...or maybe its the perceptions that Macs are only used by poor, starving artist with no money to rip off. Once the Mac user base fills with old folks with old money...let the games begin:)
I know you're talking about public perception of mac users, which is something I have not seen any real research into, but I have seen research into mac users as a market. In fact they have something in common with the gay market. Market analysts have written several articles singling out mac users as one of those affluent population segments that has money and is willing to spend. Certain high-end car companies, electronics sellers, and furniture stores have specifically targeted mac users with portions of their ad campaigns. A BMW ad in a tattoo magazine is probably not going to get you many sales. The same ad in a really common publication like "People" may get you a medium number of sales for eyeballs reached. An ad in a mac specific publication, however, yields even better results. You've just refined your ad to a segment of the population that has more disposable income and willingness to pay more for perceived quality than the average cross-segment.
I don't know what the "public" perception of mac users is, or more topically what the virus writer's perspective is, but there is some evidence as to what the mac user market segment itself is.
How hard would it be to convince some average uses that the worm/virus/trojan that they're downloading is actually an amazing tool to "tweak" some aspect of their computer's performance (internet/speed/ram/etc...)?
This is a very important point. While right now automated worms that do not rely upon any social engineering or human interaction are the bulk of the problem, it is possible that there will come a day when the user is the weakest link and social engineering and trojans are the biggest threat. It is important to note that right now this is not the case, on Windows especially. It is also the job of the OS to have default permissions in fine enough detail and with a good enough UI so that the user has the tools they need to address this problem.
Here is the proper behavior of a well written OS to a trojan such as you describe. As a new executable it is automatically contained within a jail, VM, or ACL. This grants it no access to any files it does not itself create, no direct (unfiltered) access to hardware, and no access to the internet. When the user runs the executable (which they believe is a "tuning" program) the OS makes it clear that it is an application with visual cues and the OS warns the user that this is the first time this executable has been run and asks if the user really wants to run it. The OS also presents any organizations/bodies that have reviewed the software and certify that it meets some criteria.
The process does not, however, end there. When run the OS warns the user that the program would like access to the internet and provide basic information about the communication manner. Since the program has no access to any files it could send your IP address along somewhere, but that is about it. In order to gain access to any files the program would have to specifically ask for access to those files. Even more strongly worded warning again appear and require a choice by the user to access the root level files, the buddy list, the e-mail address book, etc. The same goes for any other unusual behavior like access to the keyboard input when other programs are in the foreground.
Does this completely solve the problem? No. But it solves about 99% of the problem and until all this low hanging fruit is gathered there is no point in trying to do a lot of user education. Give users the right tools to keep their machines secure and then worry about educating them on the last little bit of the pie.
VMs and jails have come a long way in the last few years and are beginning to enter the mainstream. What is still needed is the integration, good defaults, and good GUI. My money is on Apple to do it right first, but I could be wrong. MS may beat them to the punch, and OpenBSD or one of the secure Linux's is not out of the running.
In summary, yes, trojans+social engineering are a concern. No, they aren't the biggest concern right now and no they aren't an unsolvable problem. If only OS vendors will solve the problem and move on.
The "whistleblower" status is for people who know that something dirty and wrong is going on and turn over their evidence to internal agencies of the government to deal with it.
This is wrong. Whistle-blowers status is to protect individuals who divulge information vital to the welfare of the people in which the people have an overriding interest. In many cases they are reporting on government corruption and cannot be expected to trust other elements of the government. It is important that they can provide their information to law enforcement and the public via any channel, public or private.
He leaked to the goddam newspaper. That's exactly the opposite of what you're supposed to do. He's geetting what he deserves.
A man stuck his neck out. He risked his job and possibly his life to expose corrupt and criminal actions that undermine the very foundations of out government (the democratic process). I don't care if he did it because he wanted to be famous or if he did it because he had a grudge. The end result is that the public found out about very important abuses. It is important that the laws protect him to encourage this behavior in others.
Now is it right for me to say that my linux computers are more secure just because they are running linux? No, that's stupid.
Why is that stupid? There are real architectural, operational, testing, and implementation differences between Windows and Linux. Obviously one of them is more secure and less likely to be compromised than the other. There is nothing stupid about looking at those differences and at the track record of both OS's and making predictions and making usage decisions based upon that information. "They're all the same," is the argument of a lazy man or someone trying to justify a bad choice by trying to make all choices look equally bad.
The same thing applies with this story - Macs can be exploited because that is the nature of the business. We usually find the holes because some numbnut exploits it.
No one is arguing that Macs can't be exploited. They certainly can be and are. We do not, however, find most exploitable holes by seeing exploits in the wild. The majority of holes are discovered by developers coding the products. The next largest chunk are found by users and legitimate security researchers. Then a few are found when they are exploited in the wild by hackers. How many zero day exploits have their been for Linux or OS X? The answer is very, very few if any. There have been some for Windows, but most of the underlying vulnerabilities were probably discovered by MS, but they just did not get around to fixing them.
Sure there will be exploits and even zero-day exploits for OS X, but they are just not likely to spread widely or be much of a problem for the average user. If they are a large threat they will be well-known and quickly fixed. A major worm for OS X would be news and it would be unusual. For Windows it is business as usual.
But don't assume that just because no one has broken into your house yet that your house is completely secure.
This is a very good analogy. My house is concrete block and was built with only glass block windows on the first floor. Actually the block is two thick on the first floor. Before I bought it, someone had wired a security system and outdoor flood lights. A few months back someone busted into my shed, but ran off without getting anything. The items in my shed are relatively large an not all that valuable.
I'd say that is a good analogy for OS X. It is built with security in mind on well tested, industrial grade framework. They have added onto it and made it more secure in some ways and less secure in others, but it will likely never be as insecure as the neighbor's ranch style place with two plate glass doors and a key under the mat that you see the kids get out every day.
OS X had someone break into the shed (try to distribute a trojan) but nothing has been taken. It is a good sign that maybe Apple and OS X users should be paying attention and maybe doing some more security reviews, but it is in no way comparable to the apartment complex down the street that have been burgled at least once a month for several years and where we always hear about people getting shot.
Certainly I think that not having users run as root by default will help Mac OS X, but that doesn't stop them entering their password when prompted. You can't secure against user stupidity except by scanning each file that they try to execute for viruses. And that means virus checkers, and the associated slowdowns they bring.
I disagree. Creating a blacklist of malware is a way to make machines more secure, but it is only one third of the equation. In addition modern OS's should be implementing jails, ACLs, or VMs for new executables of any sort and providing them with a very limited access to the OS. Further these default limitations need to be built around a very usable UI that informs the user about any unusual behaviors a program wants to use in plain, understandable language. It should have sensible, restrictive defaults. Finally, the application dev tools should encourage the development of programs that don't run afoul of these rules and minimize inconvenience for users. Users should only rarely be asked to let a program have additional privileges and it should always be framed in such a way that the user needs to understand what the program wants to do in order to enter the right decision. For example, "This program would like to read your e-mail address book. (Don't let it read my address book)(Let it read my e-mail address book)" That right there would stop a huge number of malware applications from propagating.
I know I would hate to have to promise that my documentation matches the current state of my latest software...
You'd think with hundreds of millions of dollars on the line they could afford to hire a few people to create said documentation if they wanted to comply. One thing of note, the independent commissioner who judged the documentation insufficient was a guy MS picked for the job.
Sure, it'd be nice if they kept to the standard, but complaining that they did something differently doesn't make much sense.
Yes, it does in this case. Normally it would not be a problem, but when you have a monopoly your motivations and the effects of your actions are subject to restrictions to prevent abuse. They intentionally broke the standard to disadvantage those using the standard. This is illegal because it is an interface to a product they have monopolized. Once you have a monopoly it is illegal to pull the same tricks that are legal when you don't have a monopoly.
I agree. You're getting into a symantics argument there. I should have said "anti-Microsoft" instead.
