Don't forget that they are released under GPL so that the source also has to be available to 2nd generation worms that are built apon the original code.
You say that the regulations haven't stopped them from upgrading their network and training technicians in your area, then you go on to say how frustrated you are that you can't get DSL installed. You also mention that their billing system is a mess, more infrastructure problems. It sounds like Qwest is definately not investing enough in their infrastructure. It took over 5 months of harrassing Ameritech for me to get my DSL installed, and without that harrassment I doubt it ever would have happened. I feel your pain.
Our rights as consumers are limited in that if one company isn't providing a service well enough, we are free to switch to another provider. However in this instance, and in many other instances, there's no place else to go. Some situations require government intervention, and most likely DSL is going to end up having to be something that is regulated.
The phone network is going to remain a monopoly because there's no good way to split it up. Therefore it's going to have to be regulated to some extent. The regulators and legislators just have to make sure they don't make matters worse by trying to force competition into the market where it doesn't make sense. DSL providers like COVAD don't really have a chance of competing on equal ground with the Phone company's DSL offering, because they bosth rely on the Phone company providing and installing the line. Competition is going to come from other sources, such as cable, wireless, and satalite.
Maybe use it under some incarnation of the GPL?
Huh? Unless you have some actual way GPL might have some relation to DSL, quit throwing out buzzwords out of context.
TW has offered access for a long time, and for them to not upgrade the equipment would hurt them as well as they have an existing buissness in the market, unlike ameritech at the time of the covad incedent.
Ameritech already had an existing business as well. They've been selling bandwidth in many forms for many years. You can also say that them not expanding their network has hurt them. Expanding telephone and cable networks requires a incredible investment on the part of the telephone and cable companies. They are taking serious risks that there won't be enough demand at a high enough price for them to be able to profit from that investment. Interference, in the form of government regulations complicates this and makes the companies much less willing to invest in quickly expanding their networks. Especially when they have to share the networks with other providers at what is likely a government controlled price. If the government keeps out of it, they can invest in expanding the network, and price the services so that they're profitable, yet competitive with other technologies (DSL, cable, Satalite). When politicians get involved, there's a lot more risk of them mandating an unreasonable price, adding a tax to the service, or adding tons of expensive oversite and regulations they need to conform to. That doesn't exactly encourage investment. If you think I'm being unreasonable, look at California's power industry.
Those old IBM keyboards are awsome. They stand up to a lot of wear and tear. If the quality of the keyboards on the terminals meet these standards, then they may last 10 years. Monitor's are a different story. I seriously doubt you used your 17" monitor 5 days a week for most of the day. If you did, it's very likely out of focus and the phosphor is getting burned out. I have a six year old 17" monitor that I still use. I have some monitor's at work that are over 5 years old that still don't look to bad, but they are the exception, not the rule. Well before you reach 10 years, the cost of repairs and upkeep on these terminals will exceed their value. Sure some of them will still work. I've got a VT100 terminal that's well over 10 years old that still works fine. The display is a little burned in, but I work fine for what I use it for. It's also the one of two working ones out of about a dozen that were purchased at the time. It will likely see limited use for years to come.
The phone company monopply exhists because we don't want our countryside clutteded up with phone poles and wires. If you know of a good way of getting around this monopoly on phone lines, please share it with us. The problem with the so called deregulation that was done with the phone company is that it doesn't address the problem on the monopoly the phone company has on the lines. There's no realy way a bunch of government regulations can ensure that the phone company provides proper access to their network for other companies. The level of level of oversight needed would require a network of observers to go out on service calls with technicians, verity that lines were being allocated fairly, and audit the phone company in a variety of ways. That would cost a fortune, and eliminate the benefits that could be gained through competition. Instead we have insufficient oversite, unfair competition, and a bunch of regulations that increase the costs of all the companies in the telophony business. I agree that phone companies need to be regulated to make sure they provide the required services at a reasonable cost. However, the regulations requiring these monopolies to open their markets don't seem to be working. They aren't provideing real benefits to consumers. If you want real competition in the market, you need to split the phone companies into a part that has a monopoly on the network itself, and a part that competes on even grounds with others to provide services to consumers. Forcing this restructuring on the phone company would be very expensive, and in the end may not be cost effective either.
There's no real way to get rid of the phone network monopoly, but other technologies such as cable and wireless are beginning to provide competition to it. The article suggests that the laws that "deregulated" the phone companies were misguided and ineffectual. The author believes, and there is some evidence to suport if from other countries, that the phone companies would have upgraded their networks and more consumers would have access to DSL if the government would have just left them alone on this, and let competition come from other sources.
It's not a view that government shouldn't interfere with monopolies. It's a view that the government often interferes when they don't need to, or in ways that don't help. The regulations the government placed on the phone company in the guise of deregulation don't seem to have resulted in lower proces, and because they seem to be inadvertantly limiting the availability of DSL, they are harming DSL's ability to compete with cable modems, and harming consumers.
I've worked as a contractor for the government before. There were a considerable number of civil servants who's job it was to to oversee us and to make sure we were doing our jobs well. They were nice people, who tried to do their jobs well, but they rarely had much of an idea what was going on. They weren't very technical people. If you require highly technical people, then someone will sue because they felt they were competent enough, and that they were being discriminated against. Their jobs ended up being to try and guess if they could believe us when we told them we were doing a good job. They would investigate complaints, but it's it's easy to provide doubt that you did something wrong, even if you did. No one likes someone going around pointing fingers, and there people have to work with you wether they like it or not.
In the end you have ineffectual oversight, that costs a lot of money. The costs of that oversight are passed on to consumers either through a direct tax on the service, or some other tax. In the end consumers get less for more.
Needless to say I got out of government contracting. The politics were frustrating, and there was just too little of an incentive to do a good job. There were some people who continued to do exelent work in that environment, but it was burning me out, so I left.
The unionized telco workers with mgmt blessing delay DSL orders for CLECs into oblivion - hell, even if you get DSL FORM the telco it can take weeks and tons of hassles - it shouldn't be this complex.
In my experience, the workers weren't delaying the process. The phone company just didn't hire and train enough of them in areas where they weren't offering DSL yet, but competing CLECs were. Getting telephone service working for people is much more important than installing DSL, so those calls got put off over and over again. Howevr, they are hiring and training more technicians, in areas where they are beginning to provide DSL.
Thie ONLY saving grace is cross technology competition. The only thing keeping cable modem prices down is DSL - If DLS disappears, all you cable modem user can rest assured your rates will go up FASTER than your normal cable bill - count on it. But with DSL out there, its a threat.
