Your post is a great example of the overall decline in the quality of the human gene pool, and society as a whole.
Ahhhhhhhhh, the irony.
It wasn't intended to be ironic. I'm completely serious. People who say such stupid things actually ARE an example of the human species' overall decline in intelligence and suitability.
"Stable platform"? C'mon. Can't you trolls come up with anything new? Windows hasn't has stability issues since the Win 95/98/ME days. At least come up with something that's marginally relevant or true. This pathetic FUD is getting really, really old and tired.
I agree 100%. Don't trust people with college degrees in Journalism. Don't trust decades old organizations that have editors and fact-checkers. Don't trust reporters just because they actually "see" news as it happens. Don't trust people who have worked, often their entire adult lives, to get to the position they occupy. Instead, trust something written anonymously on the Internet.
Your post is a great example of the overall decline in the quality of the human gene pool, and society as a whole.
"I'm the [CEO|manager|owner] don't bother me with trivial details. *I* have important work to do".
That's right, and they're right. They're more important than you. Their time is more valuable, and they are much less replaceable than you, no matter who you are. Now, get over it, and quit bothering them with trivial details, or you'll be unemployed.
I guess I have a question: What would it take Microsoft (or Linux) doing to make you consider switching? If the temperature is slowly ratcheted up, when do you jump out (or do you just boil)?
For me, it comes down to money and time (which are the same thing). It's just a simple calculation of "product X costs $$ and takes x hours a year at $y/hour to set up and keep working" vs. the same thing for product Y. Just looking at OS's here at work: I pay about $200 up front for Windows 2000 on each machine, with probably 2 hours/year dealing with various OS related problems per machine. I expect to keep the same OS for about 5-7 years. If I were to look at Linux, it would cost $0 up front along with probably 100 hours to learn how it works, set it up, and find vendors for new apps. Maintenance would probably be similar to what I do now. Those 100 or so hours up front would take many, many years to pay back, taking everything into consideration. I'd expect a financial return after one-three years, if I were to make a money/time investment now.
On top of that, I'd have to make the same evaluation for each application that I'd have to switch. Going to Linux would end up costing a *lot* of money for us, with no real return for many years.
And with software, looking much further than 5 years is a moot point, because things change so quickly. But looking at a 5-10 year horizon, I can be relatively sure that MS will still be around and kicking, but there aren't any Linux vendors right now that I'd bet on being alive in 5-10 years. So not only is any kind of ROI pretty far out, but if I end up having to move to a different vendor in even 5 years, then that pretty much destroys any hope of getting any kind of return for a good decade.
I think that those are pretty accurate estimates. And, unless I'm missing something major, I can't see why I, or somebody else in a similar situation would consider changing. The only reason that I could see considering making such a big investment would be if MS either quadrupled their prices, or charged the equivalent of the full price of the OS every year as ongoing licensing.
But tell me how this impacts me and my business right now. That's what I, as a Windows user, care about. Not some idealistic bullshit about "Windows is evil". I don't believe it, nor do I care about that. That's just stuff that academics can argue over. As far as I can tell, none of this stuff impacts us at all. Our PC's update themselves when they need to, and we don't have any problems. If you're trying to convince me, then give me a real, concrete example of how I can save money or time. If it's not saving me money or time, then I really couldn't care less (and why should I?)
I agree with your analogy. I think that it's spot-on. The crux of it for me comes down to long-term vs. short term. I'm using Windows (and other things of course) to earn a living. I own a small business with employees, and ultimately, my business runs on top of Windows. If I have software problems of any kind, we're closed and there's no income. Any kind of downtime in retail also greatly hurts customers' perception of your business, also. So, I simply can't afford to spend time and money dicking around with software, no matter what the long-term effects may be. I have several rents to pay, and people whose livelihoods also hinge on my ability to keep things running smoothly and cheaply.
I simply do not have the luxury of putting myself out now (even a little bit) in order to make a "Big picture" impact, either. That's why the biggest OSS advocates tend to be either 1. Traditionally rich (lots of money) or 2. students (lots of time, few financial responsibilities). Same thing with any kind of big picture issue, like all types of political and social activism. Average Joe (like me) simply doesn't have the time or money resources to have any impact. But if I don't address the immediate needs, them I'm pretty much out on the street.