And you'd still be wrong. I'm not anti-miscrosoft. If Microsoft obeyed the laws and stopped destroying the industry I'd have no problems with them. I'm also not anti-Osam Bin Ladin. I am anti-mass murderer. If Bin Ladin did not orchestrate the murder of thousands I'd have no problem with him. The point is MS has and is seriously damaging the industry and the progress of computing. They are hurting the consumers, killing many innovative businesses with new technologies, gouging excessive amounts of money from people, and behaving both illegally and unethically.
Your implication is that I'm opposed to MS, thus I look for reasons to dislike them. I'm asserting that MS is doing very bad things, thus I dislike them. Do you see the difference?
It would take Dell or Gateway less than 15 minutes to put Firefox, Gimp, OpenOffice, etc on their base image. It's not like they need to manually install it on every computer they sell. Why would they remove software anyway? Anyone would agree that having many choices is better than just one.
How long would it take them to make sure it was the most recent version every week? How about support costs? There are a lot of expenses involved and your implication that the barrier is insignificant is not supported by the actions of the industry. Firefox has been the better browser by a large margin for years, but no one ships it on their computers. Having more choices, is not always better from the consumer or retailer point of view. Simplicity can be cheaper to sell and support. A lot of people would like a machine without IE for security reasons, but they don't even have that option.
True. However, in this particular case the complaint is about Active Directory. It's very simple purchasing a copy of Windows 2000 without Active Directory... you just don't buy the Server version.
You're missing the point. Win2K is not even supported anymore. Win XP has AD integration built in, which means a server that includes AD has an advantage over one that does not. No one except MS can fully implement an AD server because it is not open and documented. This gives Windows server products and advantage by way of integration with their desktop. That is illegal.
So which is it... should MS provide ANY programs with their base OS, forcing users and OEM's install a web browser, email client, media player, calculator, word processor, etc; or should they provide a base set of software for their users and not prohibit users and OEM's from selecting alternatives.
The law and my opinion both say the former. If you don't understand why, you're not understanding the affects of monopolies on an industry and why basically every country has a law forbidding the latter. The reason is it is devastating to the economy and detrimental to all the industries involved and to consumers. It bypasses the advantages of capitalism and lets an inferior product dominate at an arbitrary price. It also allows a monopoly to spread until it theoretically encompasses all markets.
The thing is, almost every software company out there bundles their stuff. Adobe, Apple, Sun, linux distributions, etc. Going to complain about them as well?
OK pay attention. I'm going to say this one more time. It is illegal and very bad for the industry to use bundling to leverage a monopoly to gain in other markets. It removes all the advantages of capitalism and a free market. Adobe, Apple, Sun, and Linux retailers don't have monopolies. MS does have a monopoly. See the difference?
There is no reverse engineering required or funky calls you have to do to talk to AD. standard LDAP queries have worked fine for every version.
You misunderstand. Administrative LDAP tools have been modified to understand AD, not just to make queries. There is a lot more to administration than you are implying.
So how do you sell a car at all, given every single component of a car "is sold in another market" ?
There is a market for cars. There is a market for replacement parts. You can still sell cars, so long as you don't unfairly take over the market for replacement parts. That is to say, you can't sell a car with an additional after-market part bundled. (Theoretically this could include even extra fuses in the fuse box or spare tires.) You also can't start incorporating new products that cut into an existing market. For example, there is a market for portable TVs to watch in the car. It is illegal to start incorporating TVs into cars, unless you sell them separately from the auto's so they can be "plugged in" to the car. Further, it is illegal to use secret/restricted interfaces to plug the TV into the car or do anything else that will disadvantage others trying to sell into the same market. This is part of the price companies pay for having a monopoly. The alternative is everything you buy, rent, lease, live in, etc. is made by and owned by standard oil (or the medici's or the east india trading company). When AT&T was broken up you couldn't even buy telephones anymore, just rent them from the phone company and they all sucked. IE is a piece of crap, but everyone still uses it. See the parallel?
I've accessed the AD with normal LDAP tools and the schema is browsable with the schema tool in the Administrator Toolkit as well. The AD also has some great features that LDAP doesn't have, so calling it broken is a bit of a misnomer.
Yes, most LDAP tools work somewhat with AD, due to the reverse engineering efforts of the developers. AD is an intentionally broken implementation of a standard, that is to say it intentionally deviates from the standard to prevent interoperability. It is only broken in terms of the standard, obviously it works.
If AD were required to use Windows 2000, you might have a point, but that's far from the case here.
I strongly disagree. Anything about it that makes it work better with an MS product than with other products is leveraging their monopoly and illegal. It does not need to be required.
Most people see and care about true discrimination, but get fed up when the race card is played so frequently.
Since there is no objective way to know this we'll have to just maintain our different opinions. It is irrelevant to this discussion for the most part anyway.
So was IE. So was WMP. Both of those are scrutinized by anti-monopoly folks like yourself. Windows for Workgroups and the NT3.5 domain controller features were as well, and Active Directory is basically a more advanced version of the same thing.
What is your point? I said it was unlikely. Anyone who is not "anti-monopoly" is either a monopolist or has a lousy understanding of economics. There is a reason abusing monopolies is illegal in almost every country. They are very damaging and remove all the major benefits of capitalism.
Exactly. Microsoft should not be putting pressure on Dell, Gateway, etc to exclude non-MS products in their base setups. If Dell wants to pre-install Firefox, then MS shouldn't be able to punish Dell in any way. That's what they got into trouble with before, and it shouldn't happen again. However, that's far different than including software that customers would expect from that particular operating system or software bundle.
That does not go far enough to be a level playing field. It takes work to install software and more work to remove software. MS needs to provide application separate from their OS, the same as any other application provider does. If customers expect types of software, that is fine and should be up the OEM. If they expect a particular brand of software, an expectation built by the abuse of a monopoly over many years, that is a different case.
I don't think you're really understanding the concept of bundling and the effect upon the market. No software is free to develop and anything MS includes with their OS you are paying for, you're just not being given the option to pay for it separately. These features should be separate and the price of Windows should be lowered to compensate for that.
Given that many of the same apps run on both Mac and PC platforms, why don't more people bench Mac vs. PC? I mean we are even talking about virtually the same architecture, the mac is now just another OS running on x86 hardware like Linux et al.
Historically it is because there has not been "equivalent" hardware. There have been benchmarks and they have been a mixed bag, and no one knows what is because of hardware, what is because of software, and what is because of the OS.
Now that Intel macs are starting to come out, we can mostly eliminate one of those three variables, the hardware. More-so when people get Windows running on mac hardware or vice versus. Right now though, what are you going to benchmark? It is hard to find hardware close to an intel imac and the macbooks aren't shipping yet. And most of the software anyone is interested in is still running in emulation mode on OS X for intel. Just wait six months and we will be able to compare some native apps on different platforms and the same hardware. This will be very useful for general performance and for finding bottlenecks in OS's and in particular software.
People seem to just look for an excuse to nark on Microsoft. When I install an OS, frankly I'd rather have my essentials right then.
Yup you and the.05% of people who have ever installed an OS. You are not representative of the market. The market is almost entirely composed of the pre-installed market. The vast majority of the rest of the market is the corporate market. Both of these segments suffer because of bundling.
Any consumer wouldn't be in their right mind to say "No I'd rather go buy some from some website or something."
99% of consumers buy a computer from Dell or some other OEM. Nothing is illegal about that OEM bundling an OS, a a browser, a media player, or multiple versions of all of these. What is illegal is Dell not having a choice as to whether they install Firefox or IE; WMP or iTunes.
My sister would be content with Windows Media Player.
And that is the problem. Dell cannot pick the cheapest or best media player for your sister and your sister can't pick the computer that comes with the best player. She has to use the one MS decrees, because they are leveraging their desktop OS monopoly. That is illegal and result in most people, like your sister, using an inferior Web browser (IE). It will result in her having an inferior media player etc, once MS dominates these markets with their monopoly and no longer have any incentive to make a good product.
If what Microsoft provides is enough for the average computer user, then maybe whoever is selling their software should rethink their position compared to Microsoft's.
