thank you for proving my point. You data makes no mention of where they shop.
"You offered nothing but speculation, anecdotes."
This a the blatant lie. I am the only person in this discussion to offer actual hard data.
See above, you data does not mention WalMart. How this data correlates to WalMart patronage is your speculation.
"I offered an experiment where someone counts new/expensive cars versus old/inexpensive to sample and approximate the socioeconomic standing of a large population of customers."
And you just can't get it through your thick head that this experiment is inherently flawed.
Yet it still better than anything you have offered. The data collected would at least be related to WalMart patronage, unlike your data.
This is funny. You claim my definition of a "shill" is messed up and imply that others are lying, but when proven wrong you can't even admit to it.
I never implied other are lying, I said they were irrelevant, not even worth investigating, that even if your cigarette claim was true it counts for nothing in the current topic. The professor who wrote the book regarding Microsoft did not write anything in your cigarette reference so your so called evidence is misapplied, useless. You have proven nothing other than a proclivity to attempt misdirection and topic changes.
It just a small piece of the argument. But it's important because it points out your dishonesty. I have corroborated evidence verifying my statements on this subject. Your previous statements and implications are provably false. You are discredited.
Your statements are irrelevant, they attack Cato not the professor or his book. All you have proven is that you have a fixation on Cato and are desparate to avoid the actual topic, the Microsoft case and the professors arguments.
You attempted to appear authoritative by citing DOJ. When confronted with points such as the judge failing to consider factors other than 12,000 apps being responsible for Apple's inability to gain marketshare you decided to change the topic to Cato. Case closed.
If the hospital sends you home "while the last of the overdose [you] had taken worked its way out of [your] system" then it wasn't much of an attempt so much as a whiny cry for attention. At the least they'd make you swallow a disgusting charcoal drink or pump you out and keep you for psychiatric evaluation.
You are assuming he is not in a nation with socialized medicine.;-)
I disagree that they are irrelevant to this discussion. The only source you have directly cited and the only source I am responding to is the Cato Institute.
The professor's arguments regarding the Microsoft case come from his book. The book is not online. Cato reviewed/summarized the book and made excerpts available. Who made the excerpts available is irrelevant, Cato in this case. Cato is not the source of anything in this discussion about the Microsoft case, they are just a middleman. Again, attacking the messenger, especially an irrelevant one in the Cato case, it a pretty weak rebuttal.
"Even if your cigarette example were accurate it is irrelevant."
I dare you to prove that it's inaccurate. Come on, do it. I double dare you.
Irrelevant. The author of the book on the Microsoft case is not the author of any of the cigarette material you cite.
"Actually your definition of corporate shill does not agree with mine. Unlike you, I don't automatically consider anyone who argues that the government made an error to be a shill,"
See this is your problem, you completely ignore reality. I've given links to examples where the Cato Institute has been shown to fit the EXACT definition of a shill.
Cato is irrelevant, they only offer a summary of a book. Even if your cigarette example were accurate it is irrelevant. The professor writing about Microsoft is not the author from the cigarette example. Second, your definition of shill seems to be anyone who upsets you world view.
"Uh, "published by" refers to the "Policy Analysis" journal"
Which is the document you posted a link to. It is the document I am discussing. It is from the Cato institute.
I'm discussing the book and it's ideas, you are fixating on an article summarizing the book. If you can't attack the book attack someone who liked it and published a summary. Interesting tactic.
"Please do so, please equate using Mac/AppleWorks/etc and Linux/OpenOffice/etc with writing your own OS and apps."
This is obviously dishonest on your part. I have not done this.
To refresh your recollection,
I wrote: "They could do those things with a Mac, they could do those things with Linux, but they choose not too."
You wrote: "This is not a simple rebut as it's a complex issue. In a similar vein I can say that consumers "choose" not to write all their own operating systems and applications.
"You have no data regarding where those without cars shop. You have no data regarding whether people get rides from friends of different or sinmilar socioeconomic standing. You offered nothing but speculation, anecdotes."
Neither do you, you just pulled some uncorroborated nonsense out of your anus.
Actually I offered personal observations of several Walmart stores and suggested a larger scale experiment where cars can be counted as a sociioeconomic approximation. Both trump your general census data that offers no connection to WalMart. Neither is the true answer but both are far more than you offered.
I am singularly unimpressed by your lack of logic.
Someday when you manage to use logic rather than emotion, refrain from misrepresentation through creative snipping, referain from putting words in other peoples mouths, etc... I might find your opinion interesting.
If you want to ride off into the sunset on some neoconservative "poor people don't really matter" kick, at least come up with something marginally convincing.
You are dellusional, see below.
Yes, poor people shop at Wal-Mart. I don't know what's so difficult to grasp here, that's their demographic, for God's sake.
No one said they didn't, the topic was the majority of WalMart shoppers appearing to be middle class and that these consumers, not WalMart, are destroying the Mom and Pop shops by choosing to go to WalMart.
You may not like the actual facts I'm presenting, but at least I'm bothing to present actual facts.
I like census data. I just don't see where the data states that the poor are going to WalMart in numbers where they are not severely outnumbered by the middle class, more so than their representation in the overall population.