Now, you can also say that there are long term benefits. There may be, but depending on who you are, short term needs just cannot be overlooked. The way I see it, there may be some advantages for us to use OSS at some point, but I won't even be able to address those advantages until I'm much more secure financially. Most people in the US are in the same situation: they need to bust their ass to get by, and saving a bit of money now, and making their lives a bit better in the future by going with Company B now is less important than keeping their food cold today. If you are wealthy enough to be able to spend time and money working with Company B, either because you have a spare working unit from Company A, or if you can afford to eat out each meal if Company B's fridge isn't working quite right, then good for you. But it would be wrong to assume that it's even on the radar of most people, and not because they don't know what's out there. They know that B is out there, but we're hungry, and somewhat cold food today is much more important than having somewhat cheaper (colder?) food two years into the future.
What does Exchange have to do with Windows, other than it's made by the same company? I thought that we were talking about OS's, not apps. I have a few apps that are a PITA. How an application works has nothing to do with Windows in most cases. That's like saying that Ford sucks because your car stereo that you installed into your car sucks. I can install any of hundreds of different mail serves onto Windows.
As far as Exchange goes, I hear that it's also a real PITA, but that being said, there's no competition out there. Nobody makes anything that does what Exchange does. The options are fight with Exchange, or cobble together a mail server, a calendar server, a meeting server, a task assigner, and whatever other PIM stuff Exchange does. It sounds like the market is ripe for a more solid Exchange replacement. You should get coding!
I agree completely. My point is that suppliers are certainly not knocking each other out to get into Wal-Mart because it's quite often, a BAD business decision to go to Wal-Mart. If you do any kind of reading into the business end of Wal-Mart, you'll see that most suppliers are in Wal-Mart because they HAVE to. Do you really think that Apple WANTS to sell to Wal-Mart? Do you think that they want to sell a $200 iPod for $100? Do you think that Rolls-Royce wants to start selling a $10K car through Wal-Mart? Selling a bigger quantity of something is not necessarily better than selling less, especially if your profit per item has to drop dramatically. It's simply numbers. I question whether an already successful company like Google would really be interested in getting into a business with margins that are a tiny fraction of what they currently are.
That's my point. I haven't had any serious problems from Windows since the DOS days (Windows 95/98/ME). If something minor comes up (which I haven't seen in many years), then I can hire one of thousands on consultants, I can ask any geek, I can call Microsoft, I can hit their web site, I can Google, etc. It happens so rarely now, that it's simply not a concern.
It's not worth worrying about, any more than it's worth worry about what to do if my oven fails. An oven works until it breaks, and that's generally many, many years later. And when it does break, it's cheap enough to just buy a new one, or fix it myself if it's something simple.
But, even though I own a company that runs on Windows, it's just not a concern to me, and that's the way it should be. I worry about hardware failures much more than I worry about a Windows failure.
I don't need to constantly update virus and spyware definitions on Linux or MacOS.
I don't have to constatly plug remote exploit holes on Linux or MacOS.
Welcome to 2004! All of this has been automatic for years.
It's not worth my time to document and look for help. Why would it be? The *second* that I start looking into why X isn't working in Linux, I'm losing money and valuable time, because my alternative is to spend a couple of hundred bucks on Windows and be done with it. Unless you're a hobbyist or a masochist, there's little to no reason to intentionally cause more problems for yourself. It's kind of like if somebody came out with a "better" refrigerator (let's say that it'll save you a bit in energy costs), but you have to put it together yourself, and learn all about refrigeration to use it. What person in their right mind, other than somebody who is unemployed, would bother? Go to the store, buy a refrigerator, and plug it in. End of story. The standard for refrigerators and operating systems is "plug it in, and use it" at this point. Anything else is sub-standard unless you have special needs, and spending extra time working with it will be worth it to you in the long run.
The number of people who actually use Windows because they enjoy it and think it's a good OS is quite small, I think.
I'd agree completely, but not for the same reason that you seem to think. I think that Windows is good enough now that it's a non-issue for most people. The OS has become quite transparent, easy to use, and relatively problem free. I think that most average people these days think about Windows about as much as they think about the company that made the wiring harnesses for their car engines. Windows just works, and people ignore it. That's the way it should happen. That's the natural progression of any new product. If anything, you'll see even fewer people knowing or caring what kind of Windows that they run in the future, because it just keeps getting better. With every new Windows release, there's less reason for people to even think about their computer's OS, and you'll see alternatives like Linux become more and more of a niche hobbyist product, at least on the desktop, because there's no real reason to use it.