In a free market the best, cheapest product should dominate. If that is not happening, then the market is broken. If that is not happening because one company is breaking the law and leveraging an existing monopoly, they should be stopped and fined. Consumers should not have to settle for barely good enough. Consumers expect a fair market and act as if one existed. Surely if their was a better browser than IE and it was free, it would come with my computer, right? Because monopolies break free markets when abused, it is illegal and because nothing has been done about the abuse consumers are misled and screwed over. That is bad for the industry (look at how bad Web standards and security and usability are) and it is bad for consumers.
Microsoft should not be punished for attempting to make the average computer user's life easier. Linux bundles pretty much everything that Microsoft does (respectively different programs of course) - and I don't see Linux distro's getting flak for it.
No Linux distro is leveraging a monopoly to break the free market and breaking the law in the process. Bundling is illegal for monopolies. I have a hard time believing so many people on Slashdot can be ignorant about monopolies, bundling, and basic economics. Either people are astroturfing or our educational system is worse than I thought. MS isn't trying to make people's lives easier. They are choosing to break the law as their business model, betting that the profit will outweigh the court settlements and punishments. So far they have been correct to an astronomical degree. They understand perfectly what they are doing, but they are betting most people will be ignorant, apathetic, or bribable.
There has to be more to the story. IANAL, but "bundling" software is nothing new, and certainly shouldn't be considered wrong. How can you differentiate "bundling software" from including features? For instance Winamp can now do far more than just play media. Are the ripping features, the burning features, etc, now "bundled"? When did a law get passed saying software can only do one thing?
Here is what you are missing. It is illegal for monopolies to bundle a product from one market with a product from another market in which they have a monopoly. Bundling is not illegal for non-monopolies. Monopolies and bundling are defined in terms of markets, that is dollars moved around, not in terms of products. Further, not only bundling, but any other illegal tying that allows you to use your monopoly to get an unfair advantage in other markets is illegal. This includes things like making undocumented interface between a monopoly product and another product (Server OS+AD and their desktop OS).
So let's see, we're complaining now because Windows comes with more programs for us to use? What the hell is wrong with these people? I've seen too many anti-trust suits like this.
Allow me to once again explain why bundling is illegal for monopolies. Doesn't anyone take econ 101 anymore?
Say I gain a monopoly on cars (yes I know it is cliche). Well, maybe my cars were the best or maybe I just had the best sales guys. How does not matter. The law now says I can't bundle anything with my cars that is sold in another market. For example, since most people are forced to buy my cars if they need a car it is illegal for me to give away a free television with every car. The reason for this is simple. Televisions are not free. So what in reality is happening is I have raised the price of my cars to cover that cost. I'm now selling a car+TV bundle. The result is most TV sellers go out of business. It does not matter if their TV's cost less to produce or if they are quite a bit better than mine. So long as they are not so much better that people are willing to pay for my TV and then buy their TV as well, they will be crushed. This is unfair to them and to consumer because consumers pay more and get a worse product, even though on the surface they are getting an extra "free" TV.
Now, lets change our hypothetical a bit. Suppose instead of giving away free TVs, I were to instead change all my cars to run on a new, secret fuel. I'm not giving anything away, but I've used a secret to tie my fuel to my car. In this way I can dominate the fuel industry. Now maybe in this case someone could reverse engineer the fuel and make something else that burns the same way, for less. In the case of computer interfaces such as protocols and formats, this is exceedingly complex. This is the case with MS's server and desktop OS's. They aren't bundling them, just tying them with secret protocols. This is why the EU is demanding MS document those interfaces.
So what you perceive as a free extra application is actually them forcing you to buy additional products because you have only one option for your OS.
Next week, Canonical gets sued for shipping Ubuntu with Firefox instead of Opera; Novell gets sued for shipping GNOME instead of KDE; and the XFCE guys sue everyone because nobody uses their desktop environment.
It should be noted, right now Ford, Chevy, Honda etc. can all bundle free TVs with their cars. This is allowed because none of them are monopolies, so it is not giving them any leverage to dominate the TV market. None of the companies you listed have monopolies either, hence they can bundle whatever they want.
I can't be the only one to see this -- but I just don't get why people keep talking about the big, bad Microsoft monopoly -- then looking right PAST the one thing they *do* have a monopoly on. It's all very confusing to me.
Having a monopoly is not illegal. Using it to influence other markets is. Specifically, bundling is illegal. That is why people focus on the applications, as that is the illegal abuse.
I think, however, that the culture at MS and the slow, inefficient, and bribable nature of the justice system has shown that MS is not about to stop abusing their monopoly and current remedies (what few have been mandated) are ignored and/or ineffective. The best solution for getting competition back into the computer industry is to break up MS. I don't think Open Sourcing the OS is necessarily the proper mandate. Rather I think MS should be broken up into separate companies. The major areas of domination should be divided and forced to compete with one another. For example, two or three different new companies should all be given equal rights to the IP and code in the OS. These companies should each get equal numbers of the dev staff and funding and should be forbidden to collude with one another in any way. All product interfaces should be made open and published standards including AD, exchange, etc.
Similarly the application development should be divided. When Dell or gateway want an OS and applications for their computers they should have the option to buy from any of these new companies as well as a Linux distro or something else. Let them compete with each other on price and features. This, in my opinion, is the best solution to the current problem. MS won't abuse their monopoly because they won't have one. Money won't be diverted to overseas companies unless those companies can make a better product than any of the ones in the US. Innovation and price competition will revitalize the market.
Note, this was the original ruling of the courts, before MS bought them.
I acutally use a PowerBook but I've always wondered why tying the iPod to the iTunes music store via Fairplay isn't a anti-trust violation too since they have the Windows market share in online music and MP3 players.
Actually, the last numbers I saw listed them as 72% and 79% respectively. That is not nearly as high as MS's desktop OS market share. There is, however, legal action to get them declared a monopoly. Part of the issue is also that the only major competitor to Fairplay is WMD, which is a blatant and uncorrected act of monopoly bundling. Taking action against Apple for this while nothing has been done about MS would probably be enough to get some real questions asked about the impartiality of our legal system. As I said Apple has 79% of a market and are bundling it with something. MS has 95% of a market, have been declared an abusive monopoly, and are bundling a competing product with it.
have a Windows machine but can choose to use Outlook, Window Media Player etc, I am not forced to....Why isn't including QuickTime tied closely to OS X also the same thing.
Quicktime and OS X both have small market shares in their respective markets. Windows is a monopoly in their market, thus bundling anything from another market with it is illegal.
Bundling software isn't anti-competitive behaviour unless there's something else going on, like forcing computer manufacturers to bundle that software with their computers.
Bundling is the very first example of anti-competative behavior listed in the Sherman antitrust legislation. It is illegal to bundle a product in a market you have monopolized with a product in another market.
Nobody is forced to use Active Directory when they set up a Windows server, although most people do because it makes sense. Honestly, as someone who's not worked with large linux networks, I'm not sure what the alternative would be. However, lack of a viable alternative, or even lack of a popular alternative, doesn't make Microsoft wrong for packaging Active Directory with their product.
Active Directory is MS's intentionally broken and obfuscated implementation of LDAP. The problem with adding it to MS's server OS's is not that bundling those two together is illegal. The problem is the Desktop OS is built to rely upon AD, which is a "secret" interface between the desktop and server products. This illegally ties the two products by making MS's server work better with their monopoly desktop product. In this way their server does not have to compete on price and functionality with other server products and instead can gain market by leveraging the desktop monopoly. That is what is illegal about it. Note MS has already been convicted of leveraging their desktop OS monopoly to promote their server and that is why the EU ordered them to fully document the interaction of the two products. This is just one more secret interaction.
Outlook uses exchange and office uses Word. Both the protocol and the format are built into the desktop OS in ways that are most likely illegal. Aside from that, unless MS is shown to have a monopoly on some office productivity application I'm not sure what they are arguing for this one.
This reminds me of people playing the race card... it's done even when that complaint isn't accurate, and as a result makes people less likely to believe when there's a REAL issue.