I'm sure there's some truth to this, but there's a lot of places you just can't get DSL. It's limited by line quality and the distance to the CO. So there really isn't any competition to cable modems in a large percentage of their market. The price is most likely limited to what they think customers are willing to pay, not the price of the competition. Cable modems just became available in my area, and I'm signing up for the most basic cable (mainly broadcast stations) and internet access. The total monthly price is about the same as what I'm currently paying for my 144k IDSL line, which is my only other choice. The cable company also lets me self install the software, and are even selling me good quality cable TV cable at $0.10 a foot, so I can run outlets where I need them. Did I mention that they have an on time gaurentee for their service calls. They miss a serivce call, they give you a credit on your bill. I think the amount was about $20. I'd rather they pay me cash if they make me wait around and don't show up, but it's still incredibly better than dealing with the phone company.
Right now DSL providers are havig serious problems with the phone companies. The phone compaines have been told by law that they have to open up their networks. This has discouraged the phone companies from spending the money to upgrade their networks. They also haven't been hired and trained enough people to install all the lines that are required for DSL in many areas. The result is that DSL providers like Covad can't get the resources they need to get customers set up on DSL. My experience was that it took 5 months of the phone company making excuses and telling me outright lies to get my line installed. Covad was our a few days later to set things up, and in the last 8 months I've experienced about 1 hour where I couldn't use my connection when I tried. Another friend of mine was told by Covad that they couldn't give him DSL because there was too much line tap on the line (about 1000 ft of unused wire that was left to make it easier to hook up future customers. COvad couldn't remove the line tap themselves, and Ameritech wanted a prohibitive amount to do it. Not to mention that in other cases they considered it a non-esential service, so it would likely take many months for them to get around to it. The solution to his problem? Ameritech started offering DSL in his area. They were happy to remove the line tap as part of the install, no extra charge.
Government stepping in and opening up these companies networks doesn't seem to work. Regulations can be bent. Loopholes can be found. The competition will never be on equal footing with the owners of the network. The penalties the govenment regulators apply are never enough of a deterrant to discourage uncompetitive or simply incompetent behavior. The utilities are in no real danger of losing their monopoly, and the people making the decisions will never go to jail. As an example. Ameritech in Ohio has done a miserable job of fixing problems with their phone system in recent years. There's a huge backlog of service calls. Their technicians regularly miss severall appointments in a row while the customers sit at home waiting for someone to show up to fix their phone. Even if you give them a cell phone number to call, they won't let you know that they are running behind and won't make it. The government has found several times that they are not providing an acceptable level of service, and that they aren't even showing significan improvement. The result was a couple settlements in which I received on two occasions a phone card with a small number of minuites on it. Of course the phone card can only be used for Ameritech services like Ameritech pay phones.
The government steping into a regulated market and "fixing" it with a bunch of new regulations rarely works. The California energy market "deregulation" is a prime example of this. Just because some politician lables it deregulations, doesn't mean that there's going to be less government regulations involved. It's just a buzzword they often like to use when they decide to regulate the market in a new way. Remember, truth in advertising laws don't apply to politicians.
I would also think that if there were significant revenues comming in from these old processors, they would license the manufacture of them out to someone else to produce. Chip makers in general got hit hard by this latest economic downturn, so I would think there is production capacity available somewhere if the demand were there.
It looks like AMD is letting Intel support all the nitches, while they go after the mainstream market for a change.
The 18 GB for KDE makes a lot of sense. I'll agree that a 3 year lifespan isn't aggressive for PCs, but your people don't need the power of a PC. Thin clients are are the right solution for your place. I think the idea of a ten year duty cycle on the thin clients is laughable. The screens and keyboards won't last that long. PCs don't cost $2000 any more, and they have warranties to replace failed hardware, just like the thin clients do. This is all a moot point, because the real advantage of the thin clients is being able to configure and do software upgrades from a central location. This alone could result in $300000 in savings. You don't have to convince me of the benefits of thin clients, I once did PC support in a place that had 1200 users. I love the idea of thin clients.
I have almost no experience with Windows Terminal Server. The cost of running Exchange still sounds high to me, but I'm too far out of my limited area of expertise to know. It sounds like you've designed an exelent network that meets your users needs well. Thanks for taking the time to respond to my post.
As I read the articles I started out very skeptical, went on to be very impressed, and ended up pretty skeptical again.
It sounds like the system definately meets the City's needs, but it also seems like the Newsforge article is trying to overstate what those needs are. Lets look at the system specs.
400 Clients (800 Users)
Dual 933MHz system
3GB of Memory
18GB Hard Drive Space
Peak of about 230 concurrent users (from the first article)
Each concurrent user gets 11 to 12MB of system memory in which to work. They stated that they designed the system so they didn't have to hit the swap space. The 18 GB of hard drive space needs to be split between the OS application software and user storage space. Some users will need less space than others, so lets just ignore the space for the software and divide the total by the number of users. 18 GB/800 users = roughly 22.5 MB. How many people can here can honestly say that they don't have more space than that used for their email. The numbers tell me that the secretary they interviewed that was using Word Perfect, and email at the same time was one of their power users. I wouldn't be surprised if several hundred of their users don't even know how to access their email.
The big question is, so what? It's still a real system, that's meeting real users needs. The problem I have is that the article goes on to make tons of apples to oranges comparrisons.
It compares the cost of a thin client system in which users have very limited needs to a system with Windows desktops for everyone. How about Windows Terminal Server or other solutions that are more similar. I just don't buy the $300,000 a year hardware savings either. THese users have very limited needs, they don't need a new computer every year and a half, and $300,000 / 400 = $750 a year. Even if your buying new systems with monitors, that's way too much. $400,000 or $500,000 to run Exchange for their user base? Bullshit. I'm not saying that a Microsoft solution is cost effective, or even better excluding costs. It sounds like they found an exelent solution to their needs. The Sourceforge article however was too full of FUD to have much credibility.
And the users? Who cares. They're being paid to do their jobs, training is prvided to them, so they'd better learn to do it the way the company wants them to, since this particular way has been deemed the most efficient. They can have all the eye-candy disguised as ease of use they want on their home computers.
It sounds like Linux may very well suit your company's needs. It also sounds like your attitude doesn'tt. A large part of any IS job is dealing with users. If the above statement is really how you feel, rather than just the way you post on Slashdot, then I sure wouldn't want you working for me. There are a lot of good technical people out there that can deal with both people and computers. Lose the attitude, it does you a discredit.
Microsoft has a long history of poor security in their software. They have made progress in this area, but they are still far behind the curve.
I'm a little out of my realm of knowledge here, but it seems like IIS also has a lot of features that other web servers don't have. If you have more features, you also have a lot more likelyhood for bugs and exploits. It's much easier to secure a simple product than a more feature rich one. I've heard many people state that the cost off running MS software is much higher than running other competing software. I'm sure that that's true in many cases, especially when those users aren't utilizing the extra features that IIS may offer them. However, if those features meet their needs better than Apache for example, then maybe IIS is worth the cost and the security rick for them. Regardless of who's software they use, they need to keep up on the security patches. There was a patch for this. The problem was heavilly advertised. People, including many in Microsoft itself, didn't apply the patch.