If by "accurate" you mean more biased in the direction of your opinion but having vastly less confidence in the results...
No, by "accurate" I mean some measurement that somehow involved WalMart. Like an adhoc parking lot survey, unlike census data that makes no mention of Walmart.
... I don't think you have a good concept of the number of varibles here. I also think you don't actually want to since you're ignoring obvious issues like poor people taking the bus or riding with a friend.
You have no data regarding where those without cars shop. You have no data regarding whether people get rides from friends of different or sinmilar socioeconomic standing. You offered nothing but speculation, anecdotes. I offered an experiment where someone counts new/expensive cars versus old/inexpensive to sample and approximate the socioeconomic standing of a large population of customers. Care to reconsider who is interested in facts?
You posted information from a known corporate shill as your rebuttal. I was hoping you didn't know that, but it seems like you do and just don't care.
Actually your definition of corporate shill does not agree with mine. Unlike you, I don't automatically consider anyone who argues that the government made an error to be a shill, I don't consider a professor engaging in intellectual debate to be equivalent to a testing lab fudging a test for a client. Anyway, please continue with your failed attacks on the messenger and mislabel anyone who disagrees with your pet government ruling.
From the link you posted:
Richard McKenzie is a professor in the Graduate School of Management at the University of California, Irvine; author of Trust on Trial: How the Microsoft Case Is Reframing the Rules of Competition (Boston: Perseus, 2000); and an adjunct scholar of the Cato Institute...
The professors stated the book grew out of a graduate economics class. "McKenzie first became interested in Microsoft's legal troubles three years ago while planning a course on "network economics" for MBA students at The University of California, Irvine, where he is a professor of economics in the Graduate School of Management." http://www2.davidson.edu/news/news_archives/archiv es00/00.09mckenziereport.html
As for being an "adjunct scholar", you realize that probably means they publised a paper or something? That does not mean he is on staff. Anyway, please continue with your failed attacks on the messenger and cite away on articles that the professor did not write like the cigarette one.
... and also from the PDF:
Published by the Cato Institute
So obviously this has nothing to do with the Cato Institute (sarcasm).
Uh, "published by" refers to the "Policy Analysis" journal, the PDF, not the book.
I'll admit that I was incorrect here but not about the spirt of the discussion. Arguing the exactness of the 70,000 number is not the same as rebutting the judge's point.
Actually he seemed to be arguing that the number and it's important/unimportance demonstrated the judge's fuzzy logic, and that findings based on such fuzzy logic cannot support a conclusion of law, that the judge seems to have erred. The judge's Apple example and failure to consider that something other than only have 12,000 apps may be limiting Apple's marketshare was a good rebuttal.
"That is simply rebut by the fact that the majority of home users do very simple things. They could do those things with a Mac, they could do those things with Linux, but they choose not too."
This is not a simple rebut as it's a complex issue. In a similar vein I can say that consumers "choose" not to write all their own operating systems and applications."
Please do so, please equate using Mac/AppleWorks/etc and Linux/OpenOffice/etc with writing your own OS and apps.
"Consumers can, and will, replace MS whenever they feel like it."
In the same way that we can go to Mars any time we want. In absolutist terms, both statements are true, but functionally they aren't. There is a HUGE cost assosciated.
Yet millions use Mac and Linux for their personal needs. I suppose you believe that is faked on some Hollywood backlot lot like the Apollo landings?:-)
You might enjoy this bit of reading about the integrity of the Cato institute.
Attempting to attack the messenger is a pretty weak rebuttal, even more so when you pick the wrong target. This was not Cato research, a professor started researching Microsoft as part of a graduate level economics class studying the "network effect" of a digital good. As he looked into Microsoft the anti-trust case caught his interest, he followed it, and he wrote a book: "Trust on Trial: How the Microsoft Case Is Reframing the Rules of Competition".
Now here comes sentence number four. It's a quote from the judge with the number 70,000 inserted. It's true, but the number is not actually part of the quote and it's inclusion is dishonest.
I'm sorry, but you are the person being dishonest. From *your* own citation:
"Even if the contender attracted several thousand compatible applications, it would still look like a gamble from the consumer's perspective next to Windows, which supports *over 70,000* applications. The amount it would cost an operating system vendor to create *that many* applications is prohibitively large."
From the professor's text:
"He concludes that "the amount it would cost an operating system vendor to create [70,000] applications is prohibitively large.""
The professor replaced "that many" with "70,000" since he was not including the *preceeding line* and he properly cited the change with brackets.
What he did say was that the cost to develop the applications necessary to compete would be high. This they have not managed to rebut.
That is simply rebut by the fact that the majority of home users do very simple things. They could do those things with a Mac, they could do those things with Linux, but they choose not too. The professor is correct in that if Microsoft were to abuse it's position and attempt to charge consumers, say $1,000 for Windows, they would simply switch to Linux or Mac OS X. The government's document that you offer contains naive statements like "The inability of Apple to compete effectively with Windows provides another example of the applications barrier to entry in operation. Although Apple's Mac OS supports more than 12,000 applications, even an inventory of that magnitude is not sufficient to enable Apple to present a significant percentage of users with a viable substitute for Windows." It presumes that these users were looking for an alternative to change to, or otherwise did not find Windows more attractive, and how the hell can Mac OS not be viable when millions of people were using it for their personal computing needs? The judge's arguments are weak and at times non-sensical. You seem to confuse legally binding with factually correct. The judge's writing are only "facts" in a legal ruling sense, not in the absolute sense of being correct. Judges are often found to be wrong in their fact and overruled by other courts.
