You're being perhaps literally accurate while being technically/practically dishonest.
What happens if someone uses GPL code in their product but does not adhere to the terms of the GPL? They are then not allowed to distribute the resulting product. If they do, they did infringe on the copyright of the authors. The GPL doesn't matter at that point. The only thing that can happen is that the original authors sue for damages. Mostly they will be satisfied if the sourcecode is released, but that is NOT a requirement
GPL is designed to destroy the authors-retain-intellectual-property commercial software model. It is philosophically opposed to intellectual property rights. This is not contestable.
One of the ways it tries to acheive this aim is by acting as a land-mine inside of the aforementioned commercial software. I cannot speak for all software companies, but at Microsoft the concern is that someone will see some innocuous code that is freely available for their eyes [as in, they can see it], but that code of course exists under a license that doesn't permit them to use it under plausible terms.
The result is that when GPL software is "accidentally" included in commercial software, the intellectual property is the entire package is destroyed. _This_ is not an accident; it is a design feature of GPL and it is consistent with the anti-IP worldview of its creator. The fact that the GPL was violated will always be discovered after the fact, when the software is widely distributed. There was no choice to "infringe/not infringe", there was a desire on the part of the company to not infringe, but shit happens and they are left holding the bag. [The same thing also happens with software patents, btw].
A discussion of the merits/problems/theory of intellectual property is a fine one to have, but it is orthogonal to the discussion: namely, that GPL assumes that commercial software works and is distributed in a certain way, such that its creators retain intellectual property rights, and GPL is designed to destroy that.
The policy at Microsoft is that no employee is ever allowed to _look_ at patent filing or any peice of possibly-GPL licensed source code.
Summary: You are a fear-mongering moron
GPL is designed to destroy the current business model of most commercial software vendors. It's "teeth" are the American legal system. "Destroy" and "Legal System" ought to strike fear into any intelligent or rational person, because the legal system is _always_ a roll of the dice.
Companies never want to roll-the-dice with their core asset, and in the case of intellectual property companies, that is their IP.
Summary: you are glossing over the very real problems with GPL and commercial software. You do so beacuse you are either ignorant of the actual difficulties it creates, or are sympathetic to the goal of the GPL, namely, to destroy the current IP-retention based commercial software model.
I worked my first 3 years in Redmond. Then I asked to be transferred to Fargo.
The Fargo office is more laid back to be sure. I don't think I worked any more hours in Redmond, but i certainly wasted more hours getting around town in the Redmond/Seattle metro area.
I've worked for Microsoft for almost 10 years, both in Redmond and in Fargo, ND.
I've probably worked fewer than 10 50 hour weeks in my entire career here. I can think of one big disaster where I was at work 40 hours straight, and I slept on my office floor for a few hours here and there as RAIDs were rebuilding. But that sticks in my mind as a singular event, not a way of life.
I've told my last few bosses exactly where I stand: I plan on having more employers than wives, and I prioritize my time appropriately.
I got an eyeful, when, as a fresh-out-of-college hire at Microsoft, I watched my skip-level manager with a zillion dollars after a 15 year Microsoft career lose way more than some of his money going through a messy divorce because his wife was, basically, lonely.
Microsoft does not require consistent 50 hour weeks. If you are someone who can do top-quality productive work 60 hours a week, you'll certainly be rewarded for it, and I think that's a good thing.
I'm not saying that there aren't people who feel they have to work too many hours, and I'm not saying there are no groups or managers that lean on people for more work and are abusive about work/life balance. But it certainly isn't pervasive across the company, and employees can get out of those arrangements if they really need to.
It's really an employee-driven thing. If you feel like you need to work too much, that expectation may be coming from nobody other than you. Talk it over with your manager and move to a different group if there is an expectation mis-match. Every year employees take an anonymous survey where they rate all kinds of 1 through 5 questions about their boss, bosses boss, work life balance, and people do actally look at that stuff and try to act on it.
On the MS Fargo campus, the parking lot is pretty empty by 6pm. Earlier on Fridays in the summer. Most of us have families.
The vacation and maternity/paternity policies are also fine. I have trouble using all my vacation in a year so I roll foward anything that isn't going to be lost.
And yet you're basically demanding that I sacrifice for you and your children.
I'm demanding no such thing. I don't care what you do so long as it isn't on or to my property.
The second issue is close to what economists call the "free rider" problem: if some other sucker's kid gets vaccinated, then you won't have to vaccinate yours.
Unless I can count on all other people anywhere I plan on having an exposure risk to have been vaccinated, this really isn't "that" problem. It perhaps looks like it in some sort of detached statistical sense, but for people like me, I have a great deal of control over [and thus, in my case, stagnation] the set of people I interact with on a daily basis. Even if there are only 5 people left in the whole world who are vectors, if 3 of them are people I am likely to interact with and I choose not to vaccinate, I'm not "free riding" off of anything, I'm likely screwed.
For your kids' sake, I hope they don't end up having to be the examples which convince other parents to act rationally (I would say "for your sake", but who am I kidding? I don't care much if your faulty thinking gets weeded out by a preventable disease, but it'd be a shame if you managed to get some kids killed instead)
My kid has gotten all immunization sequence vaccinations on schedule. I don't think he got the H1N1 cocktail, but my wife, who is pregnant, did.
The point I am making, which you have either ignored or missed, is that I don't have an obligation to "society" to behave in any particlar way. The NAP governs my conduct towards individuals. Only individuals have rights -- groups do not [despite legal gymnastics to the contrary].
Epistemolgy aside, I'm not precluded from acting in my own self interest -- if I am going to allow myself to be near potentially sick people, only a fool would completely rule out taking defensive measures. Contrastingly, only a fool would automatically accept any course of action recommended to him by a nanny-state.
A more interesting discussion to me would be to what extent choosing to remain a pathogen vector made one violate the non-aggression principle. What is worrying about this line of discussion is any argument that suggests I ought to legally be required to vaccinate to arrest the possibility of harming others also seems like it could legally disallow me from exhaling [i create more CO2 than i consume, and talking-idiots all over the world continue to extoll the many harms of CO2 production.. causing prostitution, eradicating countries... so connect the dots]
This is an extreme example, of course, but it shows a real problem: if enough people believe even relatively mild conspiracy theories about flu vaccines, then they'll refuse to get vaccinated and public health -- something it's the government's job to promote and maintain -- will suffer. This means that rebutting and refuting such theories becomes a part of the government's job, as furthering the goal of public health
Let me re-phrase the vaccination "Debate".
