Then he should not be doing a review and speaking negatively about the costs involved with the software.
I don't go to the MS website much, so I'm pretty green when it comes to naviagtion. It took 3 clicks from teh front page to get to detailed information on how to buy the various Office components in different pricing packages.
Also, if you go to Google and 'I'm feeling lucky' for 'buy outlook 2003', the same page will pop right up.
If someone is going to give a review that potentially millions may read, there is a level of responsibility to actually know what you are talking about. If this guy didn't know how to find the information on what he's reviewing, he doesn't need to be writing articles.
Since I am sure he knows what google is and knows how to shop online, I take his article as bullshit cooked up to just broadcast personal opinions. It's not a review, definitely not/. worthy.
Using the latest Office 2003 would not have done most of them any good, as upgrading can cost hundreds of dollars (or more!), and might not be an option for some time.
It is $109 here. That's not quite "hundreds of dollars".
Can anyone be pro-Linux and not write such uninformed dribble? Lately, I have really started to notice why a lot of people are just anti-Linux for no good reason. Everything they hear about it comes from maroons like this author.
Believe me, folks. Be responsible when posting to the web. If you act like a zealot, people will automatically and subconciously avoid things you tout on principle.
Oh nevermind. I read the article again and noticed the reference to most people using Windows as "unfortunate". Yes, the makings of a fair and balanced review with no stench of zealotry lurking in the background. [sarcasm]
Considering the only Windows-only mail application they chose to include is a commercial mail client (Outlook), while the options for Linux are free and free-with-restrictions. Mind you, the value of Outlook is not simply it's mail features, but calendar, noting, journaling, and public folders. When properly used in a corporate enviroment, I don't see anything come close to it's simplisity and functionality. But, again, it's less of a mail checker and more of a productivity tool.
They left Outlook Express out, I assume, becase the author of the aritcle must be unaware that every single Windows computer since Windows 95B comes with a copy of it. If over 3/4 of these users are using Internet Explorer for their browser, it's highly likely they are also using Outlook Express for their email.
It's hard to take any review seriously when the author decides to ignore facts based on their personal feelings about a product.
I'm not attempting to attract flames, but I am pretty sure there are more people using Outlook Express than Evolution, KMail, Opera, and Mozilla combined.
When I did Technical support for an ISP, almost every single Mac and Windows user I spoke with used it.
That's too bad. Just like those divorce lawyers who don't let you make changes in a case because "The paperwork has already been processed" when the lawyer is really only concerned with minimizing his time per case, increasing profit while minimizing cranial activity.
It wasn't so bad. You have to remember, I spent 8 hours a day doing nothing but dealing with Netscape and Internet Explorer problems. Both were buggy piles of crap, but IE was much less tempermental than Netscape.
True, that it did become much more stable when integrated into the OS. The drawback being that it was still quite buggy by today's standards and would often take the system it was integrated into down with it. We all have to keep in mind that 95-98 were some crazy years for Internet related software. The masses wanted "more, better, now!" and for free. Both IE and Netscapes were both monumental efforts, but Netscape failed to find an alternative source of income to support it's product in a manner that allowed it to compete.
It's not like Microsoft bent them over their knee and said Netscape was not allowed to diversify. They invested all their efforts into a single project and, suprise, it failed to compete with someone much further along in the industry. There are many examples of companies who did not allow this to happen to them while facing similar odds. Take Remington.. It all started with a single gun design; Once the market started to flood with similar quality arms for less, they diversified into sewing machines, typewriters, razor blades, etc while never abandoning their gun business, no matter what the short-term financial losses. This allowed their designs to evolve with the other guys, while maintaining a stream of revenue to keep the doors open.
Netscape, with it's once-immense capitol, could have made some brighter investments than it did. They had every opportunity to hire the right people to manage their investor's cash, but chose to stick with a single plan until it turns inside out. If you want to tangle with MS and survive, you have to spend that money on the best lawyers and the best CFO you can afford. Don't win with courts, win by growing the company elsewhere for a while.