The first sentence is just plain false. Section 2 subsection 45 of the findings of fact specfically recognizes these other operating systems.
The rest of the argument doesn't even really make sense. The claim is that MS is not charging enough for their OS therfore the alternatives have not managed to become commercailly viable. This argument does not acknowedge the known facts of the case such as MS forcing OEM vendors to sign exclusive deals in order to get a good price on Windows.
Those exclusive deals were the mechanism by which MS did not "charge enough". Those deals were pretty sweet from a pricing point of view. And if the unwanted Windows software had added too much to the price of the desired DOS box a market would have formed that did not accept MS' deal. Again, my original point, consumers had a very large part in creating the environment MS operated in. Consumers did not care then, they don't really care now, they are not really interested in alternatives like Linux and Mac OS X (and formerly OS/2). What your tossing up and trying to make stick is that MS' competitors were treated unfairly, that is a different topic. Consumers can, and will, replace MS whenever they feel like it.
3) I posted real census information overturning your claim that the poor in America are "few" and your response is "look at the cars". LOOK AT THE ACTUAL CENSUS. It's real statistical data, not a bunch of idle talk.
Actually your posts are entirely idle talk, "real" data is not useful if it describes the wrong population. You have been discussing the population as a whole, I have been discussing the segment of the population shopping at WalMart. Sampling the cars at a few different WalMarts in different neighborhoods should be more accurate than bulk census info.
This is simply not true. THEY HAVE BEEN CONVICTED TWICE OF ANTITRUST VIOLATIONS.
Your statements here are provably false. Go read the findings of fact.
It is especially egregious that you believe consumers are responsible for their continued dominanace.
Your errors: (1) You conveniently ignore the rise to dominance. (2) You equate an anti-trust conviction with the existence of a monopolist market, the former does not imply the later. You might enjoy the PDF from http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa-380es.html:
"Judge Thomas Penfield Jackson bases his ruling against Microsoft on the claim that the company's monopoly in operating systems is protected by an "applications barrier to entry" made up of 70,000 Windows-based software programs.
Without an entry barrier, any dominant producer that seeks to restrict sales in order to raise prices above competitive levels will find its market share eroded as new entrants capture price-sensitive customers. But, according to Judge Jackson, to enter the operating-system market a newcomer would need a large and varied base of compatible applications like those available to consumers who might otherwise choose Windows. He concludes that "the amount it would cost an operating system vendor to create [70,000] applications is prohibitively large."
Judge Jackson seems unaware that the mere existence of a large number of Windows-based applications proves that Microsoft has stirred competition among software developers--leading to better products and falling prices and raising the value of both hardware and software to consumers. That said, there is a fatal flaw in the judge's argument: The overwhelming majority of the 70,000 Windows applications that make up the supposedly impregnable barrier to entry either never existed as unique products, no longer exist, or are totally out of date. When only unique Windows applications are counted--setting aside various versions of the same program--the number of applications is a small fraction of the judge's count.
Moreover, survey data indicate that the needs of active computer users are satisfied by a very small number of applications. That means the barrier to entry into the operating-system market is nowhere near as impregnable as the judge has claimed, which in turn helps explain many of Microsoft's aggressive business tactics to preserve its market position. Because the judge's most essential finding is clearly erroneous, it cannot support his conclusions of law."
"The judge's claim that there is "no" alternative
to Windows ignores, however, the obvious
fact that firms like Apple, Red Hat, Sun,
and IBM (and several others) already have
operating systems that can be used on personal
computers. They might not be "commercially
viable" in the sense that they have
sizable market shares, but that could be
because Microsoft is not acting like a monopolist.
Firms like Apple, Sun, and Red Hat,
which are already in the operating-system
market, could quickly become "commercially
viable" (or more commercially viable than
they already are) if Microsoft did what
monopolists are supposed to do: restrict
sales in order to raise the company's prices
and profits."
As a technical discussion, names as handles to objects or ideas don't matter (excluding downright misleading names, like a boy named Sue): it gets down to user training.
Yes, but user training costs money. The KISS principle should be applied to names too. You also ignore the fact that cute names, rather than descriptive names, give some people an amateurish impression. Such names can reinforce the "by nerds for nerds" stereotype.
At home, Grandma is going to use whatever will let her get her polaroids out of her new camera.
When confronted with two icons, one saying "photoshop" and the other saying "gimp", which one is grandma more likely to recall or deduce is for photos? Naming is one element of a user interface and user interfaces do matter.
Those people who do "choose" to shop at Wal-Mart (or $BIG-BOX, for that matter) make that choice because its what they can afford financially.
That is inaccurate. The people that are truly in that situation are few. Most shoppers choose the lower prices on basics so that they can afford *more* luxury items. A middle class wage allowing some upper middle class lifestyle. They choose individual luxuries and convenience over local economies.