Doctor: "you're not sick, but i'd like to inject you with this diluted form of an illness so that your body will build up its immune system. It may keep you from getting sick and it will statistically help you from getting other people sick" Patient: "is there any downside, risk, or side effect?" Doctor: "erm.. some people react badly to the vaccination" Patient: "how badly? do they die?" Doctor: "not usually" Patient: "how often?" Doctor: "it's not very often" Patient: "I've never gotten sick before. Why would i inject that thing into myself if it might kill me?" Doctor: "everyone has to do it, it's for the good of society" Patient: "fuck society and fuck you"
I'm not anti-vaccine. But i certainly understand the sentiment. And every time we talk about what "standard shot" my 2 year old should get next, I have to go through the above dialog again and try and get the real numbers before I think about if it's worth it or not. The statistics don't matter when the "only 1 in 10,000 who dies" is _your_ kid. And every time I've been to the doctors office for the last 20 years I've been asked "have any reactions to any medicines" and i say "yes, when i had the MMR booster shot i was fucked up for days afterwards". I have no idea why i reacted badly to it but i sure did. That doesn't widely make me fear vaccinations or anything, but it does make the consideration of "should I do this medical procedure or not?" more than a simple no-op.
But the big problem i have, and why i responded, is this bit:
public health -- something it's the government's job to promote and maintain -- will suffer
This is not the government's job. Neither to promote nor to maintain it. It's not written into the constitution and even if it were it wouldn't mean anything if it were written using that language.
Besides, the FDA murders Americans every single year. Are _those_ Americans having their health maintained? Or are they not the public?
Fuck the public. "The public" is politician weasel language for saying "my excuse for doing what I want to do". What is good for "the public" is NEVER good for every single individual in that group [like those guys that die or get really sick from vaccinations they don't need]. There is no "for the public good", there is no "the voice of the public", and there is no "what the public want".
This whole idea of "sacrifice for the public good" is the keystone of the downfall of America. The reason is simple: there is no public. There are only conveniently made slices, that exist only at some time and place, as a twinkle in the eye of some law maker. Individuals are completely expendable.
I see it differently. All 350 million "Americans" are expendable to me. I won't go out of my way to harm anyone, but I'll never sacrifice myself for "you". I do not exist for your benefit, or to be sacrificed for you as you see fit.
If a vaccine is good for me, as an individual, after considering the weighted risks of taking it vs. not taking it, I'll take it. Otherwise, I won't.
Congratulations. You have discovered (and transcribed above) the only known peice of Vogon Poetry on the topic of Video Games with Cars in them.
I applaud you for this contribution to slashdot and humanity.
However, I am not especially sophisticated, and can be at times, dense. What does what you wrote actually _mean_ ?
Re:So these guys keep wanting to prove my point!
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Gran Turismo 5 Delayed
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· Score: 4, Interesting
The thing most people haven't realized about the GT series of games is that they aren't really racing / simulation games. A friend explained it properly: Gran Turismo is Pokemon with Cars.
Forza1 came out and crushed it, physics-wise. Each successive Forza iteration has embarassed the then-current GT game in terms of accuracy of driving model.
True, Forza has always lagged in terms of number of Front Wheel Drive Micro-Vans compared to Gran Turismo.
I have a fair bit of actual track driving experience in stock and lightly prepared cars. I've also driven the nordschliefe in meat space [rent a car when you visit Germany; anyone can do it].
People who laud the Gran Turismo games as being the "real driving simulator" are embarassing themselves.
If the police are using something stronger than bi-focals to look at your house, they ought to have a warrant. That means they ought to have reasonable suspicion that a _specific_ crime is being committed.
I don't troll the interwebs looking for ways to apologize for Fox news {I have no horse in the national-news-media race}, I do think yours is a problematic point of view.
There are _lots_ of stories that the "mainstream media" doesn't pick up. That's because they don't report the news, they make it. Their priorities are capturing eyeballs and shaping public opinion, and both of those goals play second fiddle to making money. Means to an end.
When Grayson forgets to pay his dues to the right people, and when there isn't some sex scandal to report on, he'll show up in more places.
There seems to be some need to consider Fox as an outlier according to whatever metrics people want to stack rank or group news organizations by. Being an outlier isn't necessarily a bad thing; in fact, it's a great thing if you happen to be telling the truth [see also: Galileo]. Lest I set off someone's pressure cooker by conflagrating Fox news and "truth", I was merely reminding you that truth survives a hung jury.
In any case, my [limited] experience with Fox news convinces me they are staffed about the way everyone else on TV [or radio] is - by manipulative hacks that either don't understand what they're talking about or don't want _you_ to understand what they _should_ be talking about.
Government is created to try and preserve the rights men were born with.
I happen to think that I own the toil of my hands and the ingenuity of my mind. What does it mean to own something? Exclusive control of that thing.
On a desert island, I certainly own the work of my hands and mind. Why should I give up that control just because someone thinks themself my neighbor?
I shouldn't, and in the United States, at least originally, you weren't asked to.
It turns out that a large part of the law deals with preserving the intrinsic property rights of individuals -- as the idea of ownership is the most fundamental concept of a free man [certainly, a man must be allowed to own himself! another idea that is unique amongst world governments to the US constitution...]
Now, unlike the misguided collectivists who beleive that "the workers" produce and therefore should "own" the wealth of the world, hands are of marginal importance compared to minds. My hands are no stronger or more durable than were the first entites that could be rightly called human hands thousands of years ago. The difference between me and them is the foundation of _mental_ output.
Ideas are what matter. Ideas are what have value. Ideas -- and nothing more than ideas -- are the difference between a humanity full of sky scrapers, planes, a lifespan longer than 40 years, and the cavemen who didn't know how to make fire.
Intellectual Property is the basic realization that ideas are the most valuable things in human history, and that a man ought to be free to own his ideas -- just like he is when he's alone on an island.
Creating the appropriate legal protections of a mind's inventions requires much legal anquish and debate. But it is a debate and process that must continue. Attempting to dismiss IP as some fundmentally invalid or non-existant concept shows great contempt for humanity. Not "humanity, the pool of humans", but "humanity -- the essence of what a man is".
- all transactions between individuals legally allowed to own their own decisions [i.e. we can exclude "children" or "mentally handicapped" people] are fundamentally ethical, assuming they are conducted without force or fraud
- a man owns himself, and the output of his mind and his hands
I think if you start with these two axioms, it's hard to explain why a marketplace-granted near-monopoly is a problem.
I think if you aren't willing to start with these two axioms, you should refrain from calling what you beleive in a "Free" market.
