Well, SOMEONE has to give the telecoms some competition, if nothing else to keep them from raping the public. The U.S. is already the laughingstock of the planet for how behind our telephone systems and ISPs are. It used to be the other way around - the U.S. telephone system under AT&T was the best in the world (for what it was). Now everyone else is running rings around us with bandwidth and features while the U.S. telecoms are artificially limiting what they deliver. Go Munies!
Holy Cow. We just lived through a decade of that kind of behavior and you didn't notice? mp3Pro (so what) is licensable just like MP3, JPEG and everything else. Thomson never offered MP3 encoders up for free then suddenly demand royalties once MP3 got traction. Thomson always required a license. They did, however, suddenly demand a license for MP3 decoders. They're all greedy bastards. Submarine ransom demands are a great side business for Microsoft as well and everything they release is another opportunity to collect undue cash:
Microsoft encouraged the proliferation of FAT32 and one day started demanding massive royalties from all the Flash manufacturers they suckered in. Too bad they missed out on the floppy disk makers.
Terminal Services which was FREE on their servers until they encouraged enough people to use it (think Citrix) and one day they demanded all end users pay $60 per year per CAL with 3 months to comply. That made running Citrix real expensive.
Microsoft suddenly demanded royalties for hardware you connect to Xbox (steering wheels, controllers etc). Let the peripheral market develop then say "wanna stay in business? Pay up suckers".
How about the royalty threats against Samba, OSS (Linux), Mono - some of it they stole fair and square themselves from somewhere else - but are trying to figure out how to claim it or control it anyway?
They've patented their new Word file format, which is claimed to be XML but is really a compendium of proprietary digital glop. Wait until they start suing for reading a Word document without a royalty (bye-bye OpenOffice and other competitors). They're tolerating it for now but let it approach critical mass and they'll cut that Golden Goose open too.
What do you suppose is up with everything Microsoft is patenting? Bloody obvious stuff with prior art is getting patented. Are they in a contest of who can bamboozle the Patent Office the most? Nope. It's just business and they're using those patents to chase competitors who can't afford to defend themselves against suits or royalty demands.
I'm no expert on their activities but this is a common historical pattern that nearly anyone can see (do you read Slashdot by any chance?). I've even been stung directly by their behavior and have seen the difference between profiting from your effort and profiteering off your victims. For the last decade, Microsoft has held back real progress by co-opting rising technologies, modifying them a little to make sure their competitors fail, and re-releasing a crudely inferior shadow of the original. The original technology is now overwhelmed and eliminated by their own version. Interoperability was never in Microsoft's interest. That's how a lot of dreams ended. Developers and users were simply upgrading their handcuffs with each new release of Microsoft "technology". Now, Microsoft is being dragged backwards through their own stew. The last resort is trying to control competition through patent infringement threats and forging deals with unlikely allies in order to threaten the rest of their competitors who didn't sign a pact with them. There's no innovation going on there. They're even trying to capture some of the OpenSource halo by calling proprietary technologies "Open" in an attempt to tie the word to Microsoft in the eyes of people who don't know any better.
I can't for my life figure out how Microsoft or why Microsoft introduces evil into this format...
I'll guess JPEG XR will be the "free" standard and Microsoft will introduce a DRM laden, royalty cha-ching version called JPEG XR PRO which will be seeded to equipment and service vendors (cameras, Adobe, Shutterfly, Ritz etc) who get a cut of the royalties for pushing it. After it reaches critical mass in the market, Microsoft will turn around and demand that you purchase an annual license to view all your existing content.
Sorry - I deal more with graphics and mostly use Illustrator to manipulate PDFs. Acrobat is more what corporations use to make PDFs but most of the text content comes from outboard word processors of some sort.
You do realize that full fledged editing of your PDFs is impossible...
Good. Most documents are one-way items. We don't want clients editing proposals or T&Cs.
That said, PDFs can be wrapped up in a number of ways including editable and not editable. Being a very close cousin of Post Script, the right tool to edit PDFs is Adobe Illustrator at $600 - yes, way too much money and not a very good word processor. That's why we use Office or NeoOffice, then print the result to PDF including Excel worksheets. Simple, can't screw with it on the other end. If you need to edit your PDF, pull up the original document, edit and print to PDF again. Not as elegent as editing the PDF but workable
Speculation about Apple's Pages to turn into a real word processor which edits PDFs natively have been around for a while. That would be a killer app. It already understands vector objects (PDF, Illustrator, Post Script, EPS etc) you drop onto the canvas. Somebody will figure it out and knock the greed out of Adobe.