As for my points, I still see nobody coming to the defense of Trumpet Winsock. For real, chew on the idea that they had implemented an Internet-ready network stack into Windows before Microsoft did. What right did MS have in turning around and implementing their own network stack in the next release of Windows? People keep ignoring my mention of that in every thread I bring it up in. It's exactly the same type of thing that happened to Netscape, but people don't want to think about being required to pay $29.99 to get their copy of Windows on the Internet, then have to pay another $35 for a browser, then another $40 if you wanted a good email program.. Yes, that could have ended up being some alternate reality in 2004 had some anti-trust crap come up over the socket being integrated into the OS as a monopolistic activity.
My arguement is, if people are going to take the side of Netscape, they really need to consider going much further. Remember DESQview? Quarterdeck was on top of the world for a few years, that is, until MS released Windows. They were given the smackdown when Windows 3.1 was suddenly incompatible with QEMM (the once-excellent memory manager).
Personally, I feel MS is worth having around for one reason: The natural tendancy for humans to tear down giants results in a lot of good, competitive software. Monumental accomplishments have been driven by a simple hatred for big companies. Kudos to them. Because of those efforts, one day things will be different -- and Microsoft knows it.
MS gives away IE to shut down Netscape. That wasn't the crime that I thought was terrible - it was going to their OEM partners and threatening them with extra high cost of Windows if they put on Netscape.
It's refreshing to see another person not consider the Netscape fiasco a 'crime'. I was working for an ISP when IE came about. At the time, Netscape charged us $20-40 per copy that we shipped to our customers. You can imagine how quickly that adds up. When IE became an alternative, Netscape refused to negociate and lost out big-time. Meanwhile, MS would do advertising partnerships and offer a wide range of support services for free. A very tempting offer when your shop isn't making much money to begin with.
Anyway, the people at Netscape didn't move quickly to improve their browsers and, for quite some time, IE was way better concerning stability in Windows. It's not like the 2 clicks and 10 minute download destroyed them.
The anti-MS folks who always find fault in MS never really seemed to complain about Trumpet Winsock being put through the ringer by NT and 95 including their own network stacks. How about notepad.exe and calc.exe? Before that time, you could download and register shareware editors or look for freebies. I've never heard somone argue that Windows was destroying software companies by including it's own program to display image files.
But anything to do with [potentially] commerical media, such as web pages and audio/video content, grabs everyones attention and ends up with MS back in court acting confused and innocent.
I know, totally off topic. Back on topic, I promise:
I think the reason for the search results problem is likely a goof-up. Likely a low-level employee who had no idea what XFree86 is, didn't care, didn't double-check, etc before adding it to the DB. It seems reasonable that many MS employees would not be familar with Unix at all.
The judge said "How do I know you're not just making that up?" and decided for the embezzler.
I'm not buying it. It would have been very little trouble to get a professor from a local community college or university to come in as an "expert" to testify. This is typical with many cases where it expected that the judge will not be able to fully understand the technology dealt with in the case.
Perhaps the lawyer was just inexperienced or uncaring.
Blasting invaders from space is one thing; a game that lets you steal a car and run over the owner or murder prostitutes is over the line. It increases the allure of immoral behavior and blurs the line between right and wrong to an unacceptable degree in a society that is already plagued with people who cannot accept responsibility for themselves.
So blame it on video games? No. I blame the parents for not teaching their kids any values and allowing them to sit in front of a console for 4-6 hours a day playing violent video games while eating sweets.
As for the genre's intended audience (adults), I found the series very enjoyable and like the cheesey violence. Though the graphics are nice, I still do not consider it any closer to reality than Contra, Raiden or any other shooter.
Back to your views.. Are people really that stupid? They buy a video game, then lost track of reality because they saw the pixels dance the devil's dance? Hmmm.
Okay, I am not one to usually reply to my own comment, but I went searching for small-scale projects and found a design involving using parts from a $10-40 TOMYTEC mini-RC car (or clone) and a $13 electric airplane.
It involves a decent amount of hardware hacking, but looks like a fun design for not much money. Mind you, you can probably buy a pre-built toy with similar capabilities for about the same money.