When you have a law-breaking monopolist, YOU DO NOT HAVE A FREE MARKET.
MS achieved dominance through the market, through consumer choices, by consumers choosing the products that benefitted from a "network effect". Consumers made the *monopoly*, they could have chosen OS/2 1.x but found it more convenient to use DOS, they could have chosen a Mac but decided to trade usability for price, MS could virutally give away Windows 3 but consumers could have ignored it but they chose not to, consumer could have used OS/2 2.x but they chose to wait for Win95,... Consumers could use Linux or Mac OS X today, many are only performing basic operation that either alternative could do, but they chose to stick with Windows. They know it has reliability problems, they know it has virii problems, they know MS competes unfairly at times, but they don't really care. The free market created Microsoft's position, you are gratuitously ignoring this. The "Network Effect" that promotes a product like an operating system can't happen unless consumers chooses the convenience of a dominant OS. MS' monopoly powers are exaggerated for (1) political reasons - you may have noticed that some OSS advocates have a religious like hatred, (2) denial - an inability to believe that consumers choose MS over a beloved OS like Linux or Mac OS. MS is not a monopoly like Standard Oil was (buys all the gas stations in a region). Every Linux and Mac user proves that MS has limited monopoly powers, consumers had a choice when MS started their climb to dominance, consumers continue to have a choice today.
Your telling me that said "mom and pop" store can get me volume pricing like Dell can? My point is why can't I just get a stripped down computer from Dell for a little cheaper, instead of having to go to a Mom and Pop store and pay more for the parts and labour? I don't think they would be willing to offer me $500 bucks for a full system with no O/S installed. Is there no easy solution to this problem that Microsoft has created?
Microsoft has not created the problem, *consumers* have created the problem. Consumers chose DOS over Mac and OS/2 1.x. Consumers chose Windows over OS/2 2.x. Consumers have voted with their wallet for computer vendors that provide the lowest prices. As you indicate these low prices are brought about by volume discounts. The per CPU charge is part of the deal that vendors *chose*. Why did they choose this, because 99.x% of customers *want* MS products and this gives them the lower prices that consumers demand.
You can be religious or cheap. If you want to be a purist then buy from Mom and Pop. Not only will your conscience be clean but you will be supporting *local* business. If you do not like the large corporation's bottom line decision making and their ignoring of minority market segments do not do business with them! Do business with the small local shops that are more responsive to your personal situation and minority market segments. To continue with the "consumers are doing it to themselves theme": Customer focused Mom and Pop shops are not being killed off by WalMart, they are being killed off by *consumers* that choose to shop at WalMart. It's the same in many markets/industries.
In what way exactly is it illegal to post a list of information like this, even with all the dumb laws the USA is passing these days...?
It's just like the GPL, you only have the right to distribute if you comply with certain terms. If I make an appliance that uses Linux internally and I refuse to provide the source code to the kernel isn't that illegal also? Still a dumb law in your mind?
When will people learn. Security through obscurity rarely works.
"When will people learn?" is the correct question. However your statement then goes on to demonstrate a superficial understanding of security. There is nothing wrong with obscurity. It is merely one of *many* tactics that should be employed *simultaneously*. Problems arise when someone relies predominately on only one tactic, whether the one tactic is obscurity or something else doesn't really matter. Today, I hoped you learned that slashdot slogans may not offer a complete understanding of a topic.
Slashdot Mirror
I simply refuse to return to a discussion of the MS issue unless you acknowedge the error of these earlier statements:
* There is no implication there, there is merely a statement of an unknown.
* Even if your cigarette example were accurate it is irrelevant (baseless impilcation of inaccuracy)
* your definition of shill seems to be anyone who upsets you world view (I have been using the correct definition here)
* Unlike you, I don't automatically consider anyone who argues that the government made an error to be a shill, (see above)
Better, but that troll is only about a C. The out of context quotes where you distort the original meaning and/or insert meanings that are not there is marginally stronger than your last attempt. The main problem with the above is that it is trivially proven to be a self-serving misrepresentation with the simple reubttal that I've stated several time that I don't know if your portrayal of the cigartette article accurate or not, or if the article is based on junk science or not, the article's truth or falsehood is an unknown to me, and that even if true it is irrelevant as the author is not the MS book author. Furthermore your troll suffers in that anyone bored enough to still be reading would already know this.
It's dissappointing that you can't admit when you're proven wrong. It also means there's little point in continuing to discuss the original issue. You simply lack integrity.
I've not been proven wrong. I've never taken a position on your smoking misdirection, I don't know if your opinion on the matter is correct or erroneous, I don't know if the article is good science or junk science, and I have not bothered to look into it as it is irrelevant to the real topic, the Microsoft case. I've made this clear in several posts. I've even pointed out that your misdirection is useless, even if it is true it is irrelevant. The author of the smoking article is not the author of the Microsoft book. I've pointed this out several times. Yet you avoid the real topic Microsoft and keep attempting to divert to irrelevancies. I think the integrity angle is well defined by now, but it has not defined as you suggest.
Overall I grade your trolling at C-. It started out promissing, an authoratative facade with DOJ citations and all, but when arguments are shot full of holes you have to come up with something new. Your sticking to the same failed argument was not very interesting. I was hoping you would attempt a new one eventually.