For example, letting a company gain a monopoly in a particular region/industry is bad
Why?
Monopolies that help the monopoly holder sustain unnaturally high profits are unsustainable without coercion, and in western society, coercion is done by governments.
IOW: if there is a monopoly out there that is over charging you and reaping huge profits, they are not long for the world unless they have a government propping them up somehow.
If it was truly an issue of the profits being too high, a different market place entrant could provide the same or similar product/service, at the same or worse efficiency, and at a cheaper consumer price, with the difference being taken out of the healthy profit margin.
If there is a monopoly or near-monopoly without government collusion, then there is no problem, because it is by definition not fleecing customers [nothing would protect its margins from an upstart who could safetly cut into them].
Sometimes a particular company just does a really good job and gets a lot of market share. That's not a bad thing.
Our 40 year "government regulation is bad" experiment ended with disastrous results
You mean the failure of our 100+ year experiment whereby the government hands out favors to some entrants, giving them a tremendous marketplace advantage with the full power of a gun behind it? That experiment has a long history of failure world wide. It shouldn't surprise anyone that it is also failing here.
We have had a mixed economy for a very long time. The #1 trick of the statists and their useful idiots is blaming all of our problems on what we continue to have a shrinking share of - marketplace freedom.
One would surmise that if unregulated markets were actually a problem, the amplitude of our cyclic economic destruction would be ever decreasing as the benevolent weight of regulatory graft piled ever higher. Yet this has not been the case. And in light of experimental results that contradict the hypothesis thus far tried, a scientist, or a policy maker who's aim was economic success, would be willing to modify their approach.
But that's not what we have. We have a government that is it's own end. It exists for its own power, and any course of action not commensurate with the increase of power and the subjugation of man isn't realistically considered.
I'm not sure how to dignify this with a response. Do you actually have any way to refute any of what I've written? Maybe you should call an expert and get some help?
We're getting into a he-said she-said that isn't apparently accurate on either end, so I'll try and distill my main point to this:
Your theories for why people use windows do not adequately explain the number of home and small business users that buy retail copies, nor the number of users at large companies which have IT departments large enough to do whatever they like and make the users live with it.
I don't beleive I've ever excluded your points or created a false dilemma between your claims and my objections [i.e. i've never said that _all_ or even _most_ windows users are saavy comparison shoppers]: my objections being that _some_ windows users [and perhaps a large number of them, even if minority share] _have_ thought about and _have_ made a concious decision to use windows.
You don't seem to allow for that possibility, and at every juncture, you try to minimize this point or refute it with hand waving.
It's an important point because your original claim was that the price of windows is unjustified because nobody has ever thought about the fact that they're even buying it. And i think the existance of the retail market and EA/Select business agreements make your claim complete bullshit.
Perhaps so, but this says very little about the price value of Windows or its utility or efficiency as a desktop platform. Rather, it speaks volumes to user apathy ("I already know Windows"), fear ("My programs won't work on anything but Windows!"), ignorance ("Windows is the computer"), and other psychological factors.
How does it not say exactly what i said it does -- that these people have considered what they're getting and then decided to spend their money on it?
Furthermore, if people were apathetic, why would they go to a store and buy something new? If they were apathetic they'd continue using the OS they already have. Especially if, as you say, their apathy takes the form of "they already know windows", their fear takes the form of "my programs won't work". New versions of windows by definition differ from what they already know, and change what already works. They must have some compelling reason to give up what they know for something they perceive to be an improvement.
My contention is that you haven't adequately explained why people voluntarily buy windows retail boxed copies. The reasons you've given don't make sense. These are people who already have computers, and they want to buy what is [probably] a _second_, newer copy of windows. I don't see any other way of looking at this phenomena than those users speculating that a new version of windows will be valuable to them... how valuable? Approximately as much as the price they end up paying for it.
You seem to have such a deeply held distaste for Microsoft/Windows that you are unwilling to consider that some people like it enough to pay for it, even though they have other choices that they are aware of [including, the choice to do nothing].
I think the number of such people is roughly the # of retail copies of windows sold, plus some percentage of the people who _could_ get by with a Mac but choose a PC.
I think your attempt to categorize windows users as ignorant rubes who would choose differently if only they were as wise as you is pretty insulting to them, and indicative of your contempt for people's ability to make their own choices.
I am no longer in the highschool/college demographic, but availability of games is not a determining factor for what platform people use amongst the people I typically interact with. People play lots of casual games - like facebook scrabble, or the yahoo games, or the kind of things you could do in a weekend on any GUI system, but as far as people that go and carefully select a video card for gaming attributes... this certainly doesn't explain the use of windows in the business world, and this doesn't seem to be a factor in the purchasing decisions of most post-college people that just "want a computer".
_Some_ OS has to come with a computer for normal customers. An interesting question is, "does that OS have to be windows or windows compatible". The answer for a long time was "Yes". Apple has had a lot of success lately challenging that long-held truism. Linux hasn't. It's an important issue to continuously re-evaluate, but the only place where computers pre-loaded with Linux have been widely successful have been niche devices... Tivo boxes, various NAS/home-network devices, and Netbooks come to mind. On the occasions that companies have tried selling "normal" PCs that run linux, they've tended to not do well. I won't speculate on why, but that is what history has shown thus far.
To say that MS "overcharges" in some kind of absolute sense is meaningless. They don't even charage a consistent price.
That's kind of a foolish statement. Windows doesn't do things the way people want either, which is why the average user can emit an impressive stream of complaints about their computer if you let on that you're in any IT-related field
I never suggested that windows does exactly what people want; my point is that there is some clear value differentiation between what windows does and what competing products do; otherwise windows wouldn't be in the position that it is in.
Now then, do you honestly beleive that __nobody__ anywhere has carefully evaluated their options and decided that buying windows represents the best value?
In the past five years or so Linux, particularly desktop-focussed distros like Ubuntu, have gotten to the point where you could give one to Your Mom and she'd be able to install it. These are free operating systems. They're also completely gratis. There's no law that says an OS has to cost money, and there's not that much support in the history books for such a notion either.
I don't disgree with you. I'm not sure why you think you disagree. I said, and you agreed, that people have different frameworks for making value decisions. For many people, part of the value proposition of windows is that they pay more upfront to save more down the road.
That's patently absurd. Most people don't realise they're paying for Windows at all. Remember, to them, "it came with the computer". To an extent they are paying very little for it since OEMs subsidise the cost with the idiotic crapware they also pre-install. But the point is that most people do not go out and buy a Windows disc.