The problem is, as it often is with race, many people don't see or care about the discrimination.
What's next... claiming that inclusion of MS Paint is anti-competitive?
Possibly, but not likely. MSPaint was already included with the OS before they were declared a monopoly. Bundling new applications of any sort is a concern though. It should be up to OEMs like Dell and Gateway to decide what applications should be bundled on their PCs. If MS wants to sell additional applications to them for inclusion, that is fine; provided their is no coercion and provided they are offered separately from Windows. Once you become a monopoly you have to follow a whole new set of rules.
True, it does put competing products at a disadvantage...
This is illegal. It is giving one product an advantage simply because it is bundled with a monopolized product. It is a classic case of abuse. It results in possibly inferior products dominating a market and that is bad for everyone.
...but I as a customer wouldn't want to have to obtain third-party products just to do simple things like viewing images or web pages.
As a consumer you would not have to. OEMs are free to bundle whatever they want including any servers or media players. More importantly, the free market then moves to standards so that all servers and media players can interoperate. Imagine if all music and video was implemented in open standards and portable music players, could play music from all stores. Imagine if AD was documented and you could run it on a Linux, Solaris, or Windows server without hacks. It levels they playing field and lets you choose a product based upon how good and how cheap it is, rather than on the fact that it is the only one that can work with some hidden formula.
As long as alternative products are able to work with the system to the same degree as Microsoft's offerings, I see no problem.
Then you are not understanding monopolies. Web technologies have stagnated since MS took over with IE. They have a broken implementation of a ten year old standard and cannot even get the eight year old CSS2 standard to work, because they have no motivation to make a better product. Security, tabbed browsing, ad blocking, why bother when you can just use your existing monopoly to dominate. That same phenomenon will happen to server OS's and to digital media unless the law is enforced. Give them a few years to capture the market then watch the whole field come to a screeching halt while MS focuses their attention elsewhere.
Bundling small apps with the OS and increases the value of the system to the average user. If Microsoft is guilty of this, then how much moreso are *BSD and Linux distros?
Bundling only allows an inferior product to dominate when one of the products bundled together is a monopoly. MS has a monopoly. Linux and BSD do not. The law restricts monopolies and not other companies for a reason.
AD is a propriety, undocumented interface between their server and desktop OS's. You know the things the EU ordered MS to document. It is just adding one more illegal tie in that allows MS to leverage their desktop OS monopoly into market share in the server market, even though their product is inferior. Bundling it with the server is not a problem, so long as the interface with the desktop is fully documented; which it isn't.
C'mon now? AD with server..??..??! M$ also bundles telnet with the OS as well! Oh noes!,/i>
MS has a monopoly on desktop operating systems. MS is using that monopoly, illegally, to gain a monopoly on server operating systems. They do this by building proprietary, undocumented protocols and interfaces between the desktop OS and the server OS. This is illegal and they have already been convicted of this crime. Active Directory is one more proprietary, undocumented interface between the two that ties them and furthers this illegal action. Telnet is a documented, open standard. This is why the EU ordered MS to document all protocols and interfaces between these two products and that is why adding more undocumented interfaces is a concern.
Windows server is a pile of dog crap. Most sysadmins end up configuring a separate Windows server for each application they wish to serve and they have to buy more of them for the same task and at greater expense than the competition. Windows server, however, is the only first class citizen for interfacing with Windows desktop OS's. That is why people buy it and why it gains market share. It is also illegal because it leads to an inferior product dominating a market only because an existing monopoly is being leveraged.
can someone explain to me why people care about windows media player being bundled with windows?
Understanding this issue requires that you have a basic understanding of monopolies, specifically what defines them, what the effects of a monopoly on the market is, and what legal restrictions are placed upon them. It also requires that you understand the concept of bundling as one of the primary things monopolies are not allowed to do by law. Basically, if a company has a monopoly, it is possible for them to use bundling to gain another monopoly. This is detrimental in that it reduces consumer choice and a dominates a market with a product that is not necessarily the best product. By this method an inferior product can gain in market share and become a monopoly. This is illegal in almost all countries due to the obvious detrimental effect on consumers and markets.
Note, this restriction applies only to monopolies and only to the monopolized market. Apple can legally bundle a media player or a blimp with their OS. Microsoft can legally bundle a media player or a blimp with their mice. Microsoft cannot legally bundle anything with their OS for which there is an existing market. All of this is covered in economics 101.
Bundling IE has resulted in a stagnation of Web technologies and the Web itself in many ways. It has resulted in an inferior browser dominating the market. Bundling WMP if unchecked will result in stagnation of online media technologies and the domination of an inferior standard owned by one specific company. In a free market there is no way all the media producers would submit to letting one single company, a non-media company, define and control the distribution standard for the entire industry. By leveraging their OS monopoly, however, MS is able to do just that. And make no mistake, while Apple is doing a good job of single handedly building a vertical solution and several near monopolies which they can leverage to slow this domination, eventually it will happen unless the law is enforced to prevent it.
Laptops WILL be lost/stolen/broken, no matter what you try to do.
This is true and a problem due to the perpetually poor nature of many students. I have several friends attending a university where the lease of a laptop is included with tuition (ibook or thinkpad depending upon major). Basically, every two years while you are attending school they give you a new laptop and take the old one back. Graduating students are given an option to buy and the rest are auctioned off. This way if a laptop breaks, which they will, the student brings it in, they image the drive and put it back onto a new machine. The turn around is an hour or so and is all automated. It seems to work for them.
For my own personal sites I have long since stopped adding IE support. Get a real browser or fuck off. Sadly that is not acceptable in business sites. Not even the customer service section.
I do a very small amount of Web development these days. The content is strictly for security professionals and network engineers who have shelled out tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands of dollars to my employer. After spending a lot of time trying to make work arounds for IE we finally asked our customers if any of them were using IE. As a result we still support IE, but only so that the content degrades gracefully to a usable state. Anyone foolish enough to use IE will just not be getting all the bells and whistles.
There is something serious sick in Islam today and unless some of their leaders stand up and turn the ship around, it's only going to get worse.
Are there any prominent government or religious leaders in the predominantly muslim countries that did not stand up and urge tolerance and non-violence over the cartoons. Every one I can think of did. Of course you probably don't know that because you were watching Fox.
We're aren't talking about a "few", we're talking about thousands and thousands of people, in countries all over the world, reacting VIOLENTLY to images that were published in a country they've probably never even been to. Images published months ago!
They are reacting violently to the rabble rousers that insisted on touring multiple countries showing those images (some of which were later shown to have never been published prior to their demonstrations). People are reacting because they are scared, as you would be if the largest military power in your area of the world was bombed to hell and back and then taken over by people almost entirely of another religion and if horrible abuses, murders, rape, and torture were on the news every day as, "this may happen here soon."
That's lunacy, and people like you need to stop rationalizing and justifying and start calling a spade, a spade.
Yeah, racism is a great complement to your other prejudice. Do you want to be judged based upon the violent acts of a small, ignorant, frightened portion of your religion while under extreme duress?
How many millions of people need to attack freedom of speech before you understand that it's not just a few bad apples but a fundamental conflict between their beliefs and the right to freedom of speech. They blame all of Denmark for the actions of one newspaper, and expect laws passed to restrict freedom of speech because they don't like dissent from their beliefs.
Sigh, there is no getting through to some people. There is a culture and a body of law in many places that does not support the fundamental right to free expression. In different locations it is supported to differing degrees. The french ban "hateful" speech. The US bans political expression at Bush rallies and anything embarrassing or illegal as "national security issues." So yes I fundamentally disagree with many of the laws in many of these countries. I further disagree with acting violently in retaliation for the speech of others. The point is, a tiny minority acted violently and most every official religious for government body denounced the violence. Muslims risked their lives to stop it, and you and the previous poster insist on painting those officials, governments, religious leaders, and adherents to the religion as a whole with the very same brush as the people who committed the violence. Not only that, but you try to justify it by saying christians don't act the same way. Guess what some do, and a lot more would if they were in the same position as these people are.