Another reason why there may be more security exploits hitting IIS than Apache is that IS people who are properly concerned with security, and properly apply patches are more likely to be running Apache than IIS. I hate to fuel the UNIX has smarter admins fire, but there seems to be a lot of truth to it in a very general sense. Note, I said in a general sense. I'm quite sure there are brilliant NT adins, and stupid UNIX admins, I've actually met a few of each.
The difference is that the courts considered that small cluster of cells to be as valid a form of 'human life' as you, the parents would be going to jail for premeditated murder. The issue for the opponents of embryonic stem cell research (not all stem cell research), is that a living embryo is being killed. They consider that embryo to be a living human being, and the act of killing it to be murder. The issue of using the dead embryo's cells for research is actually a side issue. They don't want to create a demand for murdered humans.
It's in the President's job description to do what in our best interest, not what it's his own.
This is unquestionably true. In my opeinon he did do what was in this country's best interest. Presiden't Bush's best interests (politically) and the best interests of the country are often the same, though definately not always.
When Clinton did things that were seemingly only directed at his "getting re-elected", you Republicans denounced it vociferously.
If his actions were to only get re-elected, then he should have been denounced. I don't think you can reasonably say that he did this only to get re-elected.
Bush promised us a more ethical administration that is not "poll-driven". I guess he lied.
I think his decision was an ethical one. You're correct that he didn't simply make the decision on his own. He asked for the opinions of a lot of different special intrest groups, and I can only assume that he also looked at the polls. If Bush said that he would be completely ignore polls, then that was a very stupid thing to say. Making informed policy decisions requires many more facts and a lot broader experience than the general population has, so just following polls isn't a wise way to lead the country. It is however, our country, so we shouldn't be completely ignored either. So if he said he was going to ignore the polls, then he lied. It was a stupid lie too.
So after Microsoft who do they sue next? SUN? They've had security bugs that have caused problems for customers. How about Apache? They've also had to patch security holes. How many companies that make server software haven't had security holes at one point or another? More viruses/trujans/worms are made to attack MS OSs because they have a larger market share (in the desktop market at least), and they're probably more despised by the crackers writing the viruses/trojans/worms.
The real story here is that a lot of people running Microsoft OSs don't take applying security patches seriously enough. The fact that some of them are at Hotmail which is owned by Microsoft makes the news both funnier and more depressing.
System administrators and computer users in general need to be more concerned with the costs of not applying security patches. A more serious effort also has to be made to convince crackers that there will be serious penalties for releasing these viruses/trojans/worms. It's past time to accept excuses like I didn't mean to cause that much harm, or I was just doing it to show the hole existed. Is it necessary to throw a brick through a car window to prove that a car alarm won't stom you from steaning someones stuff out of the car? These crackers are causing serious finicial harm. They should be held responsible for their actions, and not get a slap on the wrist.
I would agree that the government funds a lot of research, especially in the form of grants to Universities in order advance technologies in certain areas, but this is only a small portion of the research that goes on in this country. How much do you think Intel invests in developing new processors. How about IBM and Lucent? The government has also moved away from simply funding research in many areas. In defense they don't usually fund resesearch, they pay for a product to be developed that they want. The companies that are developing the product do often end up with something they can develop into a commercial product and sell to other customers. However in this case, the government isn't usually getting ripped off. The company that is developing that product can bid the cost of the project lower than it costs them to develop it, and make back that money by selling the product commercially. That's why the government will pay for development on something, yet let the developer patent parts of the design. If they didn't they would have to pay considerably more in development costs. The government also gets to tax the company and their employees. So if the company does well, the govenment gets more money. This isn't "corporate welfare", it's the government working toward it's own best interests. Even the govenment has to invest money to get money back sometimes.
I know that Slashdot isn't the best palce to go for an opinion on legal issues, but does anyone have any idea if it would be legal to download and use a product that violates a US patent. I've heard of companies getting injunctions against other companies distributing products that violate their patents. However, if the distributers are outside the US, would it be illegal to use the software itself in the US?
I wonder if people in other countries look at the US kind of like they look at Microsoft. We have a unreasonable licensing agreements (laws like the DCMA). We stick our noses into everything. We tie different packages together (you want monetary of military aid, then you better pass these copyright and drug laws). The only organization that might be more like MS is the UN.
Why not? WinXP being able to switch users without closing the current user's application is an example of Windows becomming more Unix like. Microsoft isn't stupid. They know how to learn from their competition. My main issues with Windows are with stability, remote management, and handling multiple users better. MS seems to get better at addressing these issues with ever release. Note: I said those were my main issues with Windows, I have many other serious issues with Microsoft itself, which don't seem to be getting batter with successive releases of Windows.
Where Mandrake can truly succeed is in the support of older hardware. The manufacturers and Microsoft are partners, in that they both want to sell new product to consumers.
You raise a good point. I write device drivers for a variety of OSs. If a new OS comes out it's not a high priority to update drivers for older hardware that we aren't selling anymore. Even if it is a relatively simple job to update the driver, revalidating the driver on a new OS, and releasing it as a product is a very time consuming task. There's always a seemingly unlimited about of work to do on new products, so it's hard to justify spending the time (and therefore money) on supporting the old hardware.
A Linux driver writer may be a person who just happens to have one of those devices sitting around. The hardware manufacturer is much more likely to give out hardware specs on old hardware than the latest and greatest stuff, so as long as the developer has the time and interest in developing the driver, then he can do whatever he wants. The Linux developer also doesn't have to go through our ISO9000 approved process of testing and producing a product. If he so chooses, he can just release and patch as necessary. Of course, someone could do this just as easily for a Windows driver, although they do have to come up with the $500 for a MSDN Professional Subscription, and whatever the cost of Visual C++ is these days. Unless they already have these, the cost of getting started writing Windows drivers might be prohibitive.
However, the open source philosophy is to use what you've got to it's fullest - new or old. Microsoft can't survive in this model, and many manufacturers of hardware don't understand the impact to their business models.
I guess you can lump me in with those that don't understand the impact of this on business models. Hardware manufactures make money selling hardware. If you're using old hardware, you're not buying new hardware. Old hardware is supported to avoid pissing off customers, which is a good business policy as long as supporting the customer doesn't cost more than losing the customer.
Microsoft controls the hardware market. No independent firm can develop new hardware without supporting and licensing Microsoft product. It's simply not financially possible, given the control by Microsoft of the marketplace.
I agree that for most hardware it's true that MS OS's represent the vast majority of the market and that hardware manufacturers would be stupid to ignore this market. I'm just not sure that this really means that MS "controls" the hardware market. Yes you have to pay some money and license some software, but these are relatively cheap compared to a lot of other development tools for other non open source OSs. I just not sure what you mean by control here.