Happy New Year.
I never implied other are lying, I said they were irrelevant
...
You lie. You implied it WHILE saying they were irrelevant. Here's the quote: "Even if your cigarette example were accurate it is irrelevant"
Thank you for proving my case. There is no implication there, there is merely a statement of an unknown. You are reading things into the text that are not there.
If you can admit that Cato is a questionable source
Even if Cato were a questionable source it is irrelevant, they were not the source of the argument. They summarized an argument found elsewhere, in a book, by a full professor at the University of California who was investigating the "network effect" for a graduate economics class. This book is the source of the arguments, not Cato. Cato was merely a messenger, and your focus on the messenger rather than the argument is telling.
"I just don't see where the data states that the poor are going to WalMart in numbers where they are not severely outnumbered by the middle class, more so than their representation in the overall population."
This is due to your own lack of comprehension. "60% of Americans receive only 26.8% of America's income."
Thank you for proving my point. You data makes no mention of where they shop.
"You offered nothing but speculation, anecdotes."
This a the blatant lie. I am the only person in this discussion to offer actual hard data.
See above, you data does not mention WalMart. How this data correlates to WalMart patronage is your speculation.
"I offered an experiment where someone counts new/expensive cars versus old/inexpensive to sample and approximate the socioeconomic standing of a large population of customers."
And you just can't get it through your thick head that this experiment is inherently flawed.
Yet it still better than anything you have offered. The data collected would at least be related to WalMart patronage, unlike your data.
This is funny. You claim my definition of a "shill" is messed up and imply that others are lying, but when proven wrong you can't even admit to it.
I never implied other are lying, I said they were irrelevant, not even worth investigating, that even if your cigarette claim was true it counts for nothing in the current topic. The professor who wrote the book regarding Microsoft did not write anything in your cigarette reference so your so called evidence is misapplied, useless. You have proven nothing other than a proclivity to attempt misdirection and topic changes.
It just a small piece of the argument. But it's important because it points out your dishonesty. I have corroborated evidence verifying my statements on this subject. Your previous statements and implications are provably false. You are discredited.
Your statements are irrelevant, they attack Cato not the professor or his book. All you have proven is that you have a fixation on Cato and are desparate to avoid the actual topic, the Microsoft case and the professors arguments.
You attempted to appear authoritative by citing DOJ. When confronted with points such as the judge failing to consider factors other than 12,000 apps being responsible for Apple's inability to gain marketshare you decided to change the topic to Cato. Case closed.
If the hospital sends you home "while the last of the overdose [you] had taken worked its way out of [your] system" then it wasn't much of an attempt so much as a whiny cry for attention. At the least they'd make you swallow a disgusting charcoal drink or pump you out and keep you for psychiatric evaluation.
;-)
You are assuming he is not in a nation with socialized medicine.
"Cato is irrelevant"
I disagree that they are irrelevant to this discussion. The only source you have directly cited and the only source I am responding to is the Cato Institute.
The professor's arguments regarding the Microsoft case come from his book. The book is not online. Cato reviewed/summarized the book and made excerpts available. Who made the excerpts available is irrelevant, Cato in this case. Cato is not the source of anything in this discussion about the Microsoft case, they are just a middleman. Again, attacking the messenger, especially an irrelevant one in the Cato case, it a pretty weak rebuttal.
"Even if your cigarette example were accurate it is irrelevant."
I dare you to prove that it's inaccurate. Come on, do it. I double dare you.
Irrelevant. The author of the book on the Microsoft case is not the author of any of the cigarette material you cite.
A new computer to replace the infected one that I have now. Any of these will work great! http://alienware.com/alx_pages/main_alx.aspx
It's more likely they get you a Sony Vaio.
"Actually your definition of corporate shill does not agree with mine. Unlike you, I don't automatically consider anyone who argues that the government made an error to be a shill,"
See this is your problem, you completely ignore reality. I've given links to examples where the Cato Institute has been shown to fit the EXACT definition of a shill.
Cato is irrelevant, they only offer a summary of a book. Even if your cigarette example were accurate it is irrelevant. The professor writing about Microsoft is not the author from the cigarette example. Second, your definition of shill seems to be anyone who upsets you world view.
"Uh, "published by" refers to the "Policy Analysis" journal"
Which is the document you posted a link to. It is the document I am discussing. It is from the Cato institute.
I'm discussing the book and it's ideas, you are fixating on an article summarizing the book. If you can't attack the book attack someone who liked it and published a summary. Interesting tactic.
"Please do so, please equate using Mac/AppleWorks/etc and Linux/OpenOffice/etc with writing your own OS and apps."
This is obviously dishonest on your part. I have not done this.
To refresh your recollection,
I wrote: "They could do those things with a Mac, they could do those things with Linux, but they choose not too."
You wrote: "This is not a simple rebut as it's a complex issue. In a similar vein I can say that consumers "choose" not to write all their own operating systems and applications.
"You have no data regarding where those without cars shop. You have no data regarding whether people get rides from friends of different or sinmilar socioeconomic standing. You offered nothing but speculation, anecdotes."