Re:You don't need MS Office to create .doc files
on
Does ODF Have a Future?
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
No dogs, 100 person shop, yes CIO, no CEO, not in Enumclaw WA, still have too many Outlook junkies (3 remaining), OpenOffice/NeoOffice still a shade buggy for prime time and... why yes, I am important nerd on/.
The primary reason sending Word docs is irresponsible (as opposed to PDF or RTF) is security. There are so many things wrong with many versions of Word in the field, like the ability to plaster you with viruses or revealing lots of stuff you never intended to show. Bad enough even some recent versions of Word simply grab an image of the RAM surrounding your document and write it to disk - along with whatever else is in RAM nearby. This is how the original [Xerox] Bravo (the origins of Word) saved documents and Microsoft didn't feel the need to improve that for decades. Add to that what the other A/C said - you assume everyone has an expensive copy of Office or Word in a [proprietary] format compatible with what you're sending.
OK, that was nasty. Let me be more specific about why you earned that - your whole post was about jealousy:
...hordes of trendy Apple snobs wearing fashionable clothes who wasted $5000 on their last stylish Mac because of its slick exterior design, being the perfect complement for their iPods and the central hub of their digital lifestyle. Being important members of the blogosphere, they need to surf the cyberspace with class as they update their MySpace.
Re:You don't need MS Office to create .doc files
on
Does ODF Have a Future?
·
· Score: 4, Interesting
As CTO, I'm telling my staff that it's irresponsible to send MS Word.doc files. We're at least sending PDFs through email but haven't managed to break the MS Office habit yet. Still too many buzzword enamored people here but they're starting to understand.
Microsoft is now trying to catch some of the OSS halo effect... while trying to figure out how to own it... or at least trash it? Who do they think is going to buy into anything like this? I guess when your primary business model is going down in flames, you need to co-opt someone else's.
Depends on the web site. I just did a simple web based RSVP for a company event aimed at cable television industry executives, capturing browser and OS stats while I was at it. Turns out >30% of the people responding were using Macs. I see the same with standard web stats on the server - around 30% (up from 4% six years ago). Vista hasn't even tipped the meter yet.
Slashdot Mirror
Well, SOMEONE has to give the telecoms some competition, if nothing else to keep them from raping the public. The U.S. is already the laughingstock of the planet for how behind our telephone systems and ISPs are. It used to be the other way around - the U.S. telephone system under AT&T was the best in the world (for what it was). Now everyone else is running rings around us with bandwidth and features while the U.S. telecoms are artificially limiting what they deliver. Go Munies!
Microsoft cares about a uniform web experience? There's a "Lost and Found" story for ya'.
Holy Cow. We just lived through a decade of that kind of behavior and you didn't notice? mp3Pro (so what) is licensable just like MP3, JPEG and everything else. Thomson never offered MP3 encoders up for free then suddenly demand royalties once MP3 got traction. Thomson always required a license. They did, however, suddenly demand a license for MP3 decoders. They're all greedy bastards. Submarine ransom demands are a great side business for Microsoft as well and everything they release is another opportunity to collect undue cash:
I'm no expert on their activities but this is a common historical pattern that nearly anyone can see (do you read Slashdot by any chance?). I've even been stung directly by their behavior and have seen the difference between profiting from your effort and profiteering off your victims. For the last decade, Microsoft has held back real progress by co-opting rising technologies, modifying them a little to make sure their competitors fail, and re-releasing a crudely inferior shadow of the original. The original technology is now overwhelmed and eliminated by their own version. Interoperability was never in Microsoft's interest. That's how a lot of dreams ended. Developers and users were simply upgrading their handcuffs with each new release of Microsoft "technology". Now, Microsoft is being dragged backwards through their own stew. The last resort is trying to control competition through patent infringement threats and forging deals with unlikely allies in order to threaten the rest of their competitors who didn't sign a pact with them. There's no innovation going on there. They're even trying to capture some of the OpenSource halo by calling proprietary technologies "Open" in an attempt to tie the word to Microsoft in the eyes of people who don't know any better.
Ach. Look at the time...
M18A1 Claymore - boom!