The Same happends here, if symantec is distributing some program saying that it's an antivirus, and it's actually a virus, you can sue symantec, but if some scriptkiddie sends you an email saying "install this", and you do, then you are "Too stupid to own a Computer (TM)"
I would rather say the ignorant user's OS and mail application are to blame. It's not the ignorant user's fault that they have been bombarded with marketing for the past 6 years about how simple the Internet and computers are to use. On top of that, this specific case deals with a WebTV user. The intended audience for WebTV is directed more towards who are at the extreme edges of computer ignorance. It's intended to be a device for the non-savy, elderly, and those who can't afford a complete computer system.
The fact that they can run scripts or executables from an email attachment demonstrates that the WebTV design is very poor for it's intended audience. If I was in charge of QA for WebTV, I would have restricted attachments to audio, image, text, and video files.
The guy who did this is in all kinds of hot water. Rightfully so. Just because WebTV was poorly designed, that does not excuse his actions. Though, I do think you should set aside the technical zealotry. You can't expect users to take computing as seriously as a geek in the industry.
As far as people following along with a radio DJ who pretends to be teaching users something on their computer, then munges their hard drive -- That's just wrong. Since he was broadcasting on the radio, there could have been 8 year olds who run over to their Dad's home-office computer and type what the guy says and destroys a report he is support to turn into his boss the next day. Uncool.
That's a pretty slapstick response. You have not even said 'hello' to watching HD-DVDs in Linux.
So what was stopping the world from watching DVDs in Linux? I thought it had more to do with nobody obtaining a license, then writing the application, and selling it as shareware/retailware.
If that's the case, then you have nobody to blame but yourself. Either fork over a few dollars or write it yourself.
I do agree that the next standard should be open and free. But, That's not how things work. Big industry comes up with specifications for big industry products. It's to be expected that they would be self-serving. It feels a lot like having to pay sales taxes on grocery items.
I've been using one of these chairs for about 5 years. I will mourn the day it fails me.
I figure that's a long ways off, since the one I am sitting in is 5 years old and the factory mesh ass hammock is still just as tight and sturdy as it was new.
Yeah, something like this happens a couple of times they release a new chip. What good does the cheaper super computer do if the consumer level goods are priced so high?
For the price of a new G5, I could get a good quad cpu P4 up and running.
The moderators today are more looney than usual. I get modded troll for mentioning the headline as a troll? Perhaps it was the executive toy reference? In that case, I take it back. From now on, I will consider Apples to be teenage girl's computers. That should be a happy middle-ground for everyone.
Watch a proficient Mac user work. You'll notice that the left hand is on the keyboard at all times, copying, pasting, opening, closing, undoing, answering dialogue boxes, AND CTRL-CLICKING to get contextual menus. It's a different way of working; not necessarily better or worse. For me, it feels right.
No, no, no. The left hand is: Holding the phone while they sit on hold waiting for Technical Support.. Since their system gets a girly-girl, frowny face error when opening their new copy of Photoshop.
If you want to talk about power, there are many benchmarks showing the G5 being beaten by various PC offerings, so shut it up.
Agreed. I was thinking of all the poor chaps who will get modded as troll or flamebaiter because Pudgey had to go and troll the headline. Kinda funny.
On the same note as you were addressing, if the G5 was such a performance giant, then why aren't we seeing these things in datacenters? If Apple is the consistant leader in performance and reliability, why don't we see more Apples out there?
Personally, I see them more as executive toys than real computers.
Slashdot Mirror
I don't like your TV show.
Then he should not be doing a review and speaking negatively about the costs involved with the software.
/. worthy.
I don't go to the MS website much, so I'm pretty green when it comes to naviagtion. It took 3 clicks from teh front page to get to detailed information on how to buy the various Office components in different pricing packages.
Also, if you go to Google and 'I'm feeling lucky' for 'buy outlook 2003', the same page will pop right up.
If someone is going to give a review that potentially millions may read, there is a level of responsibility to actually know what you are talking about. If this guy didn't know how to find the information on what he's reviewing, he doesn't need to be writing articles.