As far as what you intended to say, I still disagree. As a small business owner, I love the fact that Windows "just works" and I don't have to think about it. When I DO notice Windows is when I'm developing custom apps for my company. I notice that I can get things done quickly and cheaply with few headaches. Hell, I just re-configured our whole network the other night to switch from DHCP to static IPs, and moved a few routers, and I was actually shocked at how simple it was. I couldn't afford to spend time working around common, simple business practices with any other OS (including Mac OS). If I need to buy software, I buy it, install it, and I'm done. I don't have to waste time (money) worry about compatibility, etc. I do what needs to be done, and get back to the part of my business that earns money.
See my reply to the previous poster (especially the link). Most regular people have no idea as to what goes on on the other side of the business. It's not as simple as, "I get to sell more shit". It's more like, "Either I sell to Wal-Mart or my competitor does. In order to sell to Wal-Mart, I have to make $0.01 on the $1. I'll probably get killed by competition if I don't sell to them, and I'll probably get killed by low to zero to even negative margins if I sell to Wal-Mart." There's more to business then you saving $0.04 on a DVD player when you hand your credit card to the clerk earning $8/hour with no health insurance.
Actually, it's you that's woefully uninformed. In case you missed it, I was talking about Wal-Mart from a supplier's point of view. If you want to be a whore and shop there, more power to you. But before you accuse people of not knowing what they're talking about, you should read a bit of business fact.
there are a great number aimed at the average user which has no such requirement
If you say so... I've tried most of them, and most of them have been nothing but problems. Sure, I got a few to boot correctly, but that's where it ended.
Wal-Mart is famous for forcing their suppliers to take tiny, tiny margins, and occasionally, pushing them into bankruptcy. Wal-Mart shoppers are the bottom-feeders of the world. It's not really a market that any manufacturer *wants* to get into. Manufacturers go to Wal-MArt only because they *have* to for some reason.
That's still not expensive. Hell, if a Windows box cost $300 more than a box with some kind of Linux on it, personally, I'd still go with Windows. A few hundred bucks isn't worth the headache for me, at least. Maybe $100/box makes a big difference to people in 3rd world countries, but in the US/East Asia/Canada/Europe, most people would (and do now) gladly pay a few hundred bucks extra NOT to have to deal with a Linux box. That's why people don't generally build their own cars: sure, they'd save money, but only a fool doesn't weigh cost against their own time.
A "low budget"? $750K/year for a website where the website owner doesn't even provide content? It's just a framework. That's it. There's very little new coding needed. What are they paying somebody to do, babysit the servers? True, they're spending less money than most dot-com hype-driven useless businesses, but they're still spending MUCH, MUCH more than they should be. I certainly wouldn't donate to a non-profit that wasted money like they do. The owner's loaded. Why doesn't he spend a tiny fraction of his money on it? We all know he's going to make out like a bandit when he finally gets around to selling Wikipedia in the next few years.
You don't have to do much research to see that the future lies with Joomla.
And you don't have to have much of a brain to realize that nobody is going to buy a piece of software called "Joomla!", no matter who's doing the programming.
Apparently, in the media driven "new science", different species can interbreed! What a great discovery! I guess that next, we'll see, what? Dog-Men? Millipede-Asparagus? Corn-Sheep?
This is all complete and utter bullshit. There's no such thing as completely different species being able to "cross breed". The weeds have just developed a resistance (through natural selection) to the pesticides from being sprayed with pesticide. That's all there is.
The same thing is happening with fleas and Frontline. Frontline used to work about 99% of the time on fleas. As of this past summer, Frontline now only works about 75% of the time on fleas in our area. Basic natural selection. Nothing to see here. Keep moving, please.
Plain and simple, this shitty advertisement disguised as an "article" sucks. Seriously, can we get the Editors to make up a new "advertising" category so we can opt out? I know that that may be asking too much from people who can't even bother to spell check a 3 sentence article summary, or check to see if the same article was posted in the past 24 hours.
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Your post is a great example of the overall decline in the quality of the human gene pool, and society as a whole.
Ahhhhhhhhh, the irony.