The point is, muslims are not violent. Christians are not violent. Some particular muslims and christians are violent.
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I know you're talking about public perception of mac users, which is something I have not seen any real research into, but I have seen research into mac users as a market. In fact they have something in common with the gay market. Market analysts have written several articles singling out mac users as one of those affluent population segments that has money and is willing to spend. Certain high-end car companies, electronics sellers, and furniture stores have specifically targeted mac users with portions of their ad campaigns. A BMW ad in a tattoo magazine is probably not going to get you many sales. The same ad in a really common publication like "People" may get you a medium number of sales for eyeballs reached. An ad in a mac specific publication, however, yields even better results. You've just refined your ad to a segment of the population that has more disposable income and willingness to pay more for perceived quality than the average cross-segment.
I don't know what the "public" perception of mac users is, or more topically what the virus writer's perspective is, but there is some evidence as to what the mac user market segment itself is.
How hard would it be to convince some average uses that the worm/virus/trojan that they're downloading is actually an amazing tool to "tweak" some aspect of their computer's performance (internet/speed/ram/etc...)?
This is a very important point. While right now automated worms that do not rely upon any social engineering or human interaction are the bulk of the problem, it is possible that there will come a day when the user is the weakest link and social engineering and trojans are the biggest threat. It is important to note that right now this is not the case, on Windows especially. It is also the job of the OS to have default permissions in fine enough detail and with a good enough UI so that the user has the tools they need to address this problem.
Here is the proper behavior of a well written OS to a trojan such as you describe. As a new executable it is automatically contained within a jail, VM, or ACL. This grants it no access to any files it does not itself create, no direct (unfiltered) access to hardware, and no access to the internet. When the user runs the executable (which they believe is a "tuning" program) the OS makes it clear that it is an application with visual cues and the OS warns the user that this is the first time this executable has been run and asks if the user really wants to run it. The OS also presents any organizations/bodies that have reviewed the software and certify that it meets some criteria.
The process does not, however, end there. When run the OS warns the user that the program would like access to the internet and provide basic information about the communication manner. Since the program has no access to any files it could send your IP address along somewhere, but that is about it. In order to gain access to any files the program would have to specifically ask for access to those files. Even more strongly worded warning again appear and require a choice by the user to access the root level files, the buddy list, the e-mail address book, etc. The same goes for any other unusual behavior like access to the keyboard input when other programs are in the foreground.
Does this completely solve the problem? No. But it solves about 99% of the problem and until all this low hanging fruit is gathered there is no point in trying to do a lot of user education. Give users the right tools to keep their machines secure and then worry about educating them on the last little bit of the pie.
VMs and jails have come a long way in the last few years and are beginning to enter the mainstream. What is still needed is the integration, good defaults, and good GUI. My money is on Apple to do it right first, but I could be wrong. MS may beat them to the punch, and OpenBSD or one of the secure Linux's is not out of the running.
In summary, yes, trojans+social engineering are a concern. No, they aren't the biggest concern right now and no they aren't an unsolvable problem. If only OS vendors will solve the problem and move on.
The "whistleblower" status is for people who know that something dirty and wrong is going on and turn over their evidence to internal agencies of the government to deal with it.
This is wrong. Whistle-blowers status is to protect individuals who divulge information vital to the welfare of the people in which the people have an overriding interest. In many cases they are reporting on government corruption and cannot be expected to trust other elements of the government. It is important that they can provide their information to law enforcement and the public via any channel, public or private.
He leaked to the goddam newspaper. That's exactly the opposite of what you're supposed to do. He's geetting what he deserves.
A man stuck his neck out. He risked his job and possibly his life to expose corrupt and criminal actions that undermine the very foundations of out government (the democratic process). I don't care if he did it because he wanted to be famous or if he did it because he had a grudge. The end result is that the public found out about very important abuses. It is important that the laws protect him to encourage this behavior in others.
Now is it right for me to say that my linux computers are more secure just because they are running linux? No, that's stupid.
Why is that stupid? There are real architectural, operational, testing, and implementation differences between Windows and Linux. Obviously one of them is more secure and less likely to be compromised than the other. There is nothing stupid about looking at those differences and at the track record of both OS's and making predictions and making usage decisions based upon that information. "They're all the same," is the argument of a lazy man or someone trying to justify a bad choice by trying to make all choices look equally bad.
The same thing applies with this story - Macs can be exploited because that is the nature of the business. We usually find the holes because some numbnut exploits it.
No one is arguing that Macs can't be exploited. They certainly can be and are. We do not, however, find most exploitable holes by seeing exploits in the wild. The majority of holes are discovered by developers coding the products. The next largest chunk are found by users and legitimate security researchers. Then a few are found when they are exploited in the wild by hackers. How many zero day exploits have their been for Linux or OS X? The answer is very, very few if any. There have been some for Windows, but most of the underlying vulnerabilities were probably discovered by MS, but they just did not get around to fixing them.
Sure there will be exploits and even zero-day exploits for OS X, but they are just not likely to spread widely or be much of a problem for the average user. If they are a large threat they will be well-known and quickly fixed. A major worm for OS X would be news and it would be unusual. For Windows it is business as usual.
But don't assume that just because no one has broken into your house yet that your house is completely secure.
This is a very good analogy. My house is concrete block and was built with only glass block windows on the first floor. Actually the block is two thick on the first floor. Before I bought it, someone had wired a security system and outdoor flood lights. A few months back someone busted into my shed, but ran off without getting anything. The items in my shed are relatively large an not all that valuable.
I'd say that is a good analogy for OS X. It is built with security in mind on well tested, industrial grade framework. They have added onto it and made it more secure in some ways and less secure in others, but it will likely never be as insecure as the neighbor's ranch style place with two plate glass doors and a key under the mat that you see the kids get out every day.
OS X had someone break into the shed (try to distribute a trojan) but nothing has been taken. It is a good sign that maybe Apple and OS X users should be paying attention and maybe doing some more security reviews, but it is in no way comparable to the apartment complex down the street that have been burgled at least once a month for several years and where we always hear about people getting shot.
Certainly I think that not having users run as root by default will help Mac OS X, but that doesn't stop them entering their password when prompted. You can't secure against user stupidity except by scanning each file that they try to execute for viruses. And that means virus checkers, and the associated slowdowns they bring.
I disagree. Creating a blacklist of malware is a way to make machines more secure, but it is only one third of the equation. In addition modern OS's should be implementing jails, ACLs, or VMs for new executables of any sort and providing them with a very limited access to the OS. Further these default limitations need to be built around a very usable UI that informs the user about any unusual behaviors a program wants to use in plain, understandable language. It should have sensible, restrictive defaults. Finally, the application dev tools should encourage the development of programs that don't run afoul of these rules and minimize inconvenience for users. Users should only rarely be asked to let a program have additional privileges and it should always be framed in such a way that the user needs to understand what the program wants to do in order to enter the right decision. For example, "This program would like to read your e-mail address book. (Don't let it read my address book)(Let it read my e-mail address book)" That right there would stop a huge number of malware applications from propagating.
I know I would hate to have to promise that my documentation matches the current state of my latest software...
You'd think with hundreds of millions of dollars on the line they could afford to hire a few people to create said documentation if they wanted to comply. One thing of note, the independent commissioner who judged the documentation insufficient was a guy MS picked for the job.
Sure, it'd be nice if they kept to the standard, but complaining that they did something differently doesn't make much sense.
Yes, it does in this case. Normally it would not be a problem, but when you have a monopoly your motivations and the effects of your actions are subject to restrictions to prevent abuse. They intentionally broke the standard to disadvantage those using the standard. This is illegal because it is an interface to a product they have monopolized. Once you have a monopoly it is illegal to pull the same tricks that are legal when you don't have a monopoly.
I agree. You're getting into a symantics argument there. I should have said "anti-Microsoft" instead.