Since I am sure he knows what google is and knows how to shop online, I take his article as bullshit cooked up to just broadcast personal opinions. It's not a review, definitely not
You don't need Office to run Outlook, period. Him bringing up Office and Outlook in a TCO while talking about mail programs is just silly.
Using the latest Office 2003 would not have done most of them any good, as upgrading can cost hundreds of dollars (or more!), and might not be an option for some time.
It is $109 here. That's not quite "hundreds of dollars".
Can anyone be pro-Linux and not write such uninformed dribble? Lately, I have really started to notice why a lot of people are just anti-Linux for no good reason. Everything they hear about it comes from maroons like this author.
Believe me, folks. Be responsible when posting to the web. If you act like a zealot, people will automatically and subconciously avoid things you tout on principle.
There's no need for all that concern over a bloody personal email password.
/. password was sent via clear-text when I signed up.
If someone's sniffing your home network to catch a clear-text password for someone's email, you've got much bigger problems to worry about.
IIRC, my
Oh nevermind. I read the article again and noticed the reference to most people using Windows as "unfortunate". Yes, the makings of a fair and balanced review with no stench of zealotry lurking in the background. [sarcasm]
Considering the only Windows-only mail application they chose to include is a commercial mail client (Outlook), while the options for Linux are free and free-with-restrictions. Mind you, the value of Outlook is not simply it's mail features, but calendar, noting, journaling, and public folders. When properly used in a corporate enviroment, I don't see anything come close to it's simplisity and functionality. But, again, it's less of a mail checker and more of a productivity tool.
They left Outlook Express out, I assume, becase the author of the aritcle must be unaware that every single Windows computer since Windows 95B comes with a copy of it. If over 3/4 of these users are using Internet Explorer for their browser, it's highly likely they are also using Outlook Express for their email.
It's hard to take any review seriously when the author decides to ignore facts based on their personal feelings about a product.
the most popular e-mail clients
I'm not attempting to attract flames, but I am pretty sure there are more people using Outlook Express than Evolution, KMail, Opera, and Mozilla combined.
When I did Technical support for an ISP, almost every single Mac and Windows user I spoke with used it.
I always liked Eudora Pro and Pegasus.
I see a lot of people taking this memo as complete and total fact. Be careful with quick assumptions from an anonymous source.
It's quite probable someone did this to FUD SCO and MS. Just saying.. Use a little sense before spouting rhetoric.
That's too bad. Just like those divorce lawyers who don't let you make changes in a case because "The paperwork has already been processed" when the lawyer is really only concerned with minimizing his time per case, increasing profit while minimizing cranial activity.
It wasn't so bad. You have to remember, I spent 8 hours a day doing nothing but dealing with Netscape and Internet Explorer problems. Both were buggy piles of crap, but IE was much less tempermental than Netscape.
True, that it did become much more stable when integrated into the OS. The drawback being that it was still quite buggy by today's standards and would often take the system it was integrated into down with it. We all have to keep in mind that 95-98 were some crazy years for Internet related software. The masses wanted "more, better, now!" and for free. Both IE and Netscapes were both monumental efforts, but Netscape failed to find an alternative source of income to support it's product in a manner that allowed it to compete.
It's not like Microsoft bent them over their knee and said Netscape was not allowed to diversify. They invested all their efforts into a single project and, suprise, it failed to compete with someone much further along in the industry. There are many examples of companies who did not allow this to happen to them while facing similar odds. Take Remington.. It all started with a single gun design; Once the market started to flood with similar quality arms for less, they diversified into sewing machines, typewriters, razor blades, etc while never abandoning their gun business, no matter what the short-term financial losses. This allowed their designs to evolve with the other guys, while maintaining a stream of revenue to keep the doors open.
Netscape, with it's once-immense capitol, could have made some brighter investments than it did. They had every opportunity to hire the right people to manage their investor's cash, but chose to stick with a single plan until it turns inside out. If you want to tangle with MS and survive, you have to spend that money on the best lawyers and the best CFO you can afford. Don't win with courts, win by growing the company elsewhere for a while.