It wasn't intended to be ironic. I'm completely serious. People who say such stupid things actually ARE an example of the human species' overall decline in intelligence and suitability.
"Stable platform"? C'mon. Can't you trolls come up with anything new? Windows hasn't has stability issues since the Win 95/98/ME days. At least come up with something that's marginally relevant or true. This pathetic FUD is getting really, really old and tired.
They get these names from marketing firms that spend lots of time and money researching the names.
I agree 100%. Don't trust people with college degrees in Journalism. Don't trust decades old organizations that have editors and fact-checkers. Don't trust reporters just because they actually "see" news as it happens. Don't trust people who have worked, often their entire adult lives, to get to the position they occupy. Instead, trust something written anonymously on the Internet.
Your post is a great example of the overall decline in the quality of the human gene pool, and society as a whole.
"I'm the [CEO|manager|owner] don't bother me with trivial details. *I* have important work to do".
That's right, and they're right. They're more important than you. Their time is more valuable, and they are much less replaceable than you, no matter who you are. Now, get over it, and quit bothering them with trivial details, or you'll be unemployed.
I guess I have a question: What would it take Microsoft (or Linux) doing to make you consider switching? If the temperature is slowly ratcheted up, when do you jump out (or do you just boil)?
For me, it comes down to money and time (which are the same thing). It's just a simple calculation of "product X costs $$ and takes x hours a year at $y/hour to set up and keep working" vs. the same thing for product Y. Just looking at OS's here at work: I pay about $200 up front for Windows 2000 on each machine, with probably 2 hours/year dealing with various OS related problems per machine. I expect to keep the same OS for about 5-7 years. If I were to look at Linux, it would cost $0 up front along with probably 100 hours to learn how it works, set it up, and find vendors for new apps. Maintenance would probably be similar to what I do now. Those 100 or so hours up front would take many, many years to pay back, taking everything into consideration. I'd expect a financial return after one-three years, if I were to make a money/time investment now.
On top of that, I'd have to make the same evaluation for each application that I'd have to switch. Going to Linux would end up costing a *lot* of money for us, with no real return for many years.
And with software, looking much further than 5 years is a moot point, because things change so quickly. But looking at a 5-10 year horizon, I can be relatively sure that MS will still be around and kicking, but there aren't any Linux vendors right now that I'd bet on being alive in 5-10 years. So not only is any kind of ROI pretty far out, but if I end up having to move to a different vendor in even 5 years, then that pretty much destroys any hope of getting any kind of return for a good decade.
I think that those are pretty accurate estimates. And, unless I'm missing something major, I can't see why I, or somebody else in a similar situation would consider changing. The only reason that I could see considering making such a big investment would be if MS either quadrupled their prices, or charged the equivalent of the full price of the OS every year as ongoing licensing.
But tell me how this impacts me and my business right now. That's what I, as a Windows user, care about. Not some idealistic bullshit about "Windows is evil". I don't believe it, nor do I care about that. That's just stuff that academics can argue over. As far as I can tell, none of this stuff impacts us at all. Our PC's update themselves when they need to, and we don't have any problems. If you're trying to convince me, then give me a real, concrete example of how I can save money or time. If it's not saving me money or time, then I really couldn't care less (and why should I?)
I agree with your analogy. I think that it's spot-on. The crux of it for me comes down to long-term vs. short term. I'm using Windows (and other things of course) to earn a living. I own a small business with employees, and ultimately, my business runs on top of Windows. If I have software problems of any kind, we're closed and there's no income. Any kind of downtime in retail also greatly hurts customers' perception of your business, also. So, I simply can't afford to spend time and money dicking around with software, no matter what the long-term effects may be. I have several rents to pay, and people whose livelihoods also hinge on my ability to keep things running smoothly and cheaply.
I simply do not have the luxury of putting myself out now (even a little bit) in order to make a "Big picture" impact, either. That's why the biggest OSS advocates tend to be either 1. Traditionally rich (lots of money) or 2. students (lots of time, few financial responsibilities). Same thing with any kind of big picture issue, like all types of political and social activism. Average Joe (like me) simply doesn't have the time or money resources to have any impact. But if I don't address the immediate needs, them I'm pretty much out on the street.
