"There's another thing that I [Gates] talked about as long as eight years ago, that we're still implementing, which the idea is if you want somebody to read an e-mail you would put up a certain amount of money. So you say, 'OK, if he reads this e-mail, I offer 20 cents for the person to read the e-mail.' What's the valuable resource? It's the reader's time. And if they read it and say, 'Oh this is my long-lost brother.' Then they can say, 'No don't charge them the 20 cents.' But it's just that you put that at risk to use their time. And because that's a scarce resource there's an economic threshold associated with that."
And Microsoft will be right there with the proprietary technology - integrated with the Windows operating system, or maybe Outlook, of course - collecting their two cent cut for every piece of email, sucked straight out of your account thanks to Passport. Those of us who don't use Windoze and/or Lookout? Either we won't be able to filter spam, or we won't be able to read email built with MS Outlook. Which is only about 90% of all email.
"What's good for me might not be so good for you, and vica [sic] versa."
Indeed. Isn't that why we all came over here to LinuxLand from WindozeWorld (or for the lucky, never spent any time at all in WindozeWorld) in the first place? We can praise and dis each others' distros out here like Ford/Chevy/Dodge truck owners, but the joy is, there are distros to praise and dis.
"Working for a company which actually seems to care about you is a very fulfilling experience."
To be sure - as long as you don't mind working for a company that doesn't give a rat's ass about anyone else, and will stop at nothing (legal, ethical or otherwise) to achieve success. Surely there must be at least a few people left in the world who would refuse all this "fulfillment" for the costs to their souls that come with it.
"I like Salon, but not enough to pay to read a website. That is a flawed business model. If advertising won't pay the bills, their demise is probably inevitable."
Hmmm... Using that logic, since the _Time_ magazine I subscribe to is riddled with advertisements, shouldn't I receive the mag for free?
"I guess I'm not Bob from Bob's hardware, but if Bob goes into partnership with his geeky son, then Bob's hardware will become another Linux/OpenOffice success story."
No, you're not Bob. You're a great example of and for Linux in a small business - the world needs more of you - but the bottom line remains, either Bob or his son still needs to be a geek to make Linux (and the software thereunder) work in the vast majority of small businesses.
The "Bobs" of the world who can successfully migrate to Linux are few and far between, at least given the current state of the distros and software. But the sons-of-Bobs can be extremely influential in giving the Redmond Beast a run for its money, or at least reining it in. Linux should take a page out of mainstream marketing's book: get 'em while they're young.
This could be interesting: kids having access to two PCs, one running Windows, the other Linux, and - inasmuch as it's possible - not-too-much bias one way or the other from the adult(s). Obviously the Windoze box will have the advantage (more software, more kids at school using them, thus less incentive to use the Linux box), but who knows? Left to their own devices, the kids might just use the Windoze machine as much as they have to, then gravitate to the Linux box for "fun."
If it could become "cool" for kids to use Linux (not just propeller-head dweebs, but cool kids) it could be the greatest boost to Linux yet, albeit down the road. Adults are too set in their ways and, face it, the bottom line's the bottom line. Larger businesses with the IT resources are the only ones who can afford to use Linux to save money. We're all kidding ourselves if we think that a small business, where the CEO, IT, Marketing and Maintenance are all the same humanoid, is going to save money with Linux instead of the standard Windowz/Office/QuickBooks kit. Maybe some day, but not today. Yeah, yeah, there are plenty of Linux/OpenOffice success stories out there - mostly at Linux distro sites - but be real. Bob's Hardware, Inc. has a much better chance of successfully moving to a Mac than it does to Linux. But chances are, Bob will just go with and stay with the Wintel boxes that Dell sold and sells him. And what will Bob buy for his kids? The same thing.
It is thanks to investors' attitudes such as yours that the Market is in the toilet - following a wave of companies based only on smoke and mirrors, with stock valuations to match. The Market was built on people who "liked" companies. Only recently has the Market become nothing much more than playing Lotto, with investors who have no idea what they're investing in. When Cisco was king of the cocktial party stock-talk hill, nine out of ten people who owned it (Yeah, I've got some of that) had no idea what the company even did.
"This is not for geeks. Maybe for geeks-in-training, but not for geeks!"
This is the ugly reality. Linux can remain a "boutique OS" on the desktops of a handful of geeks and ABM zealots, or thrive in the real world. Another ugly reality: MS-Office is plastered all over the real world. StarOffice and OpenOffice can huff and puff all they want, but MS-Office is one *hell* of a big house to blow down.
