Sure we question and analyze reality, we just believe in a different reality to you.
Your idea of reality is one that someone else has defined for you and demands that you accept at face value. Thats harldly a reality.
How else can you take the term 'raised from the dead'? He died and then he lived. He was dead and then he was raised back into life. He was pronounced dead (after slipping into a comma) but sat straight up and asked to go home 20 minutes later.
I'm not a doctor, but I've heard of many numerous incidents of people being declared dead and then coming back.
And as for 74 days without food and water being hardly abnormal? It's widely recognised that any more than about a week without water or seven weeks without food (dependent on fat stores) will cause death. This guy went 10 and a half weeks without both (and was daily beaten too).
Apparently what I said about historical examples went over your head. I don't quite know where your source for that "widely recognised" "fact" comes from.
Unfortunately some people choose to harden their hearts despite occurances that clearly defy long helf scientific and natural laws to prevent uncomfortableness.
I use my head and not my heart. None of your examples debunk science. Anything that cannot be explained with current knowledge doesn't mean its a religious occurance.
But at least with Christianity we do not try to build up a portfolio of proofs but instead rely more on faith
And this is a good thing how? Christians teach people to conform to a body of preconceived notions instead of questioning and analyzing reality.
I can tell you a story of a friend who was raised from the dead, of a Chinese preacher who lived for 74 days in prison without food or water, of people with incurable diseases being healed but this will not change a thing. Science cannot explain these things yet your head will not let your heart entertain the idea that there may be a God.
I don't exactly know what you mean by "raised from the dead", but such feats such as the Chinese preacher you mention are hardly abnormal. There are many instances of stuff like this happening.
As for things that science cannot explain, that doesn't automatically mean that the reason must somehow be supernatural. It means we have not yet managed to fully understand the logical mechanisms behind it. Unfourtunately, some people choose to explain away seemingly mysterious occurances on supernatural explanations to comfort themselves.
If there is only a 75% guarantee that you car's engine will not drop out of the chassis, or only a 75% chance that your airplane flight will make it safely, would that be acceptable? I don't think so.
When it comes to messing with people's lives like this, I think we deserve MUCH better. Standardized test scores just give colleges an excuse to be lazy in admitting students instead of allowing students to build up a portfolio of successes in high school and personal life (relevant to academia) to compete with others against on.
Tests are bogus and should be scrapped. Its a a bogus industry designed to line the pockets of so-called student performance 'experts' who are only interested in locking more students and institutions into their pattern of synthetic tests to sort people.
My intended point was that there are plenty of people that score high on standardized tests and are yet poor academic performers. If the test did what it purported to do, this would not happen.
Academic environments involve study of information, recall of information, and application and analysis of information. Standardized tests do not measure the first two (You have had 12 years to learn how to read, write, and do quantitative analysis, I hardly think the SAT is a "final exam" in that regard). As for the third, I agree to a point that it does this, but its still an artificial way of measuring it. Its hardly presented in the same context as what you get in college.
Tests can easily be set up to produce a certian set of results. This is how the SAT, etc. works.
If they took the same questions, but doubled the number of questions you had to answer in the same ammount of time, do you think it would be a great test? Kids who normally get 1400's would be getting below 1000.
Oh but its just a bunch of questions. You must be stupid!
The problem with tests like the SAT/ACT is that they do not represent any sort of work that one sees in an academic environment or in real life, for that matter. ADD kids have problems with these tests because such tests are hardly captivating and their mind tends to wander. Yet, you can stick the same kind of kids into good college programs and they somehow manage to become talented people! How is that?
Standardized tests do not represent anything of the real world. I can think of very few jobs that resemble standardized test taking.
One big example that no one ever talks about: Bill Bradley (You might remember him, a former Dem. canddiate for President) did poorly on the SAT, yet he managed to become selected as a Rhodes Scholar and he graduated Magna Cum Laude.
These are the people who have the most trouble with these tests, yet they are often some of the brightest (but by no means exclusively).
Standardized tests are nothing but a scam designed to make money for an industry. If the tests somehow gauge your intelligence or reasoning ability, why can some people spend thousands to obtain the top scores? Shouldn't someone who normally wouldn't get a high score who spends thousands on test prep be unable to get any higher score? That in itself invalidates any credibility lent to these tests.
Just as you can't judge a book by its covers, you certianly cannot judge a person based on how well they performed on a manufactured test.
All of these are used to sort people, suposedly people with higher scores on these are somehow smarter, despite obvious instances of people who do not perform according to their 'score'.