Now, you can also say that there are long term benefits. There may be, but depending on who you are, short term needs just cannot be overlooked. The way I see it, there may be some advantages for us to use OSS at some point, but I won't even be able to address those advantages until I'm much more secure financially. Most people in the US are in the same situation: they need to bust their ass to get by, and saving a bit of money now, and making their lives a bit better in the future by going with Company B now is less important than keeping their food cold today. If you are wealthy enough to be able to spend time and money working with Company B, either because you have a spare working unit from Company A, or if you can afford to eat out each meal if Company B's fridge isn't working quite right, then good for you. But it would be wrong to assume that it's even on the radar of most people, and not because they don't know what's out there. They know that B is out there, but we're hungry, and somewhat cold food today is much more important than having somewhat cheaper (colder?) food two years into the future.
What does Exchange have to do with Windows, other than it's made by the same company? I thought that we were talking about OS's, not apps. I have a few apps that are a PITA. How an application works has nothing to do with Windows in most cases. That's like saying that Ford sucks because your car stereo that you installed into your car sucks. I can install any of hundreds of different mail serves onto Windows.
As far as Exchange goes, I hear that it's also a real PITA, but that being said, there's no competition out there. Nobody makes anything that does what Exchange does. The options are fight with Exchange, or cobble together a mail server, a calendar server, a meeting server, a task assigner, and whatever other PIM stuff Exchange does. It sounds like the market is ripe for a more solid Exchange replacement. You should get coding!
I agree completely. My point is that suppliers are certainly not knocking each other out to get into Wal-Mart because it's quite often, a BAD business decision to go to Wal-Mart. If you do any kind of reading into the business end of Wal-Mart, you'll see that most suppliers are in Wal-Mart because they HAVE to. Do you really think that Apple WANTS to sell to Wal-Mart? Do you think that they want to sell a $200 iPod for $100? Do you think that Rolls-Royce wants to start selling a $10K car through Wal-Mart? Selling a bigger quantity of something is not necessarily better than selling less, especially if your profit per item has to drop dramatically. It's simply numbers. I question whether an already successful company like Google would really be interested in getting into a business with margins that are a tiny fraction of what they currently are.
And where do you go when Windows doesn't work?
That's my point. I haven't had any serious problems from Windows since the DOS days (Windows 95/98/ME). If something minor comes up (which I haven't seen in many years), then I can hire one of thousands on consultants, I can ask any geek, I can call Microsoft, I can hit their web site, I can Google, etc. It happens so rarely now, that it's simply not a concern.
It's not worth worrying about, any more than it's worth worry about what to do if my oven fails. An oven works until it breaks, and that's generally many, many years later. And when it does break, it's cheap enough to just buy a new one, or fix it myself if it's something simple.
But, even though I own a company that runs on Windows, it's just not a concern to me, and that's the way it should be. I worry about hardware failures much more than I worry about a Windows failure.
Oh yeah, and no need for the FUD. That's just tacky.
I don't need to constantly update virus and spyware definitions on Linux or MacOS. I don't have to constatly plug remote exploit holes on Linux or MacOS.
Welcome to 2004! All of this has been automatic for years.
It's not worth my time to document and look for help. Why would it be? The *second* that I start looking into why X isn't working in Linux, I'm losing money and valuable time, because my alternative is to spend a couple of hundred bucks on Windows and be done with it. Unless you're a hobbyist or a masochist, there's little to no reason to intentionally cause more problems for yourself. It's kind of like if somebody came out with a "better" refrigerator (let's say that it'll save you a bit in energy costs), but you have to put it together yourself, and learn all about refrigeration to use it. What person in their right mind, other than somebody who is unemployed, would bother? Go to the store, buy a refrigerator, and plug it in. End of story. The standard for refrigerators and operating systems is "plug it in, and use it" at this point. Anything else is sub-standard unless you have special needs, and spending extra time working with it will be worth it to you in the long run.
The number of people who actually use Windows because they enjoy it and think it's a good OS is quite small, I think.
I'd agree completely, but not for the same reason that you seem to think. I think that Windows is good enough now that it's a non-issue for most people. The OS has become quite transparent, easy to use, and relatively problem free. I think that most average people these days think about Windows about as much as they think about the company that made the wiring harnesses for their car engines. Windows just works, and people ignore it. That's the way it should happen. That's the natural progression of any new product. If anything, you'll see even fewer people knowing or caring what kind of Windows that they run in the future, because it just keeps getting better. With every new Windows release, there's less reason for people to even think about their computer's OS, and you'll see alternatives like Linux become more and more of a niche hobbyist product, at least on the desktop, because there's no real reason to use it.