Here's my assertion, which i have no data to backup, so if you've got some that refutes me, please post away:
More people buy boxed retail copies of windows, not attached to any computer, than do acquire mac OS X or any version of Linux via any delivery mechanism combined.
Assuming I am right, those people clearly know what they're buying and what it costs, and there are more such people than there are who choose [and use] the free and non-free alternatives.
I assure that I do not have more money than I know what to do with.
Regarding what Microsoft should or shouldn't do -- you are free to make a product that gives people just the things that they want that costs less than what Microsoft is charging for windows, and to become wildly successful and rich [or not rich, if you are driven by altruism] if you so desire.
But there isn't a rational argument for what it "should" cost. It "should" cost what people are willing to pay, just like every other product.
An interesting thing about costs and profits is this: if something is truly "overpriced" because the profit is so high, a competitor can always build the same [or better] product, and via their efficiency and ingenuity, offer their competitive product for a lower price and still make enough profit to make the venture worth while. Note that this is true even when there is a monopoly -- so long as the monopoly isn't government backed [i.e. a __law__ saying that only windows can be sold in the USA]
Now, nobody has made a completely identical product to windows and tried to sell it for less money, and part of this is due to the fact that it is illegal to do an outright "clone" of software. But functionally, there are many competing products that do things similarly. Some cost more, and some cost less. Is _any_ Operating System that costs more than windows automatically too expensive? Or a Rip off? Or not worth it? Are IOS releases [for Cisco products] always a rip off if they are more than $100? I assure you that there are fewer lines of code in IOS. And they run on fewer devices.... Heck, most of what IOS does can be done in freeware *nix devices. Shouldn't IOS be free?
Working and astroturfing for a monopoly is damaging to the soul/spirit/karma
Working for Microsoft in a QA role, and seeing how things work on "the inside", and influencing them now and then, has been a lot more beneficial to my "soul/spirit/karma" than staying on the outside and spinning my wheels bitching.
I resent being called an astroturfer - I make no effort to conceal who pays my salary right now, nor does Microsoft want me spending my time "defending" it on slashdot. My argument here was about economics, not Windows. Windows happened to be the subject matter at hand, but I'd make the same argument about SunOS or anything else.
It's not very effective "astroturing" when my original post says that i use free software on some of my comptuers because for me, windows just doesn't add enough extra value to be worth the cost in those situations.
There is a _price_ at which the two parties in question: buyer and seller, are willing to conduct an exchange at a given point in time.
You know how stores have sales? "15% off -- only today!" Is the product 15% less valuable today, and then tomorrow it reverts to being more "valuable"? If so, what is that value changed based on?
For all actors in the market and for all non-coercive transactions [i.e. where force or fraud are not involved], "value" is determined independantly by each party in the transaction, and what is true for both parties right now may not be true tomorrow. The product doesn't change, but the preferences and broader situation of the marketplace participants does.
Today, windows is "worth", say, $100 to me. Tomorrow, if I've lost my job, it won't be worth _anything_ to me. It's not like windows is suddenly a worse product because I've lost my job. But my framework for evaluating the "value" of things to me changes dramatically.
This isn't a new problem: it's [at first glance] wierd that Windows costs one amount in the US and a different amount in other places. Other places have a different standard of living than we do, so in such places the US based cost of a Windows license would be unthinkable.
In the US, most people have enough money that they figure the value they get from windows is worth about what they have to pay for it. Even though they pay a lot more than many other people do in other places. I think think most Americans would trade their position in the world so that they could have cheaper windows pricing, but those that would are free to do so. And in any situation, one is always free to decide windows doesn't represent a good value to them at the price Microsoft is willing to sell it for, and so no transaction has to happen.
posting my credentials would be irrelevant; in the best case it would be the logical fallacy known as "appeal to authority", in the event that you assumed i was an authority on relevant matters. I mentioned Austrian economics only because I find it to be the most compellingly rational treatment of the subject at hand, and rather than try to re-create all of it here unattributed and with the possibility of the introduction of mistakes, I figured I'd [indirectly] point readers at the source literature.
But since you have an ideological "off switch", I'll try and explain to you more concretely the specifc point given here: there is no meaningful concept of absolute value:
Situation 1: i am the last surviving human, all alone, on an island Before me are three boxes 1) an infinite supply of food and water 2) a single handgun with a single bullet 3) an infinite supply of money
Which is most valuable to me?
Situation 2: i am one of two surviving humans - the other is my wife, and we are all alone, on an island Now which is most valuable to me?
Situation 3: I am me, living in the USA in 2009. Now which is most valuable to me?
I'd claim that the answers are: 1) option #2 - so I could kill myself rather than have a lifetime of animalistic lonesome agony 2) option #1 - so that my wife and I could enjoy the remainder of our lives together with our food and water needs met 3) Trick question! If i chose option #3, nobody would take my money once they realized there was an infinite supply of it, and so it would become worthless. This is infact what the US governemnt is finding out regarding their own US dollar! HA HA!. If I chose option #1, people that had chosen option #2 would take my food or my life from me [people like the US government, for instance]. If I chose option #2, I can defend myself against exaclty one person, but doing so probably invites the wrath of many subsequent people, for which I will be unprepared. I suppose I could sell the gun and bullet though.
So in the 3rd case, there are no good choices, but option #2 isn't necessarily a bad choice.
So the point here is that the value of things isn't intrinsic, but is instead a function of who evaluates them and at what time. In the original post I told you my value assessment was that that I'd rather pay for a $120 operating system every year than for four dining-out-for-two experiences. If there was no internet and I had no particular interest in computers, I don't think I'd decide the same way, to be honest. But it is already the case that today I use my computer [and its operating system] every day and I eat at resturants fewer than 4 times per month. 20 years ago people used resturants more than they used the internet. Today I am not convinced that is the case for many segments of the population.
$30 is about what the os, in its MAX config, is worth. any os.
When you discover Austrian economics, you'll learn that there is no such concept as intrinsic value. So this statement is meaningless about any good or service. It might be meaningful for YOU for RIGHT NOW, but the notion of value is time and observer dependant.
linux, freebsd, opensolaris: all free and all way more stable.
And all miss certain desktop scenarios that windows nails, which is why everyone on the planet hasn't simultaneously said "OMG -- why do i keep paying money for windows when *nix does EVERYTHING I NEED EXACTLY THE WAY I WANT"
paying $100+ for an o/s is so 1990's.
Given the amount of inflation between now and then, even paying $250 for an OS today is "so 1990s".