Alas, trade secret laws sometimes makes Linux support counter-productive, as reverse engineering become tricky (if not impossible) business.
I'm not sure it's actually the trade secret laws as much as the hardware developers wanting to protect their investment from their competitors. No one likes to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars developing something, only to have someone else get the profits from it. The trade secret laws to help the hardware manufactures in "protecting" their trade secrets.
Another reason that Linux developers might support older hardware is that it's often easier to write drivers for. The simple fact that newer hardware is often buggy. As a developer, you're going to spend a lot of time doing the following:
1) Reproducing and documenting bugs in the driver/firmware.
2) Convincing the hardware/firmware developers that it really is a bug in the hardware/firmware.
3) Convincing hardware/firmware developers that the bug really can't be worked around in the driver. If it can fixed in the driver without serious side effect, then fix it in the driver and report bother the bug and driver fix.
4) Learning how wierd test equipment works (like PCI bus analyzers), because the hardware/firmware developers aren't going to believe the bug isn't yours unless you can prove it. Besides, if you can't prove it isn't your bug, then there's a good chance that it is yours.
Enough ranting. I've got a driver I need to get done.
When setting up a simple network of two computers with Win95 I would often have problems just getting them to see each other the first time. The solution was usually reboot them a couple of times then it would start working, and would keep working. Win98 and Me worked better for home use, and I never had this problem with NT systems. Not sure why someone moderated this to flamebait.
I wouldn't call this a well thought out article.
on
Dan Gillmor on WinXP
·
· Score: 2, Troll
Microsoft pretended to allow more competition on the desktop by saying -- now that Internet Explorer is totally integrated into the operating system and has an 80-plus percent market share -- that PC makers could remove the IE icon, but not the software code.
How does having code on a machine that doesn't do anything call for an injunction. If MS removes the icons, good enough. Otherwise we end up with courts trying to determine what libraries should be included, that's just taking things too far.
With transcendant hypocrisy, Microsoft complained about the damage to consumer choice when AOL said it would pay Compaq to put AOL only on Compaq desktops. Then Microsoft maintained its requirement, which flies in the face of supposed desktop flexibility, that PC makers give its Microsoft Network at least equal billing with any other online services.
I'll agree that it's somewhat hypocritic of Microsoft to be the ones saying it, and requiring MSN isn't justified. However, I do thing that AOL making exclusive contracts like this is bad for consumuer choice, and in general a bad thing.
Microsoft removed the Java environment from XP, thereby breaking thousands of Web sites that use Java. XP customers will face endless downloads to replace the functionality they'd come to expect.
People bitch when Microsoft integrates things, and people bitch when they don't. I think not including Java has something to do with MS's settlement with SUN, but I don't know the details.
Microsoft will force XP users to sign up for its Passport authentication system if they want to use key XP features. This is a dagger aimed at all kinds of other businesses, and despite Microsoft's claims to the contrary it represents a potentially massive threat to customers' security and privacy.
Back to people bitching about MS integrating things. If you don't want to use the features that require Passport, don't use them. There's features in almost every software package you buy that you won't use. If you want the features, but don't want to give MS that much personal information, then you can choose to lie like other people do. Your choice.
Microsoft is bundling all kinds of services into XP in ways that block competition, from photography software to video/audio playback. If customers want to use other vendors' products they'll have to jump through Microsoft-designed hoops.
So what should MS be allowed to put into an OS. Is a TCP/IP stack ok? They didn't have one in Windows 3.0. Would consumers really be better off if they hadden't added one? How about adding hooks for Audio, and 3D video? How about a text editors, simple email, a calculator, disk defragmentor? Should everyone have to purchase everything seperately. If consumers only had to pay and average of $10 each for the things they get for free in Windows (just the ones most people use), how much would it cost them? It's also just not cost effective for Microsoft to make dozens of Windows distributions so that you can just buy the features you want. The courts didn't determine that MS was overcharging consumers. Let Microsoft continue to add the things people want to Windows. If allows MS to update their OS as the market changes, and it's good for consumers.
Microsoft has added ''code-signing'' measures -- verification, supposedly, that downloads will be safe -- that could scare customers away from using software that competes with Microsoft's offerings.
People bitch about MS's lack of security, and then they bitch when they try and do something about it. People downloading malicious code and running it is a serious problem, and code-signing is a way of warning people. Yes it can possibly have a detremental effect on some developers. There's almost nothing Microsoft can do that won't have a detremental effect on some developers.
Windows XP contains harsh controls on users to prevent unauthorized copying of the software. If you reinstall the OS after upgrading your hardware in ways that Microsoft considers questionable, you'll need Microsoft's permission.
I can understand that some people find these controls irritating and offensive, but how do they really hurt anyone. You've got a reasonable period of time after you load the OS before it becomes a problem (30 days maybe). SO people testing and reviewing hardware shouldn't be effected. You can upgrade a couple parts without a problem, and if you're going to upgrade more you just need to revalidate your license. How does this really hurt anyone who isn't trying to pirate the OS.
If you haven't guessed, I think MS should be allowed to add new software to their OS including IE. I don't think they should be able to enter exclusive marketing agreements which tie Windows licening to other products like MSN and Office. Obviously there's a thin line there. I don't want to be forced into a subscription that includes MSN, Office, and Windows. But I don't want to have to buy everthing I need to use my computer a la carte either. Where would I draw the line? There isn't a very large market for Systems without a web browser, test editor, or even and IP stack. These are quickly becomming essential features in an OS distribution, and don't add significant cost to the OS. Let MS bundle / integrate them. Most home users don't need a full fledged office suite and it would significantly increase the cost of the OS. MSN also would greatly increase the cost of the OS, and most people really don't need the junk it offers, they just want an internet connection. Keep it seperate. This is a hard thing for a court to determine, which is why the courts should keep out of these thing unless there is clearly harm to consumers.
Re:Does business always have to be this way ?
on
Dan Gillmor on WinXP
·
· Score: 2
Quality and popularity are completely independent variables.
They are definatley different, but so is quality and customer satisfaction. You can have the highest quality product in the world, but if it doesn't do what the customer wants, then it's useless to them.
Microsoft got where they are by riding IBM's coat-tails, by clever business tricks, and industrial strength marketing.
Microsoft used many tricks in the process of getting where they are now, but the biggest reason is that they gave users the features they want. A very high level of stability is an exelent feature in an OS, but most people will still choose a reasonably stable OS which does what they want it to do.
Other OS's are beginning to compete with Windows in the features department, so Microsoft better work on their quality. They seem to be trying to address that problem by moving their consumer OS customers to XP which is based on the NT kernel. If Linux developers don't think there's anything they can learn from Windows, then Linux isn't likely to ever gain a lot of desktop market share. In the desktop market, quality and stability aren't enough.