As far as what you intended to say, I still disagree. As a small business owner, I love the fact that Windows "just works" and I don't have to think about it. When I DO notice Windows is when I'm developing custom apps for my company. I notice that I can get things done quickly and cheaply with few headaches. Hell, I just re-configured our whole network the other night to switch from DHCP to static IPs, and moved a few routers, and I was actually shocked at how simple it was. I couldn't afford to spend time working around common, simple business practices with any other OS (including Mac OS). If I need to buy software, I buy it, install it, and I'm done. I don't have to waste time (money) worry about compatibility, etc. I do what needs to be done, and get back to the part of my business that earns money.
See my reply to the previous poster (especially the link). Most regular people have no idea as to what goes on on the other side of the business. It's not as simple as, "I get to sell more shit". It's more like, "Either I sell to Wal-Mart or my competitor does. In order to sell to Wal-Mart, I have to make $0.01 on the $1. I'll probably get killed by competition if I don't sell to them, and I'll probably get killed by low to zero to even negative margins if I sell to Wal-Mart." There's more to business then you saving $0.04 on a DVD player when you hand your credit card to the clerk earning $8/hour with no health insurance.
Actually, it's you that's woefully uninformed. In case you missed it, I was talking about Wal-Mart from a supplier's point of view. If you want to be a whore and shop there, more power to you. But before you accuse people of not knowing what they're talking about, you should read a bit of business fact.
there are a great number aimed at the average user which has no such requirement
If you say so... I've tried most of them, and most of them have been nothing but problems. Sure, I got a few to boot correctly, but that's where it ended.
Wal-Mart is famous for forcing their suppliers to take tiny, tiny margins, and occasionally, pushing them into bankruptcy. Wal-Mart shoppers are the bottom-feeders of the world. It's not really a market that any manufacturer *wants* to get into. Manufacturers go to Wal-MArt only because they *have* to for some reason.
That's still not expensive. Hell, if a Windows box cost $300 more than a box with some kind of Linux on it, personally, I'd still go with Windows. A few hundred bucks isn't worth the headache for me, at least. Maybe $100/box makes a big difference to people in 3rd world countries, but in the US/East Asia/Canada/Europe, most people would (and do now) gladly pay a few hundred bucks extra NOT to have to deal with a Linux box. That's why people don't generally build their own cars: sure, they'd save money, but only a fool doesn't weigh cost against their own time.
A "low budget"? $750K/year for a website where the website owner doesn't even provide content? It's just a framework. That's it. There's very little new coding needed. What are they paying somebody to do, babysit the servers? True, they're spending less money than most dot-com hype-driven useless businesses, but they're still spending MUCH, MUCH more than they should be. I certainly wouldn't donate to a non-profit that wasted money like they do. The owner's loaded. Why doesn't he spend a tiny fraction of his money on it? We all know he's going to make out like a bandit when he finally gets around to selling Wikipedia in the next few years.
You don't have to do much research to see that the future lies with Joomla.
And you don't have to have much of a brain to realize that nobody is going to buy a piece of software called "Joomla!", no matter who's doing the programming.
You shouldn't believe me. You should investigate yourself, of course.
Apparently, in the media driven "new science", different species can interbreed! What a great discovery! I guess that next, we'll see, what? Dog-Men? Millipede-Asparagus? Corn-Sheep?
This is all complete and utter bullshit. There's no such thing as completely different species being able to "cross breed". The weeds have just developed a resistance (through natural selection) to the pesticides from being sprayed with pesticide. That's all there is.
The same thing is happening with fleas and Frontline. Frontline used to work about 99% of the time on fleas. As of this past summer, Frontline now only works about 75% of the time on fleas in our area. Basic natural selection. Nothing to see here. Keep moving, please.
Plain and simple, this shitty advertisement disguised as an "article" sucks. Seriously, can we get the Editors to make up a new "advertising" category so we can opt out? I know that that may be asking too much from people who can't even bother to spell check a 3 sentence article summary, or check to see if the same article was posted in the past 24 hours.