And you'd still be wrong. I'm not anti-miscrosoft. If Microsoft obeyed the laws and stopped destroying the industry I'd have no problems with them. I'm also not anti-Osam Bin Ladin. I am anti-mass murderer. If Bin Ladin did not orchestrate the murder of thousands I'd have no problem with him. The point is MS has and is seriously damaging the industry and the progress of computing. They are hurting the consumers, killing many innovative businesses with new technologies, gouging excessive amounts of money from people, and behaving both illegally and unethically.
Your implication is that I'm opposed to MS, thus I look for reasons to dislike them. I'm asserting that MS is doing very bad things, thus I dislike them. Do you see the difference?
It would take Dell or Gateway less than 15 minutes to put Firefox, Gimp, OpenOffice, etc on their base image. It's not like they need to manually install it on every computer they sell. Why would they remove software anyway? Anyone would agree that having many choices is better than just one.
How long would it take them to make sure it was the most recent version every week? How about support costs? There are a lot of expenses involved and your implication that the barrier is insignificant is not supported by the actions of the industry. Firefox has been the better browser by a large margin for years, but no one ships it on their computers. Having more choices, is not always better from the consumer or retailer point of view. Simplicity can be cheaper to sell and support. A lot of people would like a machine without IE for security reasons, but they don't even have that option.
True. However, in this particular case the complaint is about Active Directory. It's very simple purchasing a copy of Windows 2000 without Active Directory... you just don't buy the Server version.
You're missing the point. Win2K is not even supported anymore. Win XP has AD integration built in, which means a server that includes AD has an advantage over one that does not. No one except MS can fully implement an AD server because it is not open and documented. This gives Windows server products and advantage by way of integration with their desktop. That is illegal.
So which is it... should MS provide ANY programs with their base OS, forcing users and OEM's install a web browser, email client, media player, calculator, word processor, etc; or should they provide a base set of software for their users and not prohibit users and OEM's from selecting alternatives.
The law and my opinion both say the former. If you don't understand why, you're not understanding the affects of monopolies on an industry and why basically every country has a law forbidding the latter. The reason is it is devastating to the economy and detrimental to all the industries involved and to consumers. It bypasses the advantages of capitalism and lets an inferior product dominate at an arbitrary price. It also allows a monopoly to spread until it theoretically encompasses all markets.
The thing is, almost every software company out there bundles their stuff. Adobe, Apple, Sun, linux distributions, etc. Going to complain about them as well?
OK pay attention. I'm going to say this one more time. It is illegal and very bad for the industry to use bundling to leverage a monopoly to gain in other markets. It removes all the advantages of capitalism and a free market. Adobe, Apple, Sun, and Linux retailers don't have monopolies. MS does have a monopoly. See the difference?
There is no reverse engineering required or funky calls you have to do to talk to AD. standard LDAP queries have worked fine for every version.
You misunderstand. Administrative LDAP tools have been modified to understand AD, not just to make queries. There is a lot more to administration than you are implying.
So how do you sell a car at all, given every single component of a car "is sold in another market" ?
There is a market for cars. There is a market for replacement parts. You can still sell cars, so long as you don't unfairly take over the market for replacement parts. That is to say, you can't sell a car with an additional after-market part bundled. (Theoretically this could include even extra fuses in the fuse box or spare tires.) You also can't start incorporating new products that cut into an existing market. For example, there is a market for portable TVs to watch in the car. It is illegal to start incorporating TVs into cars, unless you sell them separately from the auto's so they can be "plugged in" to the car. Further, it is illegal to use secret/restricted interfaces to plug the TV into the car or do anything else that will disadvantage others trying to sell into the same market. This is part of the price companies pay for having a monopoly. The alternative is everything you buy, rent, lease, live in, etc. is made by and owned by standard oil (or the medici's or the east india trading company). When AT&T was broken up you couldn't even buy telephones anymore, just rent them from the phone company and they all sucked. IE is a piece of crap, but everyone still uses it. See the parallel?
I've accessed the AD with normal LDAP tools and the schema is browsable with the schema tool in the Administrator Toolkit as well. The AD also has some great features that LDAP doesn't have, so calling it broken is a bit of a misnomer.
Yes, most LDAP tools work somewhat with AD, due to the reverse engineering efforts of the developers. AD is an intentionally broken implementation of a standard, that is to say it intentionally deviates from the standard to prevent interoperability. It is only broken in terms of the standard, obviously it works.
If AD were required to use Windows 2000, you might have a point, but that's far from the case here.
I strongly disagree. Anything about it that makes it work better with an MS product than with other products is leveraging their monopoly and illegal. It does not need to be required.
Most people see and care about true discrimination, but get fed up when the race card is played so frequently.
Since there is no objective way to know this we'll have to just maintain our different opinions. It is irrelevant to this discussion for the most part anyway.
So was IE. So was WMP. Both of those are scrutinized by anti-monopoly folks like yourself. Windows for Workgroups and the NT3.5 domain controller features were as well, and Active Directory is basically a more advanced version of the same thing.
What is your point? I said it was unlikely. Anyone who is not "anti-monopoly" is either a monopolist or has a lousy understanding of economics. There is a reason abusing monopolies is illegal in almost every country. They are very damaging and remove all the major benefits of capitalism.
Exactly. Microsoft should not be putting pressure on Dell, Gateway, etc to exclude non-MS products in their base setups. If Dell wants to pre-install Firefox, then MS shouldn't be able to punish Dell in any way. That's what they got into trouble with before, and it shouldn't happen again. However, that's far different than including software that customers would expect from that particular operating system or software bundle.
That does not go far enough to be a level playing field. It takes work to install software and more work to remove software. MS needs to provide application separate from their OS, the same as any other application provider does. If customers expect types of software, that is fine and should be up the OEM. If they expect a particular brand of software, an expectation built by the abuse of a monopoly over many years, that is a different case.
I don't think you're really understanding the concept of bundling and the effect upon the market. No software is free to develop and anything MS includes with their OS you are paying for, you're just not being given the option to pay for it separately. These features should be separate and the price of Windows should be lowered to compensate for that.
Given that many of the same apps run on both Mac and PC platforms, why don't more people bench Mac vs. PC? I mean we are even talking about virtually the same architecture, the mac is now just another OS running on x86 hardware like Linux et al.
Historically it is because there has not been "equivalent" hardware. There have been benchmarks and they have been a mixed bag, and no one knows what is because of hardware, what is because of software, and what is because of the OS.
Now that Intel macs are starting to come out, we can mostly eliminate one of those three variables, the hardware. More-so when people get Windows running on mac hardware or vice versus. Right now though, what are you going to benchmark? It is hard to find hardware close to an intel imac and the macbooks aren't shipping yet. And most of the software anyone is interested in is still running in emulation mode on OS X for intel. Just wait six months and we will be able to compare some native apps on different platforms and the same hardware. This will be very useful for general performance and for finding bottlenecks in OS's and in particular software.
People seem to just look for an excuse to nark on Microsoft. When I install an OS, frankly I'd rather have my essentials right then.
Yup you and the .05% of people who have ever installed an OS. You are not representative of the market. The market is almost entirely composed of the pre-installed market. The vast majority of the rest of the market is the corporate market. Both of these segments suffer because of bundling.
Any consumer wouldn't be in their right mind to say "No I'd rather go buy some from some website or something."
99% of consumers buy a computer from Dell or some other OEM. Nothing is illegal about that OEM bundling an OS, a a browser, a media player, or multiple versions of all of these. What is illegal is Dell not having a choice as to whether they install Firefox or IE; WMP or iTunes.
My sister would be content with Windows Media Player.
And that is the problem. Dell cannot pick the cheapest or best media player for your sister and your sister can't pick the computer that comes with the best player. She has to use the one MS decrees, because they are leveraging their desktop OS monopoly. That is illegal and result in most people, like your sister, using an inferior Web browser (IE). It will result in her having an inferior media player etc, once MS dominates these markets with their monopoly and no longer have any incentive to make a good product.
If what Microsoft provides is enough for the average computer user, then maybe whoever is selling their software should rethink their position compared to Microsoft's.