Slashdot Mirror
Don't forget that they are released under GPL so that the source also has to be available to 2nd generation worms that are built apon the original code.
You say that the regulations haven't stopped them from upgrading their network and training technicians in your area, then you go on to say how frustrated you are that you can't get DSL installed. You also mention that their billing system is a mess, more infrastructure problems. It sounds like Qwest is definately not investing enough in their infrastructure. It took over 5 months of harrassing Ameritech for me to get my DSL installed, and without that harrassment I doubt it ever would have happened. I feel your pain.
Our rights as consumers are limited in that if one company isn't providing a service well enough, we are free to switch to another provider. However in this instance, and in many other instances, there's no place else to go. Some situations require government intervention, and most likely DSL is going to end up having to be something that is regulated.
The phone network is going to remain a monopoly because there's no good way to split it up. Therefore it's going to have to be regulated to some extent. The regulators and legislators just have to make sure they don't make matters worse by trying to force competition into the market where it doesn't make sense. DSL providers like COVAD don't really have a chance of competing on equal ground with the Phone company's DSL offering, because they bosth rely on the Phone company providing and installing the line. Competition is going to come from other sources, such as cable, wireless, and satalite.
Maybe use it under some incarnation of the GPL?
Huh? Unless you have some actual way GPL might have some relation to DSL, quit throwing out buzzwords out of context.
TW has offered access for a long time, and for them to not upgrade the equipment would hurt them as well as they have an existing buissness in the market, unlike ameritech at the time of the covad incedent.
Ameritech already had an existing business as well. They've been selling bandwidth in many forms for many years. You can also say that them not expanding their network has hurt them. Expanding telephone and cable networks requires a incredible investment on the part of the telephone and cable companies. They are taking serious risks that there won't be enough demand at a high enough price for them to be able to profit from that investment. Interference, in the form of government regulations complicates this and makes the companies much less willing to invest in quickly expanding their networks. Especially when they have to share the networks with other providers at what is likely a government controlled price. If the government keeps out of it, they can invest in expanding the network, and price the services so that they're profitable, yet competitive with other technologies (DSL, cable, Satalite). When politicians get involved, there's a lot more risk of them mandating an unreasonable price, adding a tax to the service, or adding tons of expensive oversite and regulations they need to conform to. That doesn't exactly encourage investment. If you think I'm being unreasonable, look at California's power industry.
Those old IBM keyboards are awsome. They stand up to a lot of wear and tear. If the quality of the keyboards on the terminals meet these standards, then they may last 10 years. Monitor's are a different story. I seriously doubt you used your 17" monitor 5 days a week for most of the day. If you did, it's very likely out of focus and the phosphor is getting burned out. I have a six year old 17" monitor that I still use. I have some monitor's at work that are over 5 years old that still don't look to bad, but they are the exception, not the rule. Well before you reach 10 years, the cost of repairs and upkeep on these terminals will exceed their value. Sure some of them will still work. I've got a VT100 terminal that's well over 10 years old that still works fine. The display is a little burned in, but I work fine for what I use it for. It's also the one of two working ones out of about a dozen that were purchased at the time. It will likely see limited use for years to come.
The phone company monopply exhists because we don't want our countryside clutteded up with phone poles and wires. If you know of a good way of getting around this monopoly on phone lines, please share it with us. The problem with the so called deregulation that was done with the phone company is that it doesn't address the problem on the monopoly the phone company has on the lines. There's no realy way a bunch of government regulations can ensure that the phone company provides proper access to their network for other companies. The level of level of oversight needed would require a network of observers to go out on service calls with technicians, verity that lines were being allocated fairly, and audit the phone company in a variety of ways. That would cost a fortune, and eliminate the benefits that could be gained through competition. Instead we have insufficient oversite, unfair competition, and a bunch of regulations that increase the costs of all the companies in the telophony business. I agree that phone companies need to be regulated to make sure they provide the required services at a reasonable cost. However, the regulations requiring these monopolies to open their markets don't seem to be working. They aren't provideing real benefits to consumers. If you want real competition in the market, you need to split the phone companies into a part that has a monopoly on the network itself, and a part that competes on even grounds with others to provide services to consumers. Forcing this restructuring on the phone company would be very expensive, and in the end may not be cost effective either.
There's no real way to get rid of the phone network monopoly, but other technologies such as cable and wireless are beginning to provide competition to it. The article suggests that the laws that "deregulated" the phone companies were misguided and ineffectual. The author believes, and there is some evidence to suport if from other countries, that the phone companies would have upgraded their networks and more consumers would have access to DSL if the government would have just left them alone on this, and let competition come from other sources.
It's not a view that government shouldn't interfere with monopolies. It's a view that the government often interferes when they don't need to, or in ways that don't help. The regulations the government placed on the phone company in the guise of deregulation don't seem to have resulted in lower proces, and because they seem to be inadvertantly limiting the availability of DSL, they are harming DSL's ability to compete with cable modems, and harming consumers.
I've worked as a contractor for the government before. There were a considerable number of civil servants who's job it was to to oversee us and to make sure we were doing our jobs well. They were nice people, who tried to do their jobs well, but they rarely had much of an idea what was going on. They weren't very technical people. If you require highly technical people, then someone will sue because they felt they were competent enough, and that they were being discriminated against. Their jobs ended up being to try and guess if they could believe us when we told them we were doing a good job. They would investigate complaints, but it's it's easy to provide doubt that you did something wrong, even if you did. No one likes someone going around pointing fingers, and there people have to work with you wether they like it or not.
In the end you have ineffectual oversight, that costs a lot of money. The costs of that oversight are passed on to consumers either through a direct tax on the service, or some other tax. In the end consumers get less for more.
Needless to say I got out of government contracting. The politics were frustrating, and there was just too little of an incentive to do a good job. There were some people who continued to do exelent work in that environment, but it was burning me out, so I left.
The unionized telco workers with mgmt blessing delay DSL orders for CLECs into oblivion - hell, even if you get DSL FORM the telco it can take weeks and tons of hassles - it shouldn't be this complex.
In my experience, the workers weren't delaying the process. The phone company just didn't hire and train enough of them in areas where they weren't offering DSL yet, but competing CLECs were. Getting telephone service working for people is much more important than installing DSL, so those calls got put off over and over again. Howevr, they are hiring and training more technicians, in areas where they are beginning to provide DSL.
Thie ONLY saving grace is cross technology competition. The only thing keeping cable modem prices down is DSL - If DLS disappears, all you cable modem user can rest assured your rates will go up FASTER than your normal cable bill - count on it. But with DSL out there, its a threat.