The idea that the operating system on your computer -- the thing that actually lets it do useful things -- isn't worth dinner for 2 at a national-chain resturant (your $30 figure) is completely hillarious. You honestly would rather forego the last 30 years of personal computer history and instead have 1 dinner for two?
I think "an" OS is easily worth $100 or more per year to me. I'd skip dining out 4 times a year to have one. It's nice that there are free choices available, and in some cases I use those free choices since the marginal utility benefits of pay-ware doesn't justify the marginal cost increase for my scenarios.
I think it must be a common fallacy amongst f/oss zealouts that they feel like the only people that must be clued-in, and that if only the rest of the planet would "discover" that there are free operating systems out there, Windows and other commercial operating systems would vanish.
I suspect that the major vendors and Fortune 500 companies are very well aware of free software and what its advantages and disadvantages are, and have conciously chosen to continue using Windows for the majority of what they do based on a value analysis. I also suspect that they continually re-visit this analysis [and this accounts for things like the Wal-Mart and Dell linux machines..]
I think it's fair to guess that most people paying for windows figure it is worth 75% or more [to them] of what they're paying for it.
So I don't find your post insightful at all. You don't understand economics, and your assessment of value seems very contrived to me... based on ideology rather than reality.
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If this is the "Easy option", why is it that it is so infrequently taken? Why is it that the complete product code is so often released?
You're being perhaps literally accurate while being technically/practically dishonest.
GPL is designed to destroy the authors-retain-intellectual-property commercial software model. It is philosophically opposed to intellectual property rights. This is not contestable.
One of the ways it tries to acheive this aim is by acting as a land-mine inside of the aforementioned commercial software. I cannot speak for all software companies, but at Microsoft the concern is that someone will see some innocuous code that is freely available for their eyes [as in, they can see it], but that code of course exists under a license that doesn't permit them to use it under plausible terms.
The result is that when GPL software is "accidentally" included in commercial software, the intellectual property is the entire package is destroyed. _This_ is not an accident; it is a design feature of GPL and it is consistent with the anti-IP worldview of its creator. The fact that the GPL was violated will always be discovered after the fact, when the software is widely distributed. There was no choice to "infringe/not infringe", there was a desire on the part of the company to not infringe, but shit happens and they are left holding the bag. [The same thing also happens with software patents, btw].
A discussion of the merits/problems/theory of intellectual property is a fine one to have, but it is orthogonal to the discussion: namely, that GPL assumes that commercial software works and is distributed in a certain way, such that its creators retain intellectual property rights, and GPL is designed to destroy that.
The policy at Microsoft is that no employee is ever allowed to _look_ at patent filing or any peice of possibly-GPL licensed source code.
GPL is designed to destroy the current business model of most commercial software vendors. It's "teeth" are the American legal system. "Destroy" and "Legal System" ought to strike fear into any intelligent or rational person, because the legal system is _always_ a roll of the dice.
Companies never want to roll-the-dice with their core asset, and in the case of intellectual property companies, that is their IP.
Summary: you are glossing over the very real problems with GPL and commercial software. You do so beacuse you are either ignorant of the actual difficulties it creates, or are sympathetic to the goal of the GPL, namely, to destroy the current IP-retention based commercial software model.
I worked my first 3 years in Redmond. Then I asked to be transferred to Fargo.
The Fargo office is more laid back to be sure. I don't think I worked any more hours in Redmond, but i certainly wasted more hours getting around town in the Redmond/Seattle metro area.
I've worked for Microsoft for almost 10 years, both in Redmond and in Fargo, ND.
I've probably worked fewer than 10 50 hour weeks in my entire career here. I can think of one big disaster where I was at work 40 hours straight, and I slept on my office floor for a few hours here and there as RAIDs were rebuilding. But that sticks in my mind as a singular event, not a way of life.
I've told my last few bosses exactly where I stand: I plan on having more employers than wives, and I prioritize my time appropriately.
I got an eyeful, when, as a fresh-out-of-college hire at Microsoft, I watched my skip-level manager with a zillion dollars after a 15 year Microsoft career lose way more than some of his money going through a messy divorce because his wife was, basically, lonely.
Microsoft does not require consistent 50 hour weeks. If you are someone who can do top-quality productive work 60 hours a week, you'll certainly be rewarded for it, and I think that's a good thing.
I'm not saying that there aren't people who feel they have to work too many hours, and I'm not saying there are no groups or managers that lean on people for more work and are abusive about work/life balance. But it certainly isn't pervasive across the company, and employees can get out of those arrangements if they really need to.
It's really an employee-driven thing. If you feel like you need to work too much, that expectation may be coming from nobody other than you. Talk it over with your manager and move to a different group if there is an expectation mis-match. Every year employees take an anonymous survey where they rate all kinds of 1 through 5 questions about their boss, bosses boss, work life balance, and people do actally look at that stuff and try to act on it.
On the MS Fargo campus, the parking lot is pretty empty by 6pm. Earlier on Fridays in the summer. Most of us have families.
The vacation and maternity/paternity policies are also fine. I have trouble using all my vacation in a year so I roll foward anything that isn't going to be lost.
I'm demanding no such thing. I don't care what you do so long as it isn't on or to my property.
Unless I can count on all other people anywhere I plan on having an exposure risk to have been vaccinated, this really isn't "that" problem. It perhaps looks like it in some sort of detached statistical sense, but for people like me, I have a great deal of control over [and thus, in my case, stagnation] the set of people I interact with on a daily basis. Even if there are only 5 people left in the whole world who are vectors, if 3 of them are people I am likely to interact with and I choose not to vaccinate, I'm not "free riding" off of anything, I'm likely screwed.
My kid has gotten all immunization sequence vaccinations on schedule. I don't think he got the H1N1 cocktail, but my wife, who is pregnant, did.
The point I am making, which you have either ignored or missed, is that I don't have an obligation to "society" to behave in any particlar way. The NAP governs my conduct towards individuals. Only individuals have rights -- groups do not [despite legal gymnastics to the contrary].
Epistemolgy aside, I'm not precluded from acting in my own self interest -- if I am going to allow myself to be near potentially sick people, only a fool would completely rule out taking defensive measures. Contrastingly, only a fool would automatically accept any course of action recommended to him by a nanny-state.
A more interesting discussion to me would be to what extent choosing to remain a pathogen vector made one violate the non-aggression principle. What is worrying about this line of discussion is any argument that suggests I ought to legally be required to vaccinate to arrest the possibility of harming others also seems like it could legally disallow me from exhaling [i create more CO2 than i consume, and talking-idiots all over the world continue to extoll the many harms of CO2 production.. causing prostitution, eradicating countries... so connect the dots]
Let me re-phrase the vaccination "Debate".