The American Revolution was full of dissent. Lots of it was done anonymously (pamphlets, newspapers, etc) because they knew of the reprisals that could occur if the wrong people (who could do much more to them than the people speaking out could do back) heard.
Don't believe me? I will give some real examples.
1. My school district tried to discipline me for publishing a website very critical of them. (Nothing ever ended up happening because the people in the right part of the chain of command had some sense)
2. Many countries, (China for instance), publishing information critical of the government can land you in jail (or with tanks rolling over you if you think a mass protest will somehow help)
3. Extremists hate people who talk bad about them. They would love to egg your house, threaten you day and night, and send you explosive packages in the mail.
I, for one, refuse to let my personal information become public.
What if I were the operator of a website that contained opinions that were very contraversial? One example I can think of is the abortion debate. There are extremists on both sides who will spend every waking moment trying to ruin the lives of people on the other side of the debate.
Do I want to invite people to my house to vanalize my property or burglarize me if I can help it? Certianly not.
I have always used fake information, except for my phone and email contact (I figure that its pretty immune to what I'm worried about, I can filter spam, etc) which I leave in case my registrar accidentialy forgets who my domain belongs to.
How do they know I do not live at this address? Are they going to send someone out? What if its just a drop box for mail?
Of course, I guess This particular Alpha chip was targeted towards high end servers and workstations too?
It may not have been targeted towards the Grandma at home like the Mac is (just an example), but PC is a very broad definition and Apple is definitely in the wrong here.
Taking someone's music without paying for it is totally different from taking something that is in phyisical form without paying for it.
One involves the idea that you have a right to what you physically create, and one involves a right to control what ideas and collections of information you create.
To try to blur the lines between the two is an absurd abomination.
Differnt case, different circumstances, different laws involved.
Sorry, but you have totally no clue what you're talking about.
You're either a troll or a seriously misinformed and egotistical jerk.
The RIAA wouldn't have sued anyone if they didn't have evidence, otherwise a good lawyer would have stepped in a long time ago and nailed the RIAA for filing frivolus lawsuits.
You're apparently not smart enough to understand the point I was trying to make.
Either that, or you just want to nitpick to stroke your own ego because you think you're better than everyone else.
Have you ever went to court to defend yourself against a slew of profesisonal lawyers, especially when the law and evidence is on their side? Thought not.
Most of the people being sued cannot afford the lawyer and time required to defend these lawsuits, so it is economically cheaper to settle than to take it to court.
Plus, if you actually are guilty of swapping files illegally, it makes it that much harder to win in court.
And the Justice Department can finally get quick access to pr0n so they can research it to help ban it
This isn't a joke. Its true.
I used to have a small webserver hosted off of my cable modem. I had a collection of "funny pictures". They were not ponrographic in nature, but there were a few words in some of the filenames that could be construted as porn in a different context.
What do I see one day? A hit from the DOJ. They were looking for porno (a specific set of keywords, I dont remember, but it was a Google Search referer).
I can formulate a logical argument just fine, but I no longer feel the need as you are completely stuck in your midset,
You are stuck in your mindset too. That does not make either one of us right just because the other side does not agree.
I do not take my own views to be infalliable. However I have studied the matter long enough to give myself a good grasp of both sides of the argument and why I feel that I am right.
I am sorry, but I am speaking what I have thought for a long time
So have I.
Alas, you hold the minorit view
Ah, the good ol Ad Populum fallacy.
I can't be bothered coming up with more of an argument when you won't even let what I said sink in anyhow
So its my fault becuase I refuse to agree with you? I took your points into consideration and said why I do not agree with them. That is what a debate is all about.
Anyway, I will not ask you to continue this any longer. We presented our opinions and obviously we are not going to come to any agreement.
I like how gosand gets all angry and uppity with people who disagree with him. Of course, his replies often have very litle fact but plenty of emotion.
We had these people in my high school. They were usually the ones who were insecure about their own intellect. They can't handle not having the world revolve around them.
P.S. Good job posting AC. At least this little bit of your absurdity wont be recorded in your name.
No I'm not, you are trying to insult my intelligence because you do not agree with my ideologoy.
Yes they are.
Okay. Now I know who I'm debating with. Someone who does not believe in any sort of sense of a market with consumer choice and free market driven economy.
You're right they are available. You are putting more faith into users than you should be - do you even work in IT, do you even really know what you are talking about, is your head stuck that far into the sand?