In a free market the best, cheapest product should dominate. If that is not happening, then the market is broken. If that is not happening because one company is breaking the law and leveraging an existing monopoly, they should be stopped and fined. Consumers should not have to settle for barely good enough. Consumers expect a fair market and act as if one existed. Surely if their was a better browser than IE and it was free, it would come with my computer, right? Because monopolies break free markets when abused, it is illegal and because nothing has been done about the abuse consumers are misled and screwed over. That is bad for the industry (look at how bad Web standards and security and usability are) and it is bad for consumers.
Microsoft should not be punished for attempting to make the average computer user's life easier. Linux bundles pretty much everything that Microsoft does (respectively different programs of course) - and I don't see Linux distro's getting flak for it.
No Linux distro is leveraging a monopoly to break the free market and breaking the law in the process. Bundling is illegal for monopolies. I have a hard time believing so many people on Slashdot can be ignorant about monopolies, bundling, and basic economics. Either people are astroturfing or our educational system is worse than I thought. MS isn't trying to make people's lives easier. They are choosing to break the law as their business model, betting that the profit will outweigh the court settlements and punishments. So far they have been correct to an astronomical degree. They understand perfectly what they are doing, but they are betting most people will be ignorant, apathetic, or bribable.
There has to be more to the story. IANAL, but "bundling" software is nothing new, and certainly shouldn't be considered wrong. How can you differentiate "bundling software" from including features? For instance Winamp can now do far more than just play media. Are the ripping features, the burning features, etc, now "bundled"? When did a law get passed saying software can only do one thing?
Here is what you are missing. It is illegal for monopolies to bundle a product from one market with a product from another market in which they have a monopoly. Bundling is not illegal for non-monopolies. Monopolies and bundling are defined in terms of markets, that is dollars moved around, not in terms of products. Further, not only bundling, but any other illegal tying that allows you to use your monopoly to get an unfair advantage in other markets is illegal. This includes things like making undocumented interface between a monopoly product and another product (Server OS+AD and their desktop OS).
So let's see, we're complaining now because Windows comes with more programs for us to use? What the hell is wrong with these people? I've seen too many anti-trust suits like this.
Allow me to once again explain why bundling is illegal for monopolies. Doesn't anyone take econ 101 anymore?
Say I gain a monopoly on cars (yes I know it is cliche). Well, maybe my cars were the best or maybe I just had the best sales guys. How does not matter. The law now says I can't bundle anything with my cars that is sold in another market. For example, since most people are forced to buy my cars if they need a car it is illegal for me to give away a free television with every car. The reason for this is simple. Televisions are not free. So what in reality is happening is I have raised the price of my cars to cover that cost. I'm now selling a car+TV bundle. The result is most TV sellers go out of business. It does not matter if their TV's cost less to produce or if they are quite a bit better than mine. So long as they are not so much better that people are willing to pay for my TV and then buy their TV as well, they will be crushed. This is unfair to them and to consumer because consumers pay more and get a worse product, even though on the surface they are getting an extra "free" TV.
Now, lets change our hypothetical a bit. Suppose instead of giving away free TVs, I were to instead change all my cars to run on a new, secret fuel. I'm not giving anything away, but I've used a secret to tie my fuel to my car. In this way I can dominate the fuel industry. Now maybe in this case someone could reverse engineer the fuel and make something else that burns the same way, for less. In the case of computer interfaces such as protocols and formats, this is exceedingly complex. This is the case with MS's server and desktop OS's. They aren't bundling them, just tying them with secret protocols. This is why the EU is demanding MS document those interfaces.
So what you perceive as a free extra application is actually them forcing you to buy additional products because you have only one option for your OS.
Next week, Canonical gets sued for shipping Ubuntu with Firefox instead of Opera; Novell gets sued for shipping GNOME instead of KDE; and the XFCE guys sue everyone because nobody uses their desktop environment.
It should be noted, right now Ford, Chevy, Honda etc. can all bundle free TVs with their cars. This is allowed because none of them are monopolies, so it is not giving them any leverage to dominate the TV market. None of the companies you listed have monopolies either, hence they can bundle whatever they want.
I can't be the only one to see this -- but I just don't get why people keep talking about the big, bad Microsoft monopoly -- then looking right PAST the one thing they *do* have a monopoly on. It's all very confusing to me.
Having a monopoly is not illegal. Using it to influence other markets is. Specifically, bundling is illegal. That is why people focus on the applications, as that is the illegal abuse.
I think, however, that the culture at MS and the slow, inefficient, and bribable nature of the justice system has shown that MS is not about to stop abusing their monopoly and current remedies (what few have been mandated) are ignored and/or ineffective. The best solution for getting competition back into the computer industry is to break up MS. I don't think Open Sourcing the OS is necessarily the proper mandate. Rather I think MS should be broken up into separate companies. The major areas of domination should be divided and forced to compete with one another. For example, two or three different new companies should all be given equal rights to the IP and code in the OS. These companies should each get equal numbers of the dev staff and funding and should be forbidden to collude with one another in any way. All product interfaces should be made open and published standards including AD, exchange, etc.
Similarly the application development should be divided. When Dell or gateway want an OS and applications for their computers they should have the option to buy from any of these new companies as well as a Linux distro or something else. Let them compete with each other on price and features. This, in my opinion, is the best solution to the current problem. MS won't abuse their monopoly because they won't have one. Money won't be diverted to overseas companies unless those companies can make a better product than any of the ones in the US. Innovation and price competition will revitalize the market.
Note, this was the original ruling of the courts, before MS bought them.
I acutally use a PowerBook but I've always wondered why tying the iPod to the iTunes music store via Fairplay isn't a anti-trust violation too since they have the Windows market share in online music and MP3 players.
Actually, the last numbers I saw listed them as 72% and 79% respectively. That is not nearly as high as MS's desktop OS market share. There is, however, legal action to get them declared a monopoly. Part of the issue is also that the only major competitor to Fairplay is WMD, which is a blatant and uncorrected act of monopoly bundling. Taking action against Apple for this while nothing has been done about MS would probably be enough to get some real questions asked about the impartiality of our legal system. As I said Apple has 79% of a market and are bundling it with something. MS has 95% of a market, have been declared an abusive monopoly, and are bundling a competing product with it.
have a Windows machine but can choose to use Outlook, Window Media Player etc, I am not forced to....Why isn't including QuickTime tied closely to OS X also the same thing.
Quicktime and OS X both have small market shares in their respective markets. Windows is a monopoly in their market, thus bundling anything from another market with it is illegal.
Bundling software isn't anti-competitive behaviour unless there's something else going on, like forcing computer manufacturers to bundle that software with their computers.
Bundling is the very first example of anti-competative behavior listed in the Sherman antitrust legislation. It is illegal to bundle a product in a market you have monopolized with a product in another market.
Nobody is forced to use Active Directory when they set up a Windows server, although most people do because it makes sense. Honestly, as someone who's not worked with large linux networks, I'm not sure what the alternative would be. However, lack of a viable alternative, or even lack of a popular alternative, doesn't make Microsoft wrong for packaging Active Directory with their product.
Active Directory is MS's intentionally broken and obfuscated implementation of LDAP. The problem with adding it to MS's server OS's is not that bundling those two together is illegal. The problem is the Desktop OS is built to rely upon AD, which is a "secret" interface between the desktop and server products. This illegally ties the two products by making MS's server work better with their monopoly desktop product. In this way their server does not have to compete on price and functionality with other server products and instead can gain market by leveraging the desktop monopoly. That is what is illegal about it. Note MS has already been convicted of leveraging their desktop OS monopoly to promote their server and that is why the EU ordered them to fully document the interaction of the two products. This is just one more secret interaction.
Outlook uses exchange and office uses Word. Both the protocol and the format are built into the desktop OS in ways that are most likely illegal. Aside from that, unless MS is shown to have a monopoly on some office productivity application I'm not sure what they are arguing for this one.
This reminds me of people playing the race card... it's done even when that complaint isn't accurate, and as a result makes people less likely to believe when there's a REAL issue.
The problem is, as it often is with race, many people don't see or care about the discrimination.