I'm sure there's some truth to this, but there's a lot of places you just can't get DSL. It's limited by line quality and the distance to the CO. So there really isn't any competition to cable modems in a large percentage of their market. The price is most likely limited to what they think customers are willing to pay, not the price of the competition. Cable modems just became available in my area, and I'm signing up for the most basic cable (mainly broadcast stations) and internet access. The total monthly price is about the same as what I'm currently paying for my 144k IDSL line, which is my only other choice. The cable company also lets me self install the software, and are even selling me good quality cable TV cable at $0.10 a foot, so I can run outlets where I need them. Did I mention that they have an on time gaurentee for their service calls. They miss a serivce call, they give you a credit on your bill. I think the amount was about $20. I'd rather they pay me cash if they make me wait around and don't show up, but it's still incredibly better than dealing with the phone company.
Right now DSL providers are havig serious problems with the phone companies. The phone compaines have been told by law that they have to open up their networks. This has discouraged the phone companies from spending the money to upgrade their networks. They also haven't been hired and trained enough people to install all the lines that are required for DSL in many areas. The result is that DSL providers like Covad can't get the resources they need to get customers set up on DSL. My experience was that it took 5 months of the phone company making excuses and telling me outright lies to get my line installed. Covad was our a few days later to set things up, and in the last 8 months I've experienced about 1 hour where I couldn't use my connection when I tried. Another friend of mine was told by Covad that they couldn't give him DSL because there was too much line tap on the line (about 1000 ft of unused wire that was left to make it easier to hook up future customers. COvad couldn't remove the line tap themselves, and Ameritech wanted a prohibitive amount to do it. Not to mention that in other cases they considered it a non-esential service, so it would likely take many months for them to get around to it. The solution to his problem? Ameritech started offering DSL in his area. They were happy to remove the line tap as part of the install, no extra charge.
Government stepping in and opening up these companies networks doesn't seem to work. Regulations can be bent. Loopholes can be found. The competition will never be on equal footing with the owners of the network. The penalties the govenment regulators apply are never enough of a deterrant to discourage uncompetitive or simply incompetent behavior. The utilities are in no real danger of losing their monopoly, and the people making the decisions will never go to jail. As an example. Ameritech in Ohio has done a miserable job of fixing problems with their phone system in recent years. There's a huge backlog of service calls. Their technicians regularly miss severall appointments in a row while the customers sit at home waiting for someone to show up to fix their phone. Even if you give them a cell phone number to call, they won't let you know that they are running behind and won't make it. The government has found several times that they are not providing an acceptable level of service, and that they aren't even showing significan improvement. The result was a couple settlements in which I received on two occasions a phone card with a small number of minuites on it. Of course the phone card can only be used for Ameritech services like Ameritech pay phones.
The government steping into a regulated market and "fixing" it with a bunch of new regulations rarely works. The California energy market "deregulation" is a prime example of this. Just because some politician lables it deregulations, doesn't mean that there's going to be less government regulations involved. It's just a buzzword they often like to use when they decide to regulate the market in a new way. Remember, truth in advertising laws don't apply to politicians.
I would also think that if there were significant revenues comming in from these old processors, they would license the manufacture of them out to someone else to produce. Chip makers in general got hit hard by this latest economic downturn, so I would think there is production capacity available somewhere if the demand were there.
It looks like AMD is letting Intel support all the nitches, while they go after the mainstream market for a change.
I'd add that power consumption plays a key role. The older processors have less transistors, and use less power when produced using the same process.
The 18 GB for KDE makes a lot of sense. I'll agree that a 3 year lifespan isn't aggressive for PCs, but your people don't need the power of a PC. Thin clients are are the right solution for your place. I think the idea of a ten year duty cycle on the thin clients is laughable. The screens and keyboards won't last that long. PCs don't cost $2000 any more, and they have warranties to replace failed hardware, just like the thin clients do. This is all a moot point, because the real advantage of the thin clients is being able to configure and do software upgrades from a central location. This alone could result in $300000 in savings. You don't have to convince me of the benefits of thin clients, I once did PC support in a place that had 1200 users. I love the idea of thin clients.
I have almost no experience with Windows Terminal Server. The cost of running Exchange still sounds high to me, but I'm too far out of my limited area of expertise to know. It sounds like you've designed an exelent network that meets your users needs well. Thanks for taking the time to respond to my post.
As I read the articles I started out very skeptical, went on to be very impressed, and ended up pretty skeptical again.
It sounds like the system definately meets the City's needs, but it also seems like the Newsforge article is trying to overstate what those needs are. Lets look at the system specs.
400 Clients (800 Users)
Dual 933MHz system
3GB of Memory
18GB Hard Drive Space
Peak of about 230 concurrent users (from the first article)
Each concurrent user gets 11 to 12MB of system memory in which to work. They stated that they designed the system so they didn't have to hit the swap space. The 18 GB of hard drive space needs to be split between the OS application software and user storage space. Some users will need less space than others, so lets just ignore the space for the software and divide the total by the number of users. 18 GB/800 users = roughly 22.5 MB. How many people can here can honestly say that they don't have more space than that used for their email. The numbers tell me that the secretary they interviewed that was using Word Perfect, and email at the same time was one of their power users. I wouldn't be surprised if several hundred of their users don't even know how to access their email.
The big question is, so what? It's still a real system, that's meeting real users needs. The problem I have is that the article goes on to make tons of apples to oranges comparrisons.
It compares the cost of a thin client system in which users have very limited needs to a system with Windows desktops for everyone. How about Windows Terminal Server or other solutions that are more similar. I just don't buy the $300,000 a year hardware savings either. THese users have very limited needs, they don't need a new computer every year and a half, and $300,000 / 400 = $750 a year. Even if your buying new systems with monitors, that's way too much. $400,000 or $500,000 to run Exchange for their user base? Bullshit. I'm not saying that a Microsoft solution is cost effective, or even better excluding costs. It sounds like they found an exelent solution to their needs. The Sourceforge article however was too full of FUD to have much credibility.
And the users? Who cares. They're being paid to do their jobs, training is prvided to them, so they'd better learn to do it the way the company wants them to, since this particular way has been deemed the most efficient. They can have all the eye-candy disguised as ease of use they want on their home computers.
It sounds like Linux may very well suit your company's needs. It also sounds like your attitude doesn'tt. A large part of any IS job is dealing with users. If the above statement is really how you feel, rather than just the way you post on Slashdot, then I sure wouldn't want you working for me. There are a lot of good technical people out there that can deal with both people and computers. Lose the attitude, it does you a discredit.
Microsoft has a long history of poor security in their software. They have made progress in this area, but they are still far behind the curve.
I'm a little out of my realm of knowledge here, but it seems like IIS also has a lot of features that other web servers don't have. If you have more features, you also have a lot more likelyhood for bugs and exploits. It's much easier to secure a simple product than a more feature rich one. I've heard many people state that the cost off running MS software is much higher than running other competing software. I'm sure that that's true in many cases, especially when those users aren't utilizing the extra features that IIS may offer them. However, if those features meet their needs better than Apache for example, then maybe IIS is worth the cost and the security rick for them. Regardless of who's software they use, they need to keep up on the security patches. There was a patch for this. The problem was heavilly advertised. People, including many in Microsoft itself, didn't apply the patch.