... I might find your opinion interesting.
Neither do you, you just pulled some uncorroborated nonsense out of your anus.
Actually I offered personal observations of several Walmart stores and suggested a larger scale experiment where cars can be counted as a sociioeconomic approximation. Both trump your general census data that offers no connection to WalMart. Neither is the true answer but both are far more than you offered.
I am singularly unimpressed by your lack of logic.
Someday when you manage to use logic rather than emotion, refrain from misrepresentation through creative snipping, referain from putting words in other peoples mouths, etc
If you want to ride off into the sunset on some neoconservative "poor people don't really matter" kick, at least come up with something marginally convincing.
You are dellusional, see below.
Yes, poor people shop at Wal-Mart. I don't know what's so difficult to grasp here, that's their demographic, for God's sake.
No one said they didn't, the topic was the majority of WalMart shoppers appearing to be middle class and that these consumers, not WalMart, are destroying the Mom and Pop shops by choosing to go to WalMart.
You may not like the actual facts I'm presenting, but at least I'm bothing to present actual facts.
...
... I don't think you have a good concept of the number of varibles here. I also think you don't actually want to since you're ignoring obvious issues like poor people taking the bus or riding with a friend.
I like census data. I just don't see where the data states that the poor are going to WalMart in numbers where they are not severely outnumbered by the middle class, more so than their representation in the overall population.
If by "accurate" you mean more biased in the direction of your opinion but having vastly less confidence in the results
No, by "accurate" I mean some measurement that somehow involved WalMart. Like an adhoc parking lot survey, unlike census data that makes no mention of Walmart.
You have no data regarding where those without cars shop. You have no data regarding whether people get rides from friends of different or sinmilar socioeconomic standing. You offered nothing but speculation, anecdotes. I offered an experiment where someone counts new/expensive cars versus old/inexpensive to sample and approximate the socioeconomic standing of a large population of customers. Care to reconsider who is interested in facts?
You posted information from a known corporate shill as your rebuttal. I was hoping you didn't know that, but it seems like you do and just don't care.
v es00/00.09mckenziereport.html
... and also from the PDF:
Published by the Cato Institute
So obviously this has nothing to do with the Cato Institute (sarcasm).
:-)
Actually your definition of corporate shill does not agree with mine. Unlike you, I don't automatically consider anyone who argues that the government made an error to be a shill, I don't consider a professor engaging in intellectual debate to be equivalent to a testing lab fudging a test for a client. Anyway, please continue with your failed attacks on the messenger and mislabel anyone who disagrees with your pet government ruling.
From the link you posted: Richard McKenzie is a professor in the Graduate School of Management at the University of California, Irvine; author of Trust on Trial: How the Microsoft Case Is Reframing the Rules of Competition (Boston: Perseus, 2000); and an adjunct scholar of the Cato Institute...
The professors stated the book grew out of a graduate economics class. "McKenzie first became interested in Microsoft's legal troubles three years ago while planning a course on "network economics" for MBA students at The University of California, Irvine, where he is a professor of economics in the Graduate School of Management."
http://www2.davidson.edu/news/news_archives/archi
As for being an "adjunct scholar", you realize that probably means they publised a paper or something? That does not mean he is on staff. Anyway, please continue with your failed attacks on the messenger and cite away on articles that the professor did not write like the cigarette one.
Uh, "published by" refers to the "Policy Analysis" journal, the PDF, not the book.
I'll admit that I was incorrect here but not about the spirt of the discussion. Arguing the exactness of the 70,000 number is not the same as rebutting the judge's point.
Actually he seemed to be arguing that the number and it's important/unimportance demonstrated the judge's fuzzy logic, and that findings based on such fuzzy logic cannot support a conclusion of law, that the judge seems to have erred. The judge's Apple example and failure to consider that something other than only have 12,000 apps may be limiting Apple's marketshare was a good rebuttal.
"That is simply rebut by the fact that the majority of home users do very simple things. They could do those things with a Mac, they could do those things with Linux, but they choose not too."
This is not a simple rebut as it's a complex issue. In a similar vein I can say that consumers "choose" not to write all their own operating systems and applications."
Please do so, please equate using Mac/AppleWorks/etc and Linux/OpenOffice/etc with writing your own OS and apps.
"Consumers can, and will, replace MS whenever they feel like it."
In the same way that we can go to Mars any time we want. In absolutist terms, both statements are true, but functionally they aren't. There is a HUGE cost assosciated.
Yet millions use Mac and Linux for their personal needs. I suppose you believe that is faked on some Hollywood backlot lot like the Apollo landings?
You might enjoy this bit of reading about the integrity of the Cato institute.
Attempting to attack the messenger is a pretty weak rebuttal, even more so when you pick the wrong target. This was not Cato research, a professor started researching Microsoft as part of a graduate level economics class studying the "network effect" of a digital good. As he looked into Microsoft the anti-trust case caught his interest, he followed it, and he wrote a book: "Trust on Trial: How the Microsoft Case Is Reframing the Rules of Competition".
Now here comes sentence number four. It's a quote from the judge with the number 70,000 inserted. It's true, but the number is not actually part of the quote and it's inclusion is dishonest.