MS-Office - and Quicken/QuickBooks - running under Linux may mean the difference between a handful of brave souls testing the Linux waters and a stampede of conestoga wagons heading for the New Land.
"Will this action even be a blip on their radar? Probablly not, unless environmentalists and the media are dragged into the lot."
Well there ya go. Here's where consolidation can come back and bite AOL-TW in the ass.
On the one hand, we have _Time_ magazine going on the occasional "Be good to the earth" campaign (with ads for Ford Expeditions sprinkled throughout, but that's another irony), telling us how to recycle, produce less waste, etc.
On the other hand, we have America Online, sending out tons (literally) of unwanted CD-ROMs which end up in landfills.
"...then I find out that some of them have purchased a second line. That is when I scratch my head and ask why the hell they are not using cable or DSL."
Ah, spoiled you. Perhaps you need to find out that some of us don't have the option. DSL is in my town; I'm just too far away from the Central Office. Comcast has not yet deemed our section of town worthy of digital cable. Satellite? The one sky I don't have a clear shot at out here in the sticks is south. Not only is dial-up my only option, but thanks to hamster and vacuum tube gear in the CO, 26,4 is my ceiling.
What *I* can't figure out is how all those AOL users (or for that matter, MSN users) on dial-up put up with all that graphic fluff and you'll take it whether you want it or not "updates" pissing in through a dial-up modem.
"...my (former) bank once sent me a co-branded AOL cd..."
Your (former) bank is just another marketing whore, but have you walked into a U. S. Post Office lately? I just about went, um, postal when I saw a bin of about a hundred AOL startup disks prominently displayed alongside packaging and philatelic paraphernalia.
"One way that many people get AOL for free is that they install one of those thousand hour free CDs and then when the given number of free months has expired, they call up to cancel...."
And that doesn't take into account true "churn," from those who won't put up with AOL for even free. For every "new" subscriber (are they still counting every name under the same account?), how many leave? When is the last time you spoke with someone who left AOL for a "real" ISP who was sorry about their decision? Most of the comments I hear are along the lines of "I don't know why I didn't do it sooner."
Blanket marketing (the likes of which we may have never seen before - you can't open a subpoena without finding an AOL startup disk inside), customer laziness, and good old FUD are what get and keep AOL subscribers.
Perhaps so, but Microsoft made billions with (given the experience, resources at hand and what they should be able to turn out) a bunch of crap.
We snobs may call it crap (well... it is), but AOL sure did get a lot of product on PCs.
Pride and quality is grand, but marketing makes the bottom line. Lindows and AOL might make an ugly couple, but they may just be a match made in Heaven.
Look at the bright side: Imagine a world in which MS and AOL buried the hatchet, and became partners. Time-Warner-AOL-MSNBC.
Well, that may be true (Lindows is dying), but some day we may look back fondly at Lindows for helping in some way to at least wound the Redmond Beast (I personally don't think we'll ever see it topple) and indeed, as their tag line more-or-less says, be an influence which helped "bring choice to our computers."
I remember paying $12.80 an hour for CompuServe (at 1200 bps!) Then came Prodigy. It was lame (as was, and still is IMHO, AOL), but it was also ten bucks a month. Before long CI$ had to counter with some more attractive pricing or die an earlier death than it did. (Ironically enough, after AOL bought it and shot it through the heart.) Gone went the good old captive audience days, and CI$ didn't enjoy *nothin'* like the monopoly M$ enjoys.
If nothing else, we may be thanking Lindows for being a force that got Linux into the mainstream.
Alas, the AOL influence does scare a bit, for in the fierce war between AOL and Microsoft, the wounded are those of us who choose to use neither. It gets pretty hard to argue or howl "proprietary swine!" when my "boutique" Linux/KMail (or Windoze/Eudora) email gets mangled at the door of 56 zillion AOL or MSN users - or their mail when it reaches mine. We must make sure that "Where do you want to go today?" is not limited to "Anywhere you want, so long as you take the IE bus," and that "You've got mail!" doesn't require AOL to send and receive it.
Slashdot Mirror
Never underestimate the power of ego and greed - both of which would play here. Too many arsonists stick around to watch the fire - or call it in....
No, not Microsoft indeed!
"There's another thing that I [Gates] talked about as long as eight years ago, that we're still implementing, which the idea is if you want somebody to read an e-mail you would put up a certain amount of money. So you say, 'OK, if he reads this e-mail, I offer 20 cents for the person to read the e-mail.' What's the valuable resource? It's the reader's time. And if they read it and say, 'Oh this is my long-lost brother.' Then they can say, 'No don't charge them the 20 cents.' But it's just that you put that at risk to use their time. And because that's a scarce resource there's an economic threshold associated with that."