As for my points, I still see nobody coming to the defense of Trumpet Winsock. For real, chew on the idea that they had implemented an Internet-ready network stack into Windows before Microsoft did. What right did MS have in turning around and implementing their own network stack in the next release of Windows? People keep ignoring my mention of that in every thread I bring it up in. It's exactly the same type of thing that happened to Netscape, but people don't want to think about being required to pay $29.99 to get their copy of Windows on the Internet, then have to pay another $35 for a browser, then another $40 if you wanted a good email program.. Yes, that could have ended up being some alternate reality in 2004 had some anti-trust crap come up over the socket being integrated into the OS as a monopolistic activity.
My arguement is, if people are going to take the side of Netscape, they really need to consider going much further. Remember DESQview? Quarterdeck was on top of the world for a few years, that is, until MS released Windows. They were given the smackdown when Windows 3.1 was suddenly incompatible with QEMM (the once-excellent memory manager).
Personally, I feel MS is worth having around for one reason: The natural tendancy for humans to tear down giants results in a lot of good, competitive software. Monumental accomplishments have been driven by a simple hatred for big companies. Kudos to them. Because of those efforts, one day things will be different -- and Microsoft knows it.
MS gives away IE to shut down Netscape. That wasn't the crime that I thought was terrible - it was going to their OEM partners and threatening them with extra high cost of Windows if they put on Netscape.
It's refreshing to see another person not consider the Netscape fiasco a 'crime'. I was working for an ISP when IE came about. At the time, Netscape charged us $20-40 per copy that we shipped to our customers. You can imagine how quickly that adds up. When IE became an alternative, Netscape refused to negociate and lost out big-time. Meanwhile, MS would do advertising partnerships and offer a wide range of support services for free. A very tempting offer when your shop isn't making much money to begin with.
Anyway, the people at Netscape didn't move quickly to improve their browsers and, for quite some time, IE was way better concerning stability in Windows. It's not like the 2 clicks and 10 minute download destroyed them.
The anti-MS folks who always find fault in MS never really seemed to complain about Trumpet Winsock being put through the ringer by NT and 95 including their own network stacks. How about notepad.exe and calc.exe? Before that time, you could download and register shareware editors or look for freebies. I've never heard somone argue that Windows was destroying software companies by including it's own program to display image files.
But anything to do with [potentially] commerical media, such as web pages and audio/video content, grabs everyones attention and ends up with MS back in court acting confused and innocent.
I know, totally off topic. Back on topic, I promise:
I think the reason for the search results problem is likely a goof-up. Likely a low-level employee who had no idea what XFree86 is, didn't care, didn't double-check, etc before adding it to the DB. It seems reasonable that many MS employees would not be familar with Unix at all.
The judge said "How do I know you're not just making that up?" and decided for the embezzler.
I'm not buying it. It would have been very little trouble to get a professor from a local community college or university to come in as an "expert" to testify. This is typical with many cases where it expected that the judge will not be able to fully understand the technology dealt with in the case.
Perhaps the lawyer was just inexperienced or uncaring.
Blasting invaders from space is one thing; a game that lets you steal a car and run over the owner or murder prostitutes is over the line. It increases the allure of immoral behavior and blurs the line between right and wrong to an unacceptable degree in a society that is already plagued with people who cannot accept responsibility for themselves.
So blame it on video games? No. I blame the parents for not teaching their kids any values and allowing them to sit in front of a console for 4-6 hours a day playing violent video games while eating sweets.
As for the genre's intended audience (adults), I found the series very enjoyable and like the cheesey violence. Though the graphics are nice, I still do not consider it any closer to reality than Contra, Raiden or any other shooter.
Back to your views.. Are people really that stupid? They buy a video game, then lost track of reality because they saw the pixels dance the devil's dance? Hmmm.
It's an unusual thing to bring up, but yes, I had one of these too.
It lasted about 12 years in it's little soiless bowl of glass marbles. I never watered it or even cleaned it's jar.
Okay, I am not one to usually reply to my own comment, but I went searching for small-scale projects and found a design involving using parts from a $10-40 TOMYTEC mini-RC car (or clone) and a $13 electric airplane.