Doctor: "you're not sick, but i'd like to inject you with this diluted form of an illness so that your body will build up its immune system. It may keep you from getting sick and it will statistically help you from getting other people sick"
Patient: "is there any downside, risk, or side effect?"
Doctor: "erm.. some people react badly to the vaccination"
Patient: "how badly? do they die?"
Doctor: "not usually"
Patient: "how often?"
Doctor: "it's not very often"
Patient: "I've never gotten sick before. Why would i inject that thing into myself if it might kill me?"
Doctor: "everyone has to do it, it's for the good of society"
Patient: "fuck society and fuck you"
I'm not anti-vaccine. But i certainly understand the sentiment. And every time we talk about what "standard shot" my 2 year old should get next, I have to go through the above dialog again and try and get the real numbers before I think about if it's worth it or not. The statistics don't matter when the "only 1 in 10,000 who dies" is _your_ kid. And every time I've been to the doctors office for the last 20 years I've been asked "have any reactions to any medicines" and i say "yes, when i had the MMR booster shot i was fucked up for days afterwards". I have no idea why i reacted badly to it but i sure did. That doesn't widely make me fear vaccinations or anything, but it does make the consideration of "should I do this medical procedure or not?" more than a simple no-op.
But the big problem i have, and why i responded, is this bit:
This is not the government's job. Neither to promote nor to maintain it. It's not written into the constitution and even if it were it wouldn't mean anything if it were written using that language.
Besides, the FDA murders Americans every single year. Are _those_ Americans having their health maintained? Or are they not the public?
Fuck the public. "The public" is politician weasel language for saying "my excuse for doing what I want to do". What is good for "the public" is NEVER good for every single individual in that group [like those guys that die or get really sick from vaccinations they don't need]. There is no "for the public good", there is no "the voice of the public", and there is no "what the public want".
This whole idea of "sacrifice for the public good" is the keystone of the downfall of America. The reason is simple: there is no public. There are only conveniently made slices, that exist only at some time and place, as a twinkle in the eye of some law maker. Individuals are completely expendable.
I see it differently. All 350 million "Americans" are expendable to me. I won't go out of my way to harm anyone, but I'll never sacrifice myself for "you". I do not exist for your benefit, or to be sacrificed for you as you see fit.
If a vaccine is good for me, as an individual, after considering the weighted risks of taking it vs. not taking it, I'll take it. Otherwise, I won't.
Congratulations. You have discovered (and transcribed above) the only known peice of Vogon Poetry on the topic of Video Games with Cars in them.
I applaud you for this contribution to slashdot and humanity.
However, I am not especially sophisticated, and can be at times, dense. What does what you wrote actually _mean_ ?
The thing most people haven't realized about the GT series of games is that they aren't really racing / simulation games. A friend explained it properly: Gran Turismo is Pokemon with Cars.
Forza1 came out and crushed it, physics-wise. Each successive Forza iteration has embarassed the then-current GT game in terms of accuracy of driving model.
True, Forza has always lagged in terms of number of Front Wheel Drive Micro-Vans compared to Gran Turismo.
I have a fair bit of actual track driving experience in stock and lightly prepared cars. I've also driven the nordschliefe in meat space [rent a car when you visit Germany; anyone can do it].
People who laud the Gran Turismo games as being the "real driving simulator" are embarassing themselves.
If the police are using something stronger than bi-focals to look at your house, they ought to have a warrant. That means they ought to have reasonable suspicion that a _specific_ crime is being committed.
Which news source can you trust? Why?
I don't troll the interwebs looking for ways to apologize for Fox news {I have no horse in the national-news-media race}, I do think yours is a problematic point of view.
There are _lots_ of stories that the "mainstream media" doesn't pick up. That's because they don't report the news, they make it. Their priorities are capturing eyeballs and shaping public opinion, and both of those goals play second fiddle to making money. Means to an end.
When Grayson forgets to pay his dues to the right people, and when there isn't some sex scandal to report on, he'll show up in more places.
There seems to be some need to consider Fox as an outlier according to whatever metrics people want to stack rank or group news organizations by. Being an outlier isn't necessarily a bad thing; in fact, it's a great thing if you happen to be telling the truth [see also: Galileo]. Lest I set off someone's pressure cooker by conflagrating Fox news and "truth", I was merely reminding you that truth survives a hung jury.
In any case, my [limited] experience with Fox news convinces me they are staffed about the way everyone else on TV [or radio] is - by manipulative hacks that either don't understand what they're talking about or don't want _you_ to understand what they _should_ be talking about.
Government is created to try and preserve the rights men were born with.
I happen to think that I own the toil of my hands and the ingenuity of my mind. What does it mean to own something? Exclusive control of that thing.
On a desert island, I certainly own the work of my hands and mind. Why should I give up that control just because someone thinks themself my neighbor?
I shouldn't, and in the United States, at least originally, you weren't asked to.
It turns out that a large part of the law deals with preserving the intrinsic property rights of individuals -- as the idea of ownership is the most fundamental concept of a free man [certainly, a man must be allowed to own himself! another idea that is unique amongst world governments to the US constitution...]
Now, unlike the misguided collectivists who beleive that "the workers" produce and therefore should "own" the wealth of the world, hands are of marginal importance compared to minds. My hands are no stronger or more durable than were the first entites that could be rightly called human hands thousands of years ago. The difference between me and them is the foundation of _mental_ output.
Ideas are what matter. Ideas are what have value. Ideas -- and nothing more than ideas -- are the difference between a humanity full of sky scrapers, planes, a lifespan longer than 40 years, and the cavemen who didn't know how to make fire.
Intellectual Property is the basic realization that ideas are the most valuable things in human history, and that a man ought to be free to own his ideas -- just like he is when he's alone on an island.
Creating the appropriate legal protections of a mind's inventions requires much legal anquish and debate. But it is a debate and process that must continue. Attempting to dismiss IP as some fundmentally invalid or non-existant concept shows great contempt for humanity. Not "humanity, the pool of humans", but "humanity -- the essence of what a man is".
Who is John Galt?
I think the two axioms are useful:
- all transactions between individuals legally allowed to own their own decisions [i.e. we can exclude "children" or "mentally handicapped" people] are fundamentally ethical, assuming they are conducted without force or fraud
- a man owns himself, and the output of his mind and his hands
I think if you start with these two axioms, it's hard to explain why a marketplace-granted near-monopoly is a problem.