I'm sorry, but you are the person being dishonest. From *your* own citation:
"Even if the contender attracted several thousand compatible applications, it would still look like a gamble from the consumer's perspective next to Windows, which supports *over 70,000* applications. The amount it would cost an operating system vendor to create *that many* applications is prohibitively large."
From the professor's text:
"He concludes that "the amount it would cost an operating system vendor to create [70,000] applications is prohibitively large.""
The professor replaced "that many" with "70,000" since he was not including the *preceeding line* and he properly cited the change with brackets.
What he did say was that the cost to develop the applications necessary to compete would be high. This they have not managed to rebut.
That is simply rebut by the fact that the majority of home users do very simple things. They could do those things with a Mac, they could do those things with Linux, but they choose not too. The professor is correct in that if Microsoft were to abuse it's position and attempt to charge consumers, say $1,000 for Windows, they would simply switch to Linux or Mac OS X. The government's document that you offer contains naive statements like "The inability of Apple to compete effectively with Windows provides another example of the applications barrier to entry in operation. Although Apple's Mac OS supports more than 12,000 applications, even an inventory of that magnitude is not sufficient to enable Apple to present a significant percentage of users with a viable substitute for Windows." It presumes that these users were looking for an alternative to change to, or otherwise did not find Windows more attractive, and how the hell can Mac OS not be viable when millions of people were using it for their personal computing needs? The judge's arguments are weak and at times non-sensical. You seem to confuse legally binding with factually correct. The judge's writing are only "facts" in a legal ruling sense, not in the absolute sense of being correct. Judges are often found to be wrong in their fact and overruled by other courts.
The first sentence is just plain false. Section 2 subsection 45 of the findings of fact specfically recognizes these other operating systems. The rest of the argument doesn't even really make sense. The claim is that MS is not charging enough for their OS therfore the alternatives have not managed to become commercailly viable. This argument does not acknowedge the known facts of the case such as MS forcing OEM vendors to sign exclusive deals in order to get a good price on Windows.
Those exclusive deals were the mechanism by which MS did not "charge enough". Those deals were pretty sweet from a pricing point of view. And if the unwanted Windows software had added too much to the price of the desired DOS box a market would have formed that did not accept MS' deal. Again, my original point, consumers had a very large part in creating the environment MS operated in. Consumers did not care then, they don't really care now, they are not really interested in alternatives like Linux and Mac OS X (and formerly OS/2). What your tossing up and trying to make stick is that MS' competitors were treated unfairly, that is a different topic. Consumers can, and will, replace MS whenever they feel like it.
3) I posted real census information overturning your claim that the poor in America are "few" and your response is "look at the cars". LOOK AT THE ACTUAL CENSUS. It's real statistical data, not a bunch of idle talk.
Actually your posts are entirely idle talk, "real" data is not useful if it describes the wrong population. You have been discussing the population as a whole, I have been discussing the segment of the population shopping at WalMart. Sampling the cars at a few different WalMarts in different neighborhoods should be more accurate than bulk census info.
I have no idea what point you are attempting to make.
"Crappy keyboards" was not the answer.
If you think only the poor shop at WalMart you have obviously not taken a census of the cars in the parking lots.
This is simply not true. THEY HAVE BEEN CONVICTED TWICE OF ANTITRUST VIOLATIONS. Your statements here are provably false. Go read the findings of fact. It is especially egregious that you believe consumers are responsible for their continued dominanace.
Your errors: (1) You conveniently ignore the rise to dominance. (2) You equate an anti-trust conviction with the existence of a monopolist market, the former does not imply the later. You might enjoy the PDF from http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa-380es.html:
"Judge Thomas Penfield Jackson bases his ruling against Microsoft on the claim that the company's monopoly in operating systems is protected by an "applications barrier to entry" made up of 70,000 Windows-based software programs. Without an entry barrier, any dominant producer that seeks to restrict sales in order to raise prices above competitive levels will find its market share eroded as new entrants capture price-sensitive customers. But, according to Judge Jackson, to enter the operating-system market a newcomer would need a large and varied base of compatible applications like those available to consumers who might otherwise choose Windows. He concludes that "the amount it would cost an operating system vendor to create [70,000] applications is prohibitively large." Judge Jackson seems unaware that the mere existence of a large number of Windows-based applications proves that Microsoft has stirred competition among software developers--leading to better products and falling prices and raising the value of both hardware and software to consumers. That said, there is a fatal flaw in the judge's argument: The overwhelming majority of the 70,000 Windows applications that make up the supposedly impregnable barrier to entry either never existed as unique products, no longer exist, or are totally out of date. When only unique Windows applications are counted--setting aside various versions of the same program--the number of applications is a small fraction of the judge's count. Moreover, survey data indicate that the needs of active computer users are satisfied by a very small number of applications. That means the barrier to entry into the operating-system market is nowhere near as impregnable as the judge has claimed, which in turn helps explain many of Microsoft's aggressive business tactics to preserve its market position. Because the judge's most essential finding is clearly erroneous, it cannot support his conclusions of law."
