Re: Boycott Microsoft Website

From: "Chris Lomont" <clomont@cc.omni.purdue.edu>

Date: Mon, 31 Mar 1997 00:00:00 +0000

JustIn <seismic@geocities.com> wrote in article
<333E2F8A.68E4@geocities.com>...
> Sean Gwizdak wrote:
> >
> > I forsee the coming of an OS that will be able to use all of OS/2 apps,
Windows
> > apps,  and Unix apps.  It's bound to happen.  Some company will realize
that this
> > would be the only way to make a killing.  For now,  we just have to
rely on System
>
> QnX is the most promising OS I've ever seen...

Is QnX that embedded 1meg OS? I don't believe that will replace WinNT
anytime soon :)

It would be very costly and extremely hard to make an OS support OS/2,
Win95, WinNT, and Unix. For example NT supports OpenGL, a very elaborate
multimedia system, lots of security stuff, quite a bit of user interface
things, complex networking, support for a lot of hardware (and Win95 more
so), support for handicapped access, multiple file systems, and on and on.
Then you'd have to support Unix, X-windows, and all their features. My
opinion is that no company can accomplish COMPLETE support for all these
OS's. And as a final thought, notice how quickly the Win32 platform is
moving. If you started today to try to emulate the Win32 platform, by the
time you got it done in several years (with LOTS of programmers), it would
have evolved to incorporate the next big thing from MS, such as integrated
internet access on the desktop or an object oriented file system or speech
recognition....

I believe this is extremely unlikely to happen.

>
> > >
> > >    MS is indeed a government supported monopoly because they
> > > can get away with practices that would land Mom-and-Pop Shops
> > > in jail, and start trade wars if done by foreign nations.
>
> Definitely.  It's BIG MONEY power.  Capitalism has a price,
> all-too-literally.  There are so many ways a profiteering gluttonous
> company can suck the life out of development by standing on the
> shoulders of someone else (or in Micro$oft's case, EVERYONE else).

And provide a platform for many developers to sell their product to a large
market. Think how much you'd sell if there were 5 incompatible OS's on the
market place, each with 20% share....

After all, this is rec.games.programmer I'm replying from. I'm a
professional programmer and enjoy selling product. It provides me with
money to eat so I can continue to enjoy programming.... I'm not sure what
those other newsgroups have to do with operating systems.

> > I think IBM is more government supported than Microsoft.  The school
system, for
> > example,  used to use nothing but IBM machinery.  They also always used
PC-DOS.
> > (This was for my state though.)  This was about four years ago,  and
now I'm in
> > high school.  (We don't see any of the new fancy computers,  only
illiterate
> > elementary schoolers see those!)
>
> I thought that was Apple... 8)  But seriously, M$ has so much government
> support *BECAUSE* it has so much money.  This is the end-all...
> everything else is so much cream.

This I think is wrong. The government has been taking MS to court quite
often over the last 5-10 years, but hasn't found anything illegal yet (I
think). One judge who did penalize them was removed from the case by his
superiors on the basis they said he was letting his personal beliefs make
decisions that were unwarranted legally. So our government is not
necessarily friendly with MS (or IBM for that matter - see some of the
legal restraints put on IBM from 1958 to today)...

Of course all the MS haters can go on with their beliefs, but I wonder why
so many people hate MS, and especially on paranoia and rumors. I have never
found one that ever realizes that the purpose of business is to compete,
and to make money for shareholders, etc. At least that's how it works out.
MS is just successful.

Chris Lomont

P.S. I am not a MS supporter per se, but I like the market they provide for
me to sell my services.

References

Re: Boycott Microsoft Website
Arandir <arandir@gonetgo.com>
Sat, 29 Mar 1997 00:00:00 +0000
Re: Boycott Microsoft Website
JustIn <seismic@geocities.com>
Sun, 30 Mar 1997 00:00:00 +0000
Re: Boycott Microsoft Website
mcgrath@epx.cis.umn.edu (Michael David McGrath)
Sun, 23 Mar 1997 00:00:00 +0000
Re: Boycott Microsoft Website
Rodger Coglan <rodger-@-oup-usa.org>
Tue, 25 Mar 1997 00:00:00 +0000
Re: Boycott Microsoft Website
curtis cameron <curtisc1@remove.airmail.net>
Thu, 27 Mar 1997 00:00:00 +0000
Re: Boycott Microsoft Website
Sean Gwizdak <wazm@bellsouth.net>
Thu, 27 Mar 1997 00:00:00 +0000
Re: Boycott Microsoft Website
Andy Bober <muajb2@uxa.ecn.bgu.edu>
Thu, 27 Mar 1997 00:00:00 +0000
Re: Boycott Microsoft Website
Sean Gwizdak <wazm@bellsouth.net>
Sat, 29 Mar 1997 00:00:00 +0000
Boycott Microsoft Website
Jack Teh <jteh@usthk.ust.hk>
Thu, 20 Mar 1997 00:00:00 +0000
Re: Boycott Microsoft Website
Chris Lomont <clomont@omni.cc.purdue.edu>
Thu, 20 Mar 1997 00:00:00 +0000
Re: Boycott Microsoft Website
mcgrath@epx.cis.umn.edu (Michael David McGrath)
Sat, 22 Mar 1997 00:00:00 +0000
Re: Boycott Microsoft Website
"Dennis Moran" <coolio@coolio9.com>
Sat, 22 Mar 1997 00:00:00 +0000