I think if you aren't willing to start with these two axioms, you should refrain from calling what you beleive in a "Free" market.
Why?
Monopolies that help the monopoly holder sustain unnaturally high profits are unsustainable without coercion, and in western society, coercion is done by governments.
IOW: if there is a monopoly out there that is over charging you and reaping huge profits, they are not long for the world unless they have a government propping them up somehow.
If it was truly an issue of the profits being too high, a different market place entrant could provide the same or similar product/service, at the same or worse efficiency, and at a cheaper consumer price, with the difference being taken out of the healthy profit margin.
If there is a monopoly or near-monopoly without government collusion, then there is no problem, because it is by definition not fleecing customers [nothing would protect its margins from an upstart who could safetly cut into them].
Sometimes a particular company just does a really good job and gets a lot of market share. That's not a bad thing.
You mean the failure of our 100+ year experiment whereby the government hands out favors to some entrants, giving them a tremendous marketplace advantage with the full power of a gun behind it? That experiment has a long history of failure world wide. It shouldn't surprise anyone that it is also failing here.
We have had a mixed economy for a very long time. The #1 trick of the statists and their useful idiots is blaming all of our problems on what we continue to have a shrinking share of - marketplace freedom.
One would surmise that if unregulated markets were actually a problem, the amplitude of our cyclic economic destruction would be ever decreasing as the benevolent weight of regulatory graft piled ever higher. Yet this has not been the case. And in light of experimental results that contradict the hypothesis thus far tried, a scientist, or a policy maker who's aim was economic success, would be willing to modify their approach.
But that's not what we have. We have a government that is it's own end. It exists for its own power, and any course of action not commensurate with the increase of power and the subjugation of man isn't realistically considered.
I'm not sure how to dignify this with a response. Do you actually have any way to refute any of what I've written? Maybe you should call an expert and get some help?
We're getting into a he-said she-said that isn't apparently accurate on either end, so I'll try and distill my main point to this:
Your theories for why people use windows do not adequately explain the number of home and small business users that buy retail copies, nor the number of users at large companies which have IT departments large enough to do whatever they like and make the users live with it.
I don't beleive I've ever excluded your points or created a false dilemma between your claims and my objections [i.e. i've never said that _all_ or even _most_ windows users are saavy comparison shoppers]: my objections being that _some_ windows users [and perhaps a large number of them, even if minority share] _have_ thought about and _have_ made a concious decision to use windows.
You don't seem to allow for that possibility, and at every juncture, you try to minimize this point or refute it with hand waving.
It's an important point because your original claim was that the price of windows is unjustified because nobody has ever thought about the fact that they're even buying it. And i think the existance of the retail market and EA/Select business agreements make your claim complete bullshit.
How does it not say exactly what i said it does -- that these people have considered what they're getting and then decided to spend their money on it?
Furthermore, if people were apathetic, why would they go to a store and buy something new? If they were apathetic they'd continue using the OS they already have. Especially if, as you say, their apathy takes the form of "they already know windows", their fear takes the form of "my programs won't work". New versions of windows by definition differ from what they already know, and change what already works. They must have some compelling reason to give up what they know for something they perceive to be an improvement.
My contention is that you haven't adequately explained why people voluntarily buy windows retail boxed copies. The reasons you've given don't make sense. These are people who already have computers, and they want to buy what is [probably] a _second_, newer copy of windows. I don't see any other way of looking at this phenomena than those users speculating that a new version of windows will be valuable to them... how valuable? Approximately as much as the price they end up paying for it.
You seem to have such a deeply held distaste for Microsoft/Windows that you are unwilling to consider that some people like it enough to pay for it, even though they have other choices that they are aware of [including, the choice to do nothing].
I think the number of such people is roughly the # of retail copies of windows sold, plus some percentage of the people who _could_ get by with a Mac but choose a PC.
I think your attempt to categorize windows users as ignorant rubes who would choose differently if only they were as wise as you is pretty insulting to them, and indicative of your contempt for people's ability to make their own choices.
I am no longer in the highschool/college demographic, but availability of games is not a determining factor for what platform people use amongst the people I typically interact with. People play lots of casual games - like facebook scrabble, or the yahoo games, or the kind of things you could do in a weekend on any GUI system, but as far as people that go and carefully select a video card for gaming attributes... this certainly doesn't explain the use of windows in the business world, and this doesn't seem to be a factor in the purchasing decisions of most post-college people that just "want a computer".
_Some_ OS has to come with a computer for normal customers. An interesting question is, "does that OS have to be windows or windows compatible". The answer for a long time was "Yes". Apple has had a lot of success lately challenging that long-held truism. Linux hasn't. It's an important issue to continuously re-evaluate, but the only place where computers pre-loaded with Linux have been widely successful have been niche devices... Tivo boxes, various NAS/home-network devices, and Netbooks come to mind. On the occasions that companies have tried selling "normal" PCs that run linux, they've tended to not do well. I won't speculate on why, but that is what history has shown thus far.
To say that MS "overcharges" in some kind of absolute sense is meaningless. They don't even charage a consistent price.
I never suggested that windows does exactly what people want; my point is that there is some clear value differentiation between what windows does and what competing products do; otherwise windows wouldn't be in the position that it is in.
Now then, do you honestly beleive that __nobody__ anywhere has carefully evaluated their options and decided that buying windows represents the best value?
I don't disgree with you. I'm not sure why you think you disagree. I said, and you agreed, that people have different frameworks for making value decisions. For many people, part of the value proposition of windows is that they pay more upfront to save more down the road.
Here's my assertion, which i have no data to backup, so if you've got some that refutes me, please post away:
More people buy boxed retail copies of windows, not attached to any computer, than do acquire mac OS X or any version of Linux via any delivery mechanism combined.
Assuming I am right, those people clearly know what they're buying and what it costs, and there are more such people than there are who choose [and use] the free and non-free alternatives.
I assure that I do not have more money than I know what to do with.
Regarding what Microsoft should or shouldn't do -- you are free to make a product that gives people just the things that they want that costs less than what Microsoft is charging for windows, and to become wildly successful and rich [or not rich, if you are driven by altruism] if you so desire.
But there isn't a rational argument for what it "should" cost. It "should" cost what people are willing to pay, just like every other product.