And Microsoft will be right there with the proprietary technology - integrated with the Windows operating system, or maybe Outlook, of course - collecting their two cent cut for every piece of email, sucked straight out of your account thanks to Passport. Those of us who don't use Windoze and/or Lookout? Either we won't be able to filter spam, or we won't be able to read email built with MS Outlook. Which is only about 90% of all email.
You will be assimilated....
"Maybe there's no Big Brother, but I'm convinced there's a Big Brotherhood."
Amen. You should copyright that before Clear Channel does (just to keep you from being able to use it).
"What's good for me might not be so good for you, and vica [sic] versa."
Indeed. Isn't that why we all came over here to LinuxLand from WindozeWorld (or for the lucky, never spent any time at all in WindozeWorld) in the first place? We can praise and dis each others' distros out here like Ford/Chevy/Dodge truck owners, but the joy is, there are distros to praise and dis.
"Working for a company which actually seems to care about you is a very fulfilling experience."
To be sure - as long as you don't mind working for a company that doesn't give a rat's ass about anyone else, and will stop at nothing (legal, ethical or otherwise) to achieve success. Surely there must be at least a few people left in the world who would refuse all this "fulfillment" for the costs to their souls that come with it.
"I like Salon, but not enough to pay to read a website. That is a flawed business model. If advertising won't pay the bills, their demise is probably inevitable."
Hmmm... Using that logic, since the _Time_ magazine I subscribe to is riddled with advertisements, shouldn't I receive the mag for free?
"I guess I'm not Bob from Bob's hardware, but if Bob goes into partnership with his geeky son, then Bob's hardware will become another Linux/OpenOffice success story."
No, you're not Bob. You're a great example of and for Linux in a small business - the world needs more of you - but the bottom line remains, either Bob or his son still needs to be a geek to make Linux (and the software thereunder) work in the vast majority of small businesses.
The "Bobs" of the world who can successfully migrate to Linux are few and far between, at least given the current state of the distros and software. But the sons-of-Bobs can be extremely influential in giving the Redmond Beast a run for its money, or at least reining it in. Linux should take a page out of mainstream marketing's book: get 'em while they're young.
This could be interesting: kids having access to two PCs, one running Windows, the other Linux, and - inasmuch as it's possible - not-too-much bias one way or the other from the adult(s). Obviously the Windoze box will have the advantage (more software, more kids at school using them, thus less incentive to use the Linux box), but who knows? Left to their own devices, the kids might just use the Windoze machine as much as they have to, then gravitate to the Linux box for "fun."
If it could become "cool" for kids to use Linux (not just propeller-head dweebs, but cool kids) it could be the greatest boost to Linux yet, albeit down the road. Adults are too set in their ways and, face it, the bottom line's the bottom line. Larger businesses with the IT resources are the only ones who can afford to use Linux to save money. We're all kidding ourselves if we think that a small business, where the CEO, IT, Marketing and Maintenance are all the same humanoid, is going to save money with Linux instead of the standard Windowz/Office/QuickBooks kit. Maybe some day, but not today. Yeah, yeah, there are plenty of Linux/OpenOffice success stories out there - mostly at Linux distro sites - but be real. Bob's Hardware, Inc. has a much better chance of successfully moving to a Mac than it does to Linux. But chances are, Bob will just go with and stay with the Wintel boxes that Dell sold and sells him. And what will Bob buy for his kids? The same thing.
It is thanks to investors' attitudes such as yours that the Market is in the toilet - following a wave of companies based only on smoke and mirrors, with stock valuations to match. The Market was built on people who "liked" companies. Only recently has the Market become nothing much more than playing Lotto, with investors who have no idea what they're investing in. When Cisco was king of the cocktial party stock-talk hill, nine out of ten people who owned it (Yeah, I've got some of that) had no idea what the company even did.
The only way this monopoly is going to end is if we users put our money where our rants are and refuse to support said monopoly.
I'm glad too, but you and Sun *both* believe in the Easter Bunny.
"This is not for geeks. Maybe for geeks-in-training, but not for geeks!"
This is the ugly reality. Linux can remain a "boutique OS" on the desktops of a handful of geeks and ABM zealots, or thrive in the real world. Another ugly reality: MS-Office is plastered all over the real world. StarOffice and OpenOffice can huff and puff all they want, but MS-Office is one *hell* of a big house to blow down.