Why yes I do. Does it shock you to believe people want to watch QuickTime movie trailers or listen to RealAudio streams onlne?
Does it shock you to know that WinAmp is more popular than WMP for playing MP3's? Who is the stupid user now?
Now with the insults.. You obviously cannot forumlate a logical argument to counter my points, so you choose this route of attack. Sad.
Think about it.
No, you tell me. Its not my job to formulate your arguments for you.
No, but you don't own %95 of the market. If you did - yes.
You just said the baisis of Mac OS and Linux being "okay" were that they ship multiple apps (Mac OS only ships their own). Now you just said its their market share. Which one is it?
Solitare... Please. That game sucks anyhow.
Excuse me? How is this invalid? How is this any different than your argument about Windows bundling Media Player being anti-competitive?
WTF? Are you kidding, what users? You, me? Yes, we probably would and do. Problem is that we make up a small majority of users. My mom doesn't know how to install software, and yours probably doesn't either. That goes for 80-90% or users. By MS tying in software, they *know* people are not going to install alternatives.
Hmm.. So the users are too stupid to install anything else? Tell that to all the boxes I see with Real Player and Quicktime because Windows Media Player is not satisfactory for them.
Developers also "know" that WMP is likely to be installed on all these desktops so they build for it. That also opens up another can of worms. And by having the technologies on the desktop it open other markets for them.
The technologies are avaliable. They are installed all the time by users who need them. Its not Microsoft's job to help Apple by installing Quicktime for you.
The courts have ruled it to be anti-competitive
I asked for reasons, not for you to pass the buck.
The courts have said all sorts of things, including that blacks are not people. That does not make them right in every instance.
Morally, and legally
Morally? How so?
You just enforced my point friend. Linux ships MULTIPLE apps, OSX ships MULTIPLE apps
OSX ships their own apps. Shall we bring Apple to court?
What if I make a Linux distribution and only include XMMS and not Real Player? Do I need to go to court?
You can't excuse a convicted monopolist. I don't care how much you beleive they should be allowed to do this, maybe they should, but they are using their monopoly position to further proceed into other markets - that is illegal, and that is my point.
Just because they are a monopolist does not mean they cannot be allowed to ship their own apps with their own product.
What about my Solitare argument? Does Microsoft need to unbundle Solitare because of all the Shareware solitare apps that could be making inways into the market if Microsoft did not "abuse" their monopoloy power by bundling MS Solitare?
The other companies *did* have a foothold in the market, or maybe you are too young and brainwashed to remember the glory days.
Its not Microsoft's job to ensure that they do either. Or maybe you were brainwashed in your Economics class to think so.
Problem is that once MS started bundling IE, WMP, etc. into the OS, it gave users little reason to go out and find another. They have done it with IE and were convicted of it in the States, albeit weakly. Once you have a single defacto player/browser/pick your software on the desktop, which a monoploy has created and abused, the end user, ie: mom and pop, have no need to go out and get another, forcing the rivals out of business or out of money. Don't forget, Microsoft no longer cares about IE. The only reason they care about WMP is that they are now trying to leverage the dominance into other markets such as digital distribution of movies and whatnot. That sir, is anti-competitive behaviour. I'm just glad the EU has the balls to do something about it.
There is nothing wrong with bundling media players and browsers with Windows. If there are better alternatives, users will seek them out.
How this is anti-competitive, I do not know. Users have choices still. How this is abuse, I do not see.
Does Microsoft need to unbundle Wordpad, Calculator, Solitare (what about all the Shareware versions of Solitare that cannot get a foothold into the market because of Microsoft?), etc to be legal in your eyes?
What you are asking to do is to force Microsoft to ship a product that would be inferior (funcionality wise) to operating systems such as Linux (most distributions include all sorts of apps), Mac OS, and others that bundle media players and other applications.
They already have a choice - they can download any other player they choose and let it take over as the default player.
Its not MS' job to help everyone else get a foothold into the market. Its only MS' job to ensure they play fair, and I do not think bundling their own media player as an option for users to decide to use or not is somehow anti-compeitive.
Slashdot Mirror
Sure we question and analyze reality, we just believe in a different reality to you.
Your idea of reality is one that someone else has defined for you and demands that you accept at face value. Thats harldly a reality.
How else can you take the term 'raised from the dead'? He died and then he lived. He was dead and then he was raised back into life. He was pronounced dead (after slipping into a comma) but sat straight up and asked to go home 20 minutes later.