Another reason why there may be more security exploits hitting IIS than Apache is that IS people who are properly concerned with security, and properly apply patches are more likely to be running Apache than IIS. I hate to fuel the UNIX has smarter admins fire, but there seems to be a lot of truth to it in a very general sense. Note, I said in a general sense. I'm quite sure there are brilliant NT adins, and stupid UNIX admins, I've actually met a few of each.
The difference is that the courts considered that small cluster of cells to be as valid a form of 'human life' as you, the parents would be going to jail for premeditated murder. The issue for the opponents of embryonic stem cell research (not all stem cell research), is that a living embryo is being killed. They consider that embryo to be a living human being, and the act of killing it to be murder. The issue of using the dead embryo's cells for research is actually a side issue. They don't want to create a demand for murdered humans.
It's in the President's job description to do what in our best interest, not what it's his own.
This is unquestionably true. In my opeinon he did do what was in this country's best interest. Presiden't Bush's best interests (politically) and the best interests of the country are often the same, though definately not always.
When Clinton did things that were seemingly only directed at his "getting re-elected", you Republicans denounced it vociferously.
If his actions were to only get re-elected, then he should have been denounced. I don't think you can reasonably say that he did this only to get re-elected.
Bush promised us a more ethical administration that is not "poll-driven". I guess he lied.
I think his decision was an ethical one. You're correct that he didn't simply make the decision on his own. He asked for the opinions of a lot of different special intrest groups, and I can only assume that he also looked at the polls. If Bush said that he would be completely ignore polls, then that was a very stupid thing to say. Making informed policy decisions requires many more facts and a lot broader experience than the general population has, so just following polls isn't a wise way to lead the country. It is however, our country, so we shouldn't be completely ignored either. So if he said he was going to ignore the polls, then he lied. It was a stupid lie too.
So after Microsoft who do they sue next? SUN? They've had security bugs that have caused problems for customers. How about Apache? They've also had to patch security holes. How many companies that make server software haven't had security holes at one point or another? More viruses/trujans/worms are made to attack MS OSs because they have a larger market share (in the desktop market at least), and they're probably more despised by the crackers writing the viruses/trojans/worms.
The real story here is that a lot of people running Microsoft OSs don't take applying security patches seriously enough. The fact that some of them are at Hotmail which is owned by Microsoft makes the news both funnier and more depressing.
System administrators and computer users in general need to be more concerned with the costs of not applying security patches. A more serious effort also has to be made to convince crackers that there will be serious penalties for releasing these viruses/trojans/worms. It's past time to accept excuses like I didn't mean to cause that much harm, or I was just doing it to show the hole existed. Is it necessary to throw a brick through a car window to prove that a car alarm won't stom you from steaning someones stuff out of the car? These crackers are causing serious finicial harm. They should be held responsible for their actions, and not get a slap on the wrist.
I would agree that the government funds a lot of research, especially in the form of grants to Universities in order advance technologies in certain areas, but this is only a small portion of the research that goes on in this country. How much do you think Intel invests in developing new processors. How about IBM and Lucent? The government has also moved away from simply funding research in many areas. In defense they don't usually fund resesearch, they pay for a product to be developed that they want. The companies that are developing the product do often end up with something they can develop into a commercial product and sell to other customers. However in this case, the government isn't usually getting ripped off. The company that is developing that product can bid the cost of the project lower than it costs them to develop it, and make back that money by selling the product commercially. That's why the government will pay for development on something, yet let the developer patent parts of the design. If they didn't they would have to pay considerably more in development costs. The government also gets to tax the company and their employees. So if the company does well, the govenment gets more money. This isn't "corporate welfare", it's the government working toward it's own best interests. Even the govenment has to invest money to get money back sometimes.
I know that Slashdot isn't the best palce to go for an opinion on legal issues, but does anyone have any idea if it would be legal to download and use a product that violates a US patent. I've heard of companies getting injunctions against other companies distributing products that violate their patents. However, if the distributers are outside the US, would it be illegal to use the software itself in the US?
I wonder if people in other countries look at the US kind of like they look at Microsoft. We have a unreasonable licensing agreements (laws like the DCMA). We stick our noses into everything. We tie different packages together (you want monetary of military aid, then you better pass these copyright and drug laws). The only organization that might be more like MS is the UN.
Oh, I get it. Now they are copying us.
Why not? WinXP being able to switch users without closing the current user's application is an example of Windows becomming more Unix like. Microsoft isn't stupid. They know how to learn from their competition. My main issues with Windows are with stability, remote management, and handling multiple users better. MS seems to get better at addressing these issues with ever release. Note: I said those were my main issues with Windows, I have many other serious issues with Microsoft itself, which don't seem to be getting batter with successive releases of Windows.
Where Mandrake can truly succeed is in the support of older hardware. The manufacturers and Microsoft are partners, in that they both want to sell new product to consumers.
You raise a good point. I write device drivers for a variety of OSs. If a new OS comes out it's not a high priority to update drivers for older hardware that we aren't selling anymore. Even if it is a relatively simple job to update the driver, revalidating the driver on a new OS, and releasing it as a product is a very time consuming task. There's always a seemingly unlimited about of work to do on new products, so it's hard to justify spending the time (and therefore money) on supporting the old hardware.
A Linux driver writer may be a person who just happens to have one of those devices sitting around. The hardware manufacturer is much more likely to give out hardware specs on old hardware than the latest and greatest stuff, so as long as the developer has the time and interest in developing the driver, then he can do whatever he wants. The Linux developer also doesn't have to go through our ISO9000 approved process of testing and producing a product. If he so chooses, he can just release and patch as necessary. Of course, someone could do this just as easily for a Windows driver, although they do have to come up with the $500 for a MSDN Professional Subscription, and whatever the cost of Visual C++ is these days. Unless they already have these, the cost of getting started writing Windows drivers might be prohibitive.
However, the open source philosophy is to use what you've got to it's fullest - new or old. Microsoft can't survive in this model, and many manufacturers of hardware don't understand the impact to their business models.
I guess you can lump me in with those that don't understand the impact of this on business models. Hardware manufactures make money selling hardware. If you're using old hardware, you're not buying new hardware. Old hardware is supported to avoid pissing off customers, which is a good business policy as long as supporting the customer doesn't cost more than losing the customer.
Microsoft controls the hardware market. No independent firm can develop new hardware without supporting and licensing Microsoft product. It's simply not financially possible, given the control by Microsoft of the marketplace.