What if that black stratum is the radioactive remains of everything organic that died all at once?
Who let the English professor on Slashdot?
</humor>
I'll guess JPEG XR will be the "free" standard and Microsoft will introduce a DRM laden, royalty cha-ching version called JPEG XR PRO which will be seeded to equipment and service vendors (cameras, Adobe, Shutterfly, Ritz etc) who get a cut of the royalties for pushing it. After it reaches critical mass in the market, Microsoft will turn around and demand that you purchase an annual license to view all your existing content.
I vote "No".
Sorry - I deal more with graphics and mostly use Illustrator to manipulate PDFs. Acrobat is more what corporations use to make PDFs but most of the text content comes from outboard word processors of some sort.
Good. Most documents are one-way items. We don't want clients editing proposals or T&Cs.
That said, PDFs can be wrapped up in a number of ways including editable and not editable. Being a very close cousin of Post Script, the right tool to edit PDFs is Adobe Illustrator at $600 - yes, way too much money and not a very good word processor. That's why we use Office or NeoOffice, then print the result to PDF including Excel worksheets. Simple, can't screw with it on the other end. If you need to edit your PDF, pull up the original document, edit and print to PDF again. Not as elegent as editing the PDF but workable
Speculation about Apple's Pages to turn into a real word processor which edits PDFs natively have been around for a while. That would be a killer app. It already understands vector objects (PDF, Illustrator, Post Script, EPS etc) you drop onto the canvas. Somebody will figure it out and knock the greed out of Adobe.
I sold the latte stand about 5 years ago.
No dogs, 100 person shop, yes CIO, no CEO, not in Enumclaw WA, still have too many Outlook junkies (3 remaining), OpenOffice/NeoOffice still a shade buggy for prime time and... why yes, I am important nerd on /.
The primary reason sending Word docs is irresponsible (as opposed to PDF or RTF) is security. There are so many things wrong with many versions of Word in the field, like the ability to plaster you with viruses or revealing lots of stuff you never intended to show. Bad enough even some recent versions of Word simply grab an image of the RAM surrounding your document and write it to disk - along with whatever else is in RAM nearby. This is how the original [Xerox] Bravo (the origins of Word) saved documents and Microsoft didn't feel the need to improve that for decades. Add to that what the other A/C said - you assume everyone has an expensive copy of Office or Word in a [proprietary] format compatible with what you're sending.
OK, that was nasty. Let me be more specific about why you earned that - your whole post was about jealousy:
...hordes of trendy Apple snobs wearing fashionable clothes who wasted $5000 on their last stylish Mac because of its slick exterior design, being the perfect complement for their iPods and the central hub of their digital lifestyle. Being important members of the blogosphere, they need to surf the cyberspace with class as they update their MySpace.You must live in a trailer park.
You must live in a trailer park.
As CTO, I'm telling my staff that it's irresponsible to send MS Word .doc files. We're at least sending PDFs through email but haven't managed to break the MS Office habit yet. Still too many buzzword enamored people here but they're starting to understand.
This is nothing. Just wait 'til the Thought Police get ahold of you.
Ballmer? Is that you?
Now with MS providing a serious place to get OSS...
If by "OSS" you mean "Overly Shitty Software", then yes Microsoft is the place to go.
Well said. There have been signs of this "openness" pretense for a while. How does that saying go? "..but keep your enemies closer".
Microsoft is now trying to catch some of the OSS halo effect... while trying to figure out how to own it... or at least trash it? Who do they think is going to buy into anything like this? I guess when your primary business model is going down in flames, you need to co-opt someone else's.
Do like Microsoft does with standards... run away as far as possible as fast as you can.
Depends on the web site. I just did a simple web based RSVP for a company event aimed at cable television industry executives, capturing browser and OS stats while I was at it. Turns out >30% of the people responding were using Macs. I see the same with standard web stats on the server - around 30% (up from 4% six years ago). Vista hasn't even tipped the meter yet.
The first time I previewed it said "DK1g>" on the end, then it previewed fine the second time but posted with that "000c" - sheesh.
using000c
?
Data error on transmission: "I stopped using it"
I never saw any articles predicting "note passing", and lip-reading becoming the protocol de jour.
As soon as my teachers krakd pig latin, I stopped using000c
Is this something they found online?
Next, they figure out how to use the camera to make and sell their own porn.