I'm not a doctor, but I've heard of many numerous incidents of people being declared dead and then coming back.
And as for 74 days without food and water being hardly abnormal? It's widely recognised that any more than about a week without water or seven weeks without food (dependent on fat stores) will cause death. This guy went 10 and a half weeks without both (and was daily beaten too).
Apparently what I said about historical examples went over your head. I don't quite know where your source for that "widely recognised" "fact" comes from.
Unfortunately some people choose to harden their hearts despite occurances that clearly defy long helf scientific and natural laws to prevent uncomfortableness.
I use my head and not my heart. None of your examples debunk science. Anything that cannot be explained with current knowledge doesn't mean its a religious occurance.
But at least with Christianity we do not try to build up a portfolio of proofs but instead rely more on faith
And this is a good thing how? Christians teach people to conform to a body of preconceived notions instead of questioning and analyzing reality.
I can tell you a story of a friend who was raised from the dead, of a Chinese preacher who lived for 74 days in prison without food or water, of people with incurable diseases being healed but this will not change a thing. Science cannot explain these things yet your head will not let your heart entertain the idea that there may be a God.
I don't exactly know what you mean by "raised from the dead", but such feats such as the Chinese preacher you mention are hardly abnormal. There are many instances of stuff like this happening.
As for things that science cannot explain, that doesn't automatically mean that the reason must somehow be supernatural. It means we have not yet managed to fully understand the logical mechanisms behind it. Unfourtunately, some people choose to explain away seemingly mysterious occurances on supernatural explanations to comfort themselves.
If there is only a 75% guarantee that you car's engine will not drop out of the chassis, or only a 75% chance that your airplane flight will make it safely, would that be acceptable? I don't think so.
When it comes to messing with people's lives like this, I think we deserve MUCH better. Standardized test scores just give colleges an excuse to be lazy in admitting students instead of allowing students to build up a portfolio of successes in high school and personal life (relevant to academia) to compete with others against on.
Tests are bogus and should be scrapped. Its a a bogus industry designed to line the pockets of so-called student performance 'experts' who are only interested in locking more students and institutions into their pattern of synthetic tests to sort people.
No.
My intended point was that there are plenty of people that score high on standardized tests and are yet poor academic performers. If the test did what it purported to do, this would not happen.
Academic environments involve study of information, recall of information, and application and analysis of information. Standardized tests do not measure the first two (You have had 12 years to learn how to read, write, and do quantitative analysis, I hardly think the SAT is a "final exam" in that regard). As for the third, I agree to a point that it does this, but its still an artificial way of measuring it. Its hardly presented in the same context as what you get in college.
Tests can easily be set up to produce a certian set of results. This is how the SAT, etc. works.
If they took the same questions, but doubled the number of questions you had to answer in the same ammount of time, do you think it would be a great test? Kids who normally get 1400's would be getting below 1000.
Oh but its just a bunch of questions. You must be stupid!
The problem with tests like the SAT/ACT is that they do not represent any sort of work that one sees in an academic environment or in real life, for that matter. ADD kids have problems with these tests because such tests are hardly captivating and their mind tends to wander. Yet, you can stick the same kind of kids into good college programs and they somehow manage to become talented people! How is that?
Standardized tests do not represent anything of the real world. I can think of very few jobs that resemble standardized test taking.
One big example that no one ever talks about: Bill Bradley (You might remember him, a former Dem. canddiate for President) did poorly on the SAT, yet he managed to become selected as a Rhodes Scholar and he graduated Magna Cum Laude.
These are the people who have the most trouble with these tests, yet they are often some of the brightest (but by no means exclusively).
Standardized tests are nothing but a scam designed to make money for an industry. If the tests somehow gauge your intelligence or reasoning ability, why can some people spend thousands to obtain the top scores? Shouldn't someone who normally wouldn't get a high score who spends thousands on test prep be unable to get any higher score? That in itself invalidates any credibility lent to these tests.
Just as you can't judge a book by its covers, you certianly cannot judge a person based on how well they performed on a manufactured test.
Scams in the forms of SAT/ACT tests and IQ tests.
All of these are used to sort people, suposedly people with higher scores on these are somehow smarter, despite obvious instances of people who do not perform according to their 'score'.
The American Revolution was full of dissent. Lots of it was done anonymously (pamphlets, newspapers, etc) because they knew of the reprisals that could occur if the wrong people (who could do much more to them than the people speaking out could do back) heard.
Don't believe me? I will give some real examples.