I agree that for most hardware it's true that MS OS's represent the vast majority of the market and that hardware manufacturers would be stupid to ignore this market. I'm just not sure that this really means that MS "controls" the hardware market. Yes you have to pay some money and license some software, but these are relatively cheap compared to a lot of other development tools for other non open source OSs. I just not sure what you mean by control here.
Alas, trade secret laws sometimes makes Linux support counter-productive, as reverse engineering become tricky (if not impossible) business.
I'm not sure it's actually the trade secret laws as much as the hardware developers wanting to protect their investment from their competitors. No one likes to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars developing something, only to have someone else get the profits from it. The trade secret laws to help the hardware manufactures in "protecting" their trade secrets.
Another reason that Linux developers might support older hardware is that it's often easier to write drivers for. The simple fact that newer hardware is often buggy. As a developer, you're going to spend a lot of time doing the following:
1) Reproducing and documenting bugs in the driver/firmware.
2) Convincing the hardware/firmware developers that it really is a bug in the hardware/firmware.
3) Convincing hardware/firmware developers that the bug really can't be worked around in the driver. If it can fixed in the driver without serious side effect, then fix it in the driver and report bother the bug and driver fix.
4) Learning how wierd test equipment works (like PCI bus analyzers), because the hardware/firmware developers aren't going to believe the bug isn't yours unless you can prove it. Besides, if you can't prove it isn't your bug, then there's a good chance that it is yours.
Enough ranting. I've got a driver I need to get done.
When setting up a simple network of two computers with Win95 I would often have problems just getting them to see each other the first time. The solution was usually reboot them a couple of times then it would start working, and would keep working. Win98 and Me worked better for home use, and I never had this problem with NT systems. Not sure why someone moderated this to flamebait.
Microsoft pretended to allow more competition on the desktop by saying -- now that Internet Explorer is totally integrated into the operating system and has an 80-plus percent market share -- that PC makers could remove the IE icon, but not the software code.
How does having code on a machine that doesn't do anything call for an injunction. If MS removes the icons, good enough. Otherwise we end up with courts trying to determine what libraries should be included, that's just taking things too far.
With transcendant hypocrisy, Microsoft complained about the damage to consumer choice when AOL said it would pay Compaq to put AOL only on Compaq desktops. Then Microsoft maintained its requirement, which flies in the face of supposed desktop flexibility, that PC makers give its Microsoft Network at least equal billing with any other online services.
I'll agree that it's somewhat hypocritic of Microsoft to be the ones saying it, and requiring MSN isn't justified. However, I do thing that AOL making exclusive contracts like this is bad for consumuer choice, and in general a bad thing.
Microsoft removed the Java environment from XP, thereby breaking thousands of Web sites that use Java. XP customers will face endless downloads to replace the functionality they'd come to expect.
People bitch when Microsoft integrates things, and people bitch when they don't. I think not including Java has something to do with MS's settlement with SUN, but I don't know the details.
Microsoft will force XP users to sign up for its Passport authentication system if they want to use key XP features. This is a dagger aimed at all kinds of other businesses, and despite Microsoft's claims to the contrary it represents a potentially massive threat to customers' security and privacy.
Back to people bitching about MS integrating things. If you don't want to use the features that require Passport, don't use them. There's features in almost every software package you buy that you won't use. If you want the features, but don't want to give MS that much personal information, then you can choose to lie like other people do. Your choice.
Microsoft is bundling all kinds of services into XP in ways that block competition, from photography software to video/audio playback. If customers want to use other vendors' products they'll have to jump through Microsoft-designed hoops.
So what should MS be allowed to put into an OS. Is a TCP/IP stack ok? They didn't have one in Windows 3.0. Would consumers really be better off if they hadden't added one? How about adding hooks for Audio, and 3D video? How about a text editors, simple email, a calculator, disk defragmentor? Should everyone have to purchase everything seperately. If consumers only had to pay and average of $10 each for the things they get for free in Windows (just the ones most people use), how much would it cost them? It's also just not cost effective for Microsoft to make dozens of Windows distributions so that you can just buy the features you want. The courts didn't determine that MS was overcharging consumers. Let Microsoft continue to add the things people want to Windows. If allows MS to update their OS as the market changes, and it's good for consumers.
Microsoft has added ''code-signing'' measures -- verification, supposedly, that downloads will be safe -- that could scare customers away from using software that competes with Microsoft's offerings.
People bitch about MS's lack of security, and then they bitch when they try and do something about it. People downloading malicious code and running it is a serious problem, and code-signing is a way of warning people. Yes it can possibly have a detremental effect on some developers. There's almost nothing Microsoft can do that won't have a detremental effect on some developers.
Windows XP contains harsh controls on users to prevent unauthorized copying of the software. If you reinstall the OS after upgrading your hardware in ways that Microsoft considers questionable, you'll need Microsoft's permission.
I can understand that some people find these controls irritating and offensive, but how do they really hurt anyone. You've got a reasonable period of time after you load the OS before it becomes a problem (30 days maybe). SO people testing and reviewing hardware shouldn't be effected. You can upgrade a couple parts without a problem, and if you're going to upgrade more you just need to revalidate your license. How does this really hurt anyone who isn't trying to pirate the OS.
If you haven't guessed, I think MS should be allowed to add new software to their OS including IE. I don't think they should be able to enter exclusive marketing agreements which tie Windows licening to other products like MSN and Office. Obviously there's a thin line there. I don't want to be forced into a subscription that includes MSN, Office, and Windows. But I don't want to have to buy everthing I need to use my computer a la carte either. Where would I draw the line? There isn't a very large market for Systems without a web browser, test editor, or even and IP stack. These are quickly becomming essential features in an OS distribution, and don't add significant cost to the OS. Let MS bundle / integrate them. Most home users don't need a full fledged office suite and it would significantly increase the cost of the OS. MSN also would greatly increase the cost of the OS, and most people really don't need the junk it offers, they just want an internet connection. Keep it seperate. This is a hard thing for a court to determine, which is why the courts should keep out of these thing unless there is clearly harm to consumers.
Quality and popularity are completely independent variables.
They are definatley different, but so is quality and customer satisfaction. You can have the highest quality product in the world, but if it doesn't do what the customer wants, then it's useless to them.
Microsoft got where they are by riding IBM's coat-tails, by clever business tricks, and industrial strength marketing.
Microsoft used many tricks in the process of getting where they are now, but the biggest reason is that they gave users the features they want. A very high level of stability is an exelent feature in an OS, but most people will still choose a reasonably stable OS which does what they want it to do.
Other OS's are beginning to compete with Windows in the features department, so Microsoft better work on their quality. They seem to be trying to address that problem by moving their consumer OS customers to XP which is based on the NT kernel. If Linux developers don't think there's anything they can learn from Windows, then Linux isn't likely to ever gain a lot of desktop market share. In the desktop market, quality and stability aren't enough.