"The judge's claim that there is "no" alternative to Windows ignores, however, the obvious fact that firms like Apple, Red Hat, Sun, and IBM (and several others) already have operating systems that can be used on personal computers. They might not be "commercially viable" in the sense that they have sizable market shares, but that could be because Microsoft is not acting like a monopolist. Firms like Apple, Sun, and Red Hat, which are already in the operating-system market, could quickly become "commercially viable" (or more commercially viable than they already are) if Microsoft did what monopolists are supposed to do: restrict sales in order to raise the company's prices and profits."
Acutally it's because they were using teletypes with crappy keyboards and very slow connections.
Good lord, you don't think today's bundled $3 keyboards are better than a crappy 70s terminal?
Punch cards would be a better, a finite number of columns on a line. Think of a shell script being "loaded" into the system.
Or on a related note a line on the screen having a finite number of columns, 80 nearly universally, it's convenient to get things on a single line.
As a technical discussion, names as handles to objects or ideas don't matter (excluding downright misleading names, like a boy named Sue): it gets down to user training.
Yes, but user training costs money. The KISS principle should be applied to names too. You also ignore the fact that cute names, rather than descriptive names, give some people an amateurish impression. Such names can reinforce the "by nerds for nerds" stereotype.
At home, Grandma is going to use whatever will let her get her polaroids out of her new camera.
When confronted with two icons, one saying "photoshop" and the other saying "gimp", which one is grandma more likely to recall or deduce is for photos? Naming is one element of a user interface and user interfaces do matter.
Those people who do "choose" to shop at Wal-Mart (or $BIG-BOX, for that matter) make that choice because its what they can afford financially.
That is inaccurate. The people that are truly in that situation are few. Most shoppers choose the lower prices on basics so that they can afford *more* luxury items. A middle class wage allowing some upper middle class lifestyle. They choose individual luxuries and convenience over local economies.
When you have a law-breaking monopolist, YOU DO NOT HAVE A FREE MARKET.
... Consumers could use Linux or Mac OS X today, many are only performing basic operation that either alternative could do, but they chose to stick with Windows. They know it has reliability problems, they know it has virii problems, they know MS competes unfairly at times, but they don't really care. The free market created Microsoft's position, you are gratuitously ignoring this. The "Network Effect" that promotes a product like an operating system can't happen unless consumers chooses the convenience of a dominant OS. MS' monopoly powers are exaggerated for (1) political reasons - you may have noticed that some OSS advocates have a religious like hatred, (2) denial - an inability to believe that consumers choose MS over a beloved OS like Linux or Mac OS. MS is not a monopoly like Standard Oil was (buys all the gas stations in a region). Every Linux and Mac user proves that MS has limited monopoly powers, consumers had a choice when MS started their climb to dominance, consumers continue to have a choice today.
MS achieved dominance through the market, through consumer choices, by consumers choosing the products that benefitted from a "network effect". Consumers made the *monopoly*, they could have chosen OS/2 1.x but found it more convenient to use DOS, they could have chosen a Mac but decided to trade usability for price, MS could virutally give away Windows 3 but consumers could have ignored it but they chose not to, consumer could have used OS/2 2.x but they chose to wait for Win95,
Your telling me that said "mom and pop" store can get me volume pricing like Dell can? My point is why can't I just get a stripped down computer from Dell for a little cheaper, instead of having to go to a Mom and Pop store and pay more for the parts and labour? I don't think they would be willing to offer me $500 bucks for a full system with no O/S installed. Is there no easy solution to this problem that Microsoft has created?
Microsoft has not created the problem, *consumers* have created the problem. Consumers chose DOS over Mac and OS/2 1.x. Consumers chose Windows over OS/2 2.x. Consumers have voted with their wallet for computer vendors that provide the lowest prices. As you indicate these low prices are brought about by volume discounts. The per CPU charge is part of the deal that vendors *chose*. Why did they choose this, because 99.x% of customers *want* MS products and this gives them the lower prices that consumers demand.
You can be religious or cheap. If you want to be a purist then buy from Mom and Pop. Not only will your conscience be clean but you will be supporting *local* business. If you do not like the large corporation's bottom line decision making and their ignoring of minority market segments do not do business with them! Do business with the small local shops that are more responsive to your personal situation and minority market segments. To continue with the "consumers are doing it to themselves theme": Customer focused Mom and Pop shops are not being killed off by WalMart, they are being killed off by *consumers* that choose to shop at WalMart. It's the same in many markets/industries.
Does that make the rest of us accidental nillionaires?
;-)
If you write open source software it is probably no accident that you are a nillionaire.
In what way exactly is it illegal to post a list of information like this, even with all the dumb laws the USA is passing these days...?
It's just like the GPL, you only have the right to distribute if you comply with certain terms. If I make an appliance that uses Linux internally and I refuse to provide the source code to the kernel isn't that illegal also? Still a dumb law in your mind?
When will people learn. Security through obscurity rarely works.
"When will people learn?" is the correct question. However your statement then goes on to demonstrate a superficial understanding of security. There is nothing wrong with obscurity. It is merely one of *many* tactics that should be employed *simultaneously*. Problems arise when someone relies predominately on only one tactic, whether the one tactic is obscurity or something else doesn't really matter. Today, I hoped you learned that slashdot slogans may not offer a complete understanding of a topic.