1. My school district tried to discipline me for publishing a website very critical of them. (Nothing ever ended up happening because the people in the right part of the chain of command had some sense)
2. Many countries, (China for instance), publishing information critical of the government can land you in jail (or with tanks rolling over you if you think a mass protest will somehow help)
3. Extremists hate people who talk bad about them. They would love to egg your house, threaten you day and night, and send you explosive packages in the mail.
I, for one, refuse to let my personal information become public.
What if I were the operator of a website that contained opinions that were very contraversial? One example I can think of is the abortion debate. There are extremists on both sides who will spend every waking moment trying to ruin the lives of people on the other side of the debate.
Do I want to invite people to my house to vanalize my property or burglarize me if I can help it? Certianly not.
I have always used fake information, except for my phone and email contact (I figure that its pretty immune to what I'm worried about, I can filter spam, etc) which I leave in case my registrar accidentialy forgets who my domain belongs to.
How do they know I do not live at this address? Are they going to send someone out? What if its just a drop box for mail?
I dont recall a Mac OS "PC" either.
Of course, I guess This particular Alpha chip was targeted towards high end servers and workstations too?
It may not have been targeted towards the Grandma at home like the Mac is (just an example), but PC is a very broad definition and Apple is definitely in the wrong here.
Part of the problem is the redundant math courses.
I get sick of learning the same thing three times in several different math classes because the masses cannot get a grasp on it the first time.
(This is speaking from the public high school perspective)
You again highlight the absurdity of your argument.
Cable TV service is something that has to be hooked up to your house from the physical property of your cable TV company.
Stealing a CD is theft.
Downloading the audio bits off of Kazaa is not theft. It is copyright infringement.
Theft != Copyright Infringment.
You cannot steal something that is intangible.
Taking someone's music without paying for it is totally different from taking something that is in phyisical form without paying for it.
One involves the idea that you have a right to what you physically create, and one involves a right to control what ideas and collections of information you create.
To try to blur the lines between the two is an absurd abomination.
Differnt case, different circumstances, different laws involved.
Sorry, but you have totally no clue what you're talking about.
You're either a troll or a seriously misinformed and egotistical jerk.
The RIAA wouldn't have sued anyone if they didn't have evidence, otherwise a good lawyer would have stepped in a long time ago and nailed the RIAA for filing frivolus lawsuits.
You're apparently not smart enough to understand the point I was trying to make.
Either that, or you just want to nitpick to stroke your own ego because you think you're better than everyone else.
Have you ever went to court to defend yourself against a slew of profesisonal lawyers, especially when the law and evidence is on their side? Thought not.
Most of the people being sued cannot afford the lawyer and time required to defend these lawsuits, so it is economically cheaper to settle than to take it to court.
Plus, if you actually are guilty of swapping files illegally, it makes it that much harder to win in court.
And the Justice Department can finally get quick access to pr0n so they can research it to help ban it
This isn't a joke. Its true.
I used to have a small webserver hosted off of my cable modem. I had a collection of "funny pictures". They were not ponrographic in nature, but there were a few words in some of the filenames that could be construted as porn in a different context.
What do I see one day? A hit from the DOJ. They were looking for porno (a specific set of keywords, I dont remember, but it was a Google Search referer).
I can formulate a logical argument just fine, but I no longer feel the need as you are completely stuck in your midset,
You are stuck in your mindset too. That does not make either one of us right just because the other side does not agree.
I do not take my own views to be infalliable. However I have studied the matter long enough to give myself a good grasp of both sides of the argument and why I feel that I am right.
I am sorry, but I am speaking what I have thought for a long time
So have I.
Alas, you hold the minorit view
Ah, the good ol Ad Populum fallacy.
I can't be bothered coming up with more of an argument when you won't even let what I said sink in anyhow
So its my fault becuase I refuse to agree with you? I took your points into consideration and said why I do not agree with them. That is what a debate is all about.
Anyway, I will not ask you to continue this any longer. We presented our opinions and obviously we are not going to come to any agreement.
Have a good day.
LOL. Anyone who doesnt agree with you is a twit?
I like how gosand gets all angry and uppity with people who disagree with him. Of course, his replies often have very litle fact but plenty of emotion.
We had these people in my high school. They were usually the ones who were insecure about their own intellect. They can't handle not having the world revolve around them.
P.S. Good job posting AC. At least this little bit of your absurdity wont be recorded in your name.
you are using nothing but circular logic
No I'm not, you are trying to insult my intelligence because you do not agree with my ideologoy.