An interesting thing about costs and profits is this: if something is truly "overpriced" because the profit is so high, a competitor can always build the same [or better] product, and via their efficiency and ingenuity, offer their competitive product for a lower price and still make enough profit to make the venture worth while. Note that this is true even when there is a monopoly -- so long as the monopoly isn't government backed [i.e. a __law__ saying that only windows can be sold in the USA]
Now, nobody has made a completely identical product to windows and tried to sell it for less money, and part of this is due to the fact that it is illegal to do an outright "clone" of software. But functionally, there are many competing products that do things similarly. Some cost more, and some cost less. Is _any_ Operating System that costs more than windows automatically too expensive? Or a Rip off? Or not worth it? Are IOS releases [for Cisco products] always a rip off if they are more than $100? I assure you that there are fewer lines of code in IOS. And they run on fewer devices.... Heck, most of what IOS does can be done in freeware *nix devices. Shouldn't IOS be free?
Working for Microsoft in a QA role, and seeing how things work on "the inside", and influencing them now and then, has been a lot more beneficial to my "soul/spirit/karma" than staying on the outside and spinning my wheels bitching.
I resent being called an astroturfer - I make no effort to conceal who pays my salary right now, nor does Microsoft want me spending my time "defending" it on slashdot. My argument here was about economics, not Windows. Windows happened to be the subject matter at hand, but I'd make the same argument about SunOS or anything else.
It's not very effective "astroturing" when my original post says that i use free software on some of my comptuers because for me, windows just doesn't add enough extra value to be worth the cost in those situations.
There isn't an actual value.
There is a _price_ at which the two parties in question: buyer and seller, are willing to conduct an exchange at a given point in time.
You know how stores have sales? "15% off -- only today!" Is the product 15% less valuable today, and then tomorrow it reverts to being more "valuable"? If so, what is that value changed based on?
For all actors in the market and for all non-coercive transactions [i.e. where force or fraud are not involved], "value" is determined independantly by each party in the transaction, and what is true for both parties right now may not be true tomorrow. The product doesn't change, but the preferences and broader situation of the marketplace participants does.
Today, windows is "worth", say, $100 to me. Tomorrow, if I've lost my job, it won't be worth _anything_ to me. It's not like windows is suddenly a worse product because I've lost my job. But my framework for evaluating the "value" of things to me changes dramatically.
This isn't a new problem: it's [at first glance] wierd that Windows costs one amount in the US and a different amount in other places. Other places have a different standard of living than we do, so in such places the US based cost of a Windows license would be unthinkable.
In the US, most people have enough money that they figure the value they get from windows is worth about what they have to pay for it. Even though they pay a lot more than many other people do in other places. I think think most Americans would trade their position in the world so that they could have cheaper windows pricing, but those that would are free to do so. And in any situation, one is always free to decide windows doesn't represent a good value to them at the price Microsoft is willing to sell it for, and so no transaction has to happen.
posting my credentials would be irrelevant; in the best case it would be the logical fallacy known as "appeal to authority", in the event that you assumed i was an authority on relevant matters. I mentioned Austrian economics only because I find it to be the most compellingly rational treatment of the subject at hand, and rather than try to re-create all of it here unattributed and with the possibility of the introduction of mistakes, I figured I'd [indirectly] point readers at the source literature.
But since you have an ideological "off switch", I'll try and explain to you more concretely the specifc point given here: there is no meaningful concept of absolute value:
Situation 1: i am the last surviving human, all alone, on an island
Before me are three boxes
1) an infinite supply of food and water
2) a single handgun with a single bullet
3) an infinite supply of money
Which is most valuable to me?
Situation 2: i am one of two surviving humans - the other is my wife, and we are all alone, on an island
Now which is most valuable to me?
Situation 3: I am me, living in the USA in 2009.
Now which is most valuable to me?
I'd claim that the answers are:
1) option #2 - so I could kill myself rather than have a lifetime of animalistic lonesome agony
2) option #1 - so that my wife and I could enjoy the remainder of our lives together with our food and water needs met
3) Trick question!
If i chose option #3, nobody would take my money once they realized there was an infinite supply of it, and so it would become worthless. This is infact what the US governemnt is finding out regarding their own US dollar! HA HA!.
If I chose option #1, people that had chosen option #2 would take my food or my life from me [people like the US government, for instance].
If I chose option #2, I can defend myself against exaclty one person, but doing so probably invites the wrath of many subsequent people, for which I will be unprepared. I suppose I could sell the gun and bullet though.
So in the 3rd case, there are no good choices, but option #2 isn't necessarily a bad choice.
So the point here is that the value of things isn't intrinsic, but is instead a function of who evaluates them and at what time. In the original post I told you my value assessment was that that I'd rather pay for a $120 operating system every year than for four dining-out-for-two experiences. If there was no internet and I had no particular interest in computers, I don't think I'd decide the same way, to be honest. But it is already the case that today I use my computer [and its operating system] every day and I eat at resturants fewer than 4 times per month. 20 years ago people used resturants more than they used the internet. Today I am not convinced that is the case for many segments of the population.
When you discover Austrian economics, you'll learn that there is no such concept as intrinsic value. So this statement is meaningless about any good or service. It might be meaningful for YOU for RIGHT NOW, but the notion of value is time and observer dependant.
And all miss certain desktop scenarios that windows nails, which is why everyone on the planet hasn't simultaneously said "OMG -- why do i keep paying money for windows when *nix does EVERYTHING I NEED EXACTLY THE WAY I WANT"
Given the amount of inflation between now and then, even paying $250 for an OS today is "so 1990s".
The idea that the operating system on your computer -- the thing that actually lets it do useful things -- isn't worth dinner for 2 at a national-chain resturant (your $30 figure) is completely hillarious. You honestly would rather forego the last 30 years of personal computer history and instead have 1 dinner for two?
I think "an" OS is easily worth $100 or more per year to me. I'd skip dining out 4 times a year to have one. It's nice that there are free choices available, and in some cases I use those free choices since the marginal utility benefits of pay-ware doesn't justify the marginal cost increase for my scenarios.
I think it must be a common fallacy amongst f/oss zealouts that they feel like the only people that must be clued-in, and that if only the rest of the planet would "discover" that there are free operating systems out there, Windows and other commercial operating systems would vanish.
I suspect that the major vendors and Fortune 500 companies are very well aware of free software and what its advantages and disadvantages are, and have conciously chosen to continue using Windows for the majority of what they do based on a value analysis. I also suspect that they continually re-visit this analysis [and this accounts for things like the Wal-Mart and Dell linux machines..]
I think it's fair to guess that most people paying for windows figure it is worth 75% or more [to them] of what they're paying for it.
So I don't find your post insightful at all. You don't understand economics, and your assessment of value seems very contrived to me... based on ideology rather than reality.