What's next... claiming that inclusion of MS Paint is anti-competitive?
Possibly, but not likely. MSPaint was already included with the OS before they were declared a monopoly. Bundling new applications of any sort is a concern though. It should be up to OEMs like Dell and Gateway to decide what applications should be bundled on their PCs. If MS wants to sell additional applications to them for inclusion, that is fine; provided their is no coercion and provided they are offered separately from Windows. Once you become a monopoly you have to follow a whole new set of rules.
True, it does put competing products at a disadvantage...
This is illegal. It is giving one product an advantage simply because it is bundled with a monopolized product. It is a classic case of abuse. It results in possibly inferior products dominating a market and that is bad for everyone.
As a consumer you would not have to. OEMs are free to bundle whatever they want including any servers or media players. More importantly, the free market then moves to standards so that all servers and media players can interoperate. Imagine if all music and video was implemented in open standards and portable music players, could play music from all stores. Imagine if AD was documented and you could run it on a Linux, Solaris, or Windows server without hacks. It levels they playing field and lets you choose a product based upon how good and how cheap it is, rather than on the fact that it is the only one that can work with some hidden formula.
As long as alternative products are able to work with the system to the same degree as Microsoft's offerings, I see no problem.
Then you are not understanding monopolies. Web technologies have stagnated since MS took over with IE. They have a broken implementation of a ten year old standard and cannot even get the eight year old CSS2 standard to work, because they have no motivation to make a better product. Security, tabbed browsing, ad blocking, why bother when you can just use your existing monopoly to dominate. That same phenomenon will happen to server OS's and to digital media unless the law is enforced. Give them a few years to capture the market then watch the whole field come to a screeching halt while MS focuses their attention elsewhere.
Bundling small apps with the OS and increases the value of the system to the average user. If Microsoft is guilty of this, then how much moreso are *BSD and Linux distros?
Bundling only allows an inferior product to dominate when one of the products bundled together is a monopoly. MS has a monopoly. Linux and BSD do not. The law restricts monopolies and not other companies for a reason.
Active Directory? WTF are they thinking?
AD is a propriety, undocumented interface between their server and desktop OS's. You know the things the EU ordered MS to document. It is just adding one more illegal tie in that allows MS to leverage their desktop OS monopoly into market share in the server market, even though their product is inferior. Bundling it with the server is not a problem, so long as the interface with the desktop is fully documented; which it isn't.
C'mon now? AD with server..??..??! M$ also bundles telnet with the OS as well! Oh noes!,/i>
MS has a monopoly on desktop operating systems. MS is using that monopoly, illegally, to gain a monopoly on server operating systems. They do this by building proprietary, undocumented protocols and interfaces between the desktop OS and the server OS. This is illegal and they have already been convicted of this crime. Active Directory is one more proprietary, undocumented interface between the two that ties them and furthers this illegal action. Telnet is a documented, open standard. This is why the EU ordered MS to document all protocols and interfaces between these two products and that is why adding more undocumented interfaces is a concern.
Windows server is a pile of dog crap. Most sysadmins end up configuring a separate Windows server for each application they wish to serve and they have to buy more of them for the same task and at greater expense than the competition. Windows server, however, is the only first class citizen for interfacing with Windows desktop OS's. That is why people buy it and why it gains market share. It is also illegal because it leads to an inferior product dominating a market only because an existing monopoly is being leveraged.
can someone explain to me why people care about windows media player being bundled with windows?
Understanding this issue requires that you have a basic understanding of monopolies, specifically what defines them, what the effects of a monopoly on the market is, and what legal restrictions are placed upon them. It also requires that you understand the concept of bundling as one of the primary things monopolies are not allowed to do by law. Basically, if a company has a monopoly, it is possible for them to use bundling to gain another monopoly. This is detrimental in that it reduces consumer choice and a dominates a market with a product that is not necessarily the best product. By this method an inferior product can gain in market share and become a monopoly. This is illegal in almost all countries due to the obvious detrimental effect on consumers and markets.
Note, this restriction applies only to monopolies and only to the monopolized market. Apple can legally bundle a media player or a blimp with their OS. Microsoft can legally bundle a media player or a blimp with their mice. Microsoft cannot legally bundle anything with their OS for which there is an existing market. All of this is covered in economics 101.
Bundling IE has resulted in a stagnation of Web technologies and the Web itself in many ways. It has resulted in an inferior browser dominating the market. Bundling WMP if unchecked will result in stagnation of online media technologies and the domination of an inferior standard owned by one specific company. In a free market there is no way all the media producers would submit to letting one single company, a non-media company, define and control the distribution standard for the entire industry. By leveraging their OS monopoly, however, MS is able to do just that. And make no mistake, while Apple is doing a good job of single handedly building a vertical solution and several near monopolies which they can leverage to slow this domination, eventually it will happen unless the law is enforced to prevent it.
Laptops WILL be lost/stolen/broken, no matter what you try to do.
This is true and a problem due to the perpetually poor nature of many students. I have several friends attending a university where the lease of a laptop is included with tuition (ibook or thinkpad depending upon major). Basically, every two years while you are attending school they give you a new laptop and take the old one back. Graduating students are given an option to buy and the rest are auctioned off. This way if a laptop breaks, which they will, the student brings it in, they image the drive and put it back onto a new machine. The turn around is an hour or so and is all automated. It seems to work for them.
For my own personal sites I have long since stopped adding IE support. Get a real browser or fuck off. Sadly that is not acceptable in business sites. Not even the customer service section.
I do a very small amount of Web development these days. The content is strictly for security professionals and network engineers who have shelled out tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands of dollars to my employer. After spending a lot of time trying to make work arounds for IE we finally asked our customers if any of them were using IE. As a result we still support IE, but only so that the content degrades gracefully to a usable state. Anyone foolish enough to use IE will just not be getting all the bells and whistles.
There is something serious sick in Islam today and unless some of their leaders stand up and turn the ship around, it's only going to get worse.
Are there any prominent government or religious leaders in the predominantly muslim countries that did not stand up and urge tolerance and non-violence over the cartoons. Every one I can think of did. Of course you probably don't know that because you were watching Fox.
We're aren't talking about a "few", we're talking about thousands and thousands of people, in countries all over the world, reacting VIOLENTLY to images that were published in a country they've probably never even been to. Images published months ago!
They are reacting violently to the rabble rousers that insisted on touring multiple countries showing those images (some of which were later shown to have never been published prior to their demonstrations). People are reacting because they are scared, as you would be if the largest military power in your area of the world was bombed to hell and back and then taken over by people almost entirely of another religion and if horrible abuses, murders, rape, and torture were on the news every day as, "this may happen here soon."
That's lunacy, and people like you need to stop rationalizing and justifying and start calling a spade, a spade.
Yeah, racism is a great complement to your other prejudice. Do you want to be judged based upon the violent acts of a small, ignorant, frightened portion of your religion while under extreme duress?
How many millions of people need to attack freedom of speech before you understand that it's not just a few bad apples but a fundamental conflict between their beliefs and the right to freedom of speech. They blame all of Denmark for the actions of one newspaper, and expect laws passed to restrict freedom of speech because they don't like dissent from their beliefs.
Sigh, there is no getting through to some people. There is a culture and a body of law in many places that does not support the fundamental right to free expression. In different locations it is supported to differing degrees. The french ban "hateful" speech. The US bans political expression at Bush rallies and anything embarrassing or illegal as "national security issues." So yes I fundamentally disagree with many of the laws in many of these countries. I further disagree with acting violently in retaliation for the speech of others. The point is, a tiny minority acted violently and most every official religious for government body denounced the violence. Muslims risked their lives to stop it, and you and the previous poster insist on painting those officials, governments, religious leaders, and adherents to the religion as a whole with the very same brush as the people who committed the violence. Not only that, but you try to justify it by saying christians don't act the same way. Guess what some do, and a lot more would if they were in the same position as these people are.
The point is, muslims are not violent. Christians are not violent. Some particular muslims and christians are violent.