It involves a decent amount of hardware hacking, but looks like a fun design for not much money. Mind you, you can probably buy a pre-built toy with similar capabilities for about the same money.
The project is located here.
I would like to see someone post some mini-RC howto sites. Some instructions on how to build a little chopper or plane would be some nice reading.
The Same happends here, if symantec is distributing some program saying that it's an antivirus, and it's actually a virus, you can sue symantec, but if some scriptkiddie sends you an email saying "install this", and you do, then you are "Too stupid to own a Computer (TM)"
I would rather say the ignorant user's OS and mail application are to blame. It's not the ignorant user's fault that they have been bombarded with marketing for the past 6 years about how simple the Internet and computers are to use. On top of that, this specific case deals with a WebTV user. The intended audience for WebTV is directed more towards who are at the extreme edges of computer ignorance. It's intended to be a device for the non-savy, elderly, and those who can't afford a complete computer system.
The fact that they can run scripts or executables from an email attachment demonstrates that the WebTV design is very poor for it's intended audience. If I was in charge of QA for WebTV, I would have restricted attachments to audio, image, text, and video files.
The guy who did this is in all kinds of hot water. Rightfully so. Just because WebTV was poorly designed, that does not excuse his actions. Though, I do think you should set aside the technical zealotry. You can't expect users to take computing as seriously as a geek in the industry.
As far as people following along with a radio DJ who pretends to be teaching users something on their computer, then munges their hard drive -- That's just wrong. Since he was broadcasting on the radio, there could have been 8 year olds who run over to their Dad's home-office computer and type what the guy says and destroys a report he is support to turn into his boss the next day. Uncool.
That's a pretty slapstick response. You have not even said 'hello' to watching HD-DVDs in Linux.
So what was stopping the world from watching DVDs in Linux? I thought it had more to do with nobody obtaining a license, then writing the application, and selling it as shareware/retailware.
If that's the case, then you have nobody to blame but yourself. Either fork over a few dollars or write it yourself.
I do agree that the next standard should be open and free. But, That's not how things work. Big industry comes up with specifications for big industry products. It's to be expected that they would be self-serving. It feels a lot like having to pay sales taxes on grocery items.
Nice rant, but it's your own fault for attempting to use an Apple as a gaming platform.
I've been using one of these chairs for about 5 years. I will mourn the day it fails me.
I figure that's a long ways off, since the one I am sitting in is 5 years old and the factory mesh ass hammock is still just as tight and sturdy as it was new.
Yeah, something like this happens a couple of times they release a new chip. What good does the cheaper super computer do if the consumer level goods are priced so high?
For the price of a new G5, I could get a good quad cpu P4 up and running.
The moderators today are more looney than usual. I get modded troll for mentioning the headline as a troll? Perhaps it was the executive toy reference? In that case, I take it back. From now on, I will consider Apples to be teenage girl's computers. That should be a happy middle-ground for everyone.
Watch a proficient Mac user work. You'll notice that the left hand is on the keyboard at all times, copying, pasting, opening, closing, undoing, answering dialogue boxes, AND CTRL-CLICKING to get contextual menus. It's a different way of working; not necessarily better or worse. For me, it feels right.
No, no, no. The left hand is: Holding the phone while they sit on hold waiting for Technical Support.. Since their system gets a girly-girl, frowny face error when opening their new copy of Photoshop.
If you want to talk about power, there are many benchmarks showing the G5 being beaten by various PC offerings, so shut it up.
Agreed. I was thinking of all the poor chaps who will get modded as troll or flamebaiter because Pudgey had to go and troll the headline. Kinda funny.
On the same note as you were addressing, if the G5 was such a performance giant, then why aren't we seeing these things in datacenters? If Apple is the consistant leader in performance and reliability, why don't we see more Apples out there?
Personally, I see them more as executive toys than real computers.
Remember kids, there is no money in the first five frets! :)
:D
What about the Indigo Girls?
Jailarity insues.
;)
Take your farkisms back to Fark with the other AOL noobs. It's encouraged to RTFA, it's not a trap.