MS-Office - and Quicken/QuickBooks - running under Linux may mean the difference between a handful of brave souls testing the Linux waters and a stampede of conestoga wagons heading for the New Land.
"Will this action even be a blip on their radar? Probablly not, unless environmentalists and the media are dragged into the lot."
Well there ya go. Here's where consolidation can come back and bite AOL-TW in the ass.
On the one hand, we have _Time_ magazine going on the occasional "Be good to the earth" campaign (with ads for Ford Expeditions sprinkled throughout, but that's another irony), telling us how to recycle, produce less waste, etc.
On the other hand, we have America Online, sending out tons (literally) of unwanted CD-ROMs which end up in landfills.
Really. Just what we need on top of the bunch of rude, f*cking idiots we already have talking on phones.
"...then I find out that some of them have purchased a second line. That is when I scratch my head and ask why the hell they are not using cable or DSL."
Ah, spoiled you. Perhaps you need to find out that some of us don't have the option. DSL is in my town; I'm just too far away from the Central Office. Comcast has not yet deemed our section of town worthy of digital cable. Satellite? The one sky I don't have a clear shot at out here in the sticks is south. Not only is dial-up my only option, but thanks to hamster and vacuum tube gear in the CO, 26,4 is my ceiling.
What *I* can't figure out is how all those AOL users (or for that matter, MSN users) on dial-up put up with all that graphic fluff and you'll take it whether you want it or not "updates" pissing in through a dial-up modem.
"...my (former) bank once sent me a co-branded AOL cd..."
Your (former) bank is just another marketing whore, but have you walked into a U. S. Post Office lately? I just about went, um, postal when I saw a bin of about a hundred AOL startup disks prominently displayed alongside packaging and philatelic paraphernalia.
"One way that many people get AOL for free is that they install one of those thousand hour free CDs and then when the given number of free months has expired, they call up to cancel...."
And that doesn't take into account true "churn," from those who won't put up with AOL for even free. For every "new" subscriber (are they still counting every name under the same account?), how many leave? When is the last time you spoke with someone who left AOL for a "real" ISP who was sorry about their decision? Most of the comments I hear are along the lines of "I don't know why I didn't do it sooner."
Blanket marketing (the likes of which we may have never seen before - you can't open a subpoena without finding an AOL startup disk inside), customer laziness, and good old FUD are what get and keep AOL subscribers.
Well... A good start is to tell them that AOL is number one because it's so easy to use.
AOL is number one because you can't open a subpoena without finding an AOL startup disk inside.
Perhaps so, but Microsoft made billions with (given the experience, resources at hand and what they should be able to turn out) a bunch of crap.
We snobs may call it crap (well... it is), but AOL sure did get a lot of product on PCs.
Pride and quality is grand, but marketing makes the bottom line. Lindows and AOL might make an ugly couple, but they may just be a match made in Heaven.
Look at the bright side: Imagine a world in which MS and AOL buried the hatchet, and became partners. Time-Warner-AOL-MSNBC.
Damn. Now I'm gonna have nightmares.
Well, that may be true (Lindows is dying), but some day we may look back fondly at Lindows for helping in some way to at least wound the Redmond Beast (I personally don't think we'll ever see it topple) and indeed, as their tag line more-or-less says, be an influence which helped "bring choice to our computers."
I remember paying $12.80 an hour for CompuServe (at 1200 bps!) Then came Prodigy. It was lame (as was, and still is IMHO, AOL), but it was also ten bucks a month. Before long CI$ had to counter with some more attractive pricing or die an earlier death than it did. (Ironically enough, after AOL bought it and shot it through the heart.) Gone went the good old captive audience days, and CI$ didn't enjoy *nothin'* like the monopoly M$ enjoys.
If nothing else, we may be thanking Lindows for being a force that got Linux into the mainstream.
Alas, the AOL influence does scare a bit, for in the fierce war between AOL and Microsoft, the wounded are those of us who choose to use neither. It gets pretty hard to argue or howl "proprietary swine!" when my "boutique" Linux/KMail (or Windoze/Eudora) email gets mangled at the door of 56 zillion AOL or MSN users - or their mail when it reaches mine. We must make sure that "Where do you want to go today?" is not limited to "Anywhere you want, so long as you take the IE bus," and that "You've got mail!" doesn't require AOL to send and receive it.
'Anyone want to place bets on how long before HP "decides that supporting Linux is just too costly" and bails on the platform entirely?'
Exactly what I was thinking. Desperate companies do desperate things, and HP won't be the first company to sell their soul to the Redmond devil.
Then again, HP lost their soul long ago.