Yes they are.
Okay. Now I know who I'm debating with. Someone who does not believe in any sort of sense of a market with consumer choice and free market driven economy.
You're right they are available. You are putting more faith into users than you should be - do you even work in IT, do you even really know what you are talking about, is your head stuck that far into the sand?
Why yes I do. Does it shock you to believe people want to watch QuickTime movie trailers or listen to RealAudio streams onlne?
Does it shock you to know that WinAmp is more popular than WMP for playing MP3's? Who is the stupid user now?
Now with the insults.. You obviously cannot forumlate a logical argument to counter my points, so you choose this route of attack. Sad.
Think about it.
No, you tell me. Its not my job to formulate your arguments for you.
No, but you don't own %95 of the market. If you did - yes.
You just said the baisis of Mac OS and Linux being "okay" were that they ship multiple apps (Mac OS only ships their own). Now you just said its their market share. Which one is it?
Solitare... Please. That game sucks anyhow.
Excuse me? How is this invalid? How is this any different than your argument about Windows bundling Media Player being anti-competitive?
Like I said... I am done
So you concede the argument.
WTF? Are you kidding, what users? You, me? Yes, we probably would and do. Problem is that we make up a small majority of users. My mom doesn't know how to install software, and yours probably doesn't either. That goes for 80-90% or users. By MS tying in software, they *know* people are not going to install alternatives.
Hmm.. So the users are too stupid to install anything else? Tell that to all the boxes I see with Real Player and Quicktime because Windows Media Player is not satisfactory for them.
Developers also "know" that WMP is likely to be installed on all these desktops so they build for it. That also opens up another can of worms. And by having the technologies on the desktop it open other markets for them.
The technologies are avaliable. They are installed all the time by users who need them. Its not Microsoft's job to help Apple by installing Quicktime for you.
The courts have ruled it to be anti-competitive
I asked for reasons, not for you to pass the buck.
The courts have said all sorts of things, including that blacks are not people. That does not make them right in every instance.
Morally, and legally
Morally? How so?
You just enforced my point friend. Linux ships MULTIPLE apps, OSX ships MULTIPLE apps
OSX ships their own apps. Shall we bring Apple to court?
What if I make a Linux distribution and only include XMMS and not Real Player? Do I need to go to court?
You can't excuse a convicted monopolist. I don't care how much you beleive they should be allowed to do this, maybe they should, but they are using their monopoly position to further proceed into other markets - that is illegal, and that is my point.
Just because they are a monopolist does not mean they cannot be allowed to ship their own apps with their own product.
What about my Solitare argument? Does Microsoft need to unbundle Solitare because of all the Shareware solitare apps that could be making inways into the market if Microsoft did not "abuse" their monopoloy power by bundling MS Solitare?
The other companies *did* have a foothold in the market, or maybe you are too young and brainwashed to remember the glory days.
Its not Microsoft's job to ensure that they do either. Or maybe you were brainwashed in your Economics class to think so.
Problem is that once MS started bundling IE, WMP, etc. into the OS, it gave users little reason to go out and find another. They have done it with IE and were convicted of it in the States, albeit weakly. Once you have a single defacto player/browser/pick your software on the desktop, which a monoploy has created and abused, the end user, ie: mom and pop, have no need to go out and get another, forcing the rivals out of business or out of money. Don't forget, Microsoft no longer cares about IE. The only reason they care about WMP is that they are now trying to leverage the dominance into other markets such as digital distribution of movies and whatnot. That sir, is anti-competitive behaviour. I'm just glad the EU has the balls to do something about it.
There is nothing wrong with bundling media players and browsers with Windows. If there are better alternatives, users will seek them out.
How this is anti-competitive, I do not know. Users have choices still. How this is abuse, I do not see.
Does Microsoft need to unbundle Wordpad, Calculator, Solitare (what about all the Shareware versions of Solitare that cannot get a foothold into the market because of Microsoft?), etc to be legal in your eyes?
What you are asking to do is to force Microsoft to ship a product that would be inferior (funcionality wise) to operating systems such as Linux (most distributions include all sorts of apps), Mac OS, and others that bundle media players and other applications.
They already have a choice - they can download any other player they choose and let it take over as the default player.
Its not MS' job to help everyone else get a foothold into the market. Its only MS' job to ensure they play fair, and I do not think bundling their own media player as an option for users to decide to use or not is somehow anti-compeitive.