From: eric at arcticbears.com (Eric Paynter)
Subject: M$ Getting Better?

On Mon, June 21, 2004 8:43 am, joe said:
> Last time I heard, IE was the most popular browser with something like
> 70%+ of the browsing done with IE. As for browsing OSes I think I recall
> hearing that XP was over 50% of the machines and that Windows machines as
> a whole accounts for over 90%.

All you have to do is search google for the words "Microsoft" and "fined"
to see how many times they have been convicted of braking the law to
maintain that market share. They use unfair and illegal tactics to hold
the fort. That's why people don't like them.

Are you happy doing business with criminals?


> Why do you feel you have to go around whining? It is almost as if you are
> trying to justify your decision.

No, not justify. The reason is to attempt to bring awareness to the fact
that the only reason Microsoft holds the balance of power is because
people continue to support them. And that alternatives are available, but
they are struggling. Until the majority starts to realize that there are
alternatives, MS will hold their seat of power. But with more awareness,
the alternatives will grow. So people go around "whining" to spread
awareness of the alternatives. Perhaps with greater awareness, MS will be
held accountable by their (ex-)customers, who will vote with their dollars
by not purchasing MS products.


> When you break up with a g/f (or b/f?)  do you go around telling everyone
> how horrible that person is or do you just go find someone else. If the
> former, you have deeper issues. If the later, apply that your OS choice
> and be done with it, I think you may be happier.

See above... it's not a significant other we're talking about here. It's a
dominant market player who controls innovation and has severly hurt the
high-technology industry. A better analogy is a tyrant dictator who needs
to be unseated. Only through education can people begin to realize just
how unethical Microsoft has been. And perhaps with that education, they
will stop buying products from the company that regularly violates the law
and inhibits innovation. Then we will see the alternatives grow and real
innovation will occur.


> No company that sells a product for real money can win against a
> product that is free unless the product being sold offers some sort of
> value that doesn't exist in the free one.

Not true. The company that sells a product for real money can win against a
product that is free because they have real money for marketing. And they
use it to convince (non-technical) CEO's and other large-dollar decision
makers that the alternatives are not safe. The other products, whether
free or for sale, have no defense because they simply don't have the
resources to combat the multi-billion dollar marketing campaigns that MS
puts forward.

And before people say this is too off topic, I suggest it is strongly
on-topic. Having a single product account for a clear majority of the
market is dangerous from a security perspective because it reduces
diversity. As we've seen time and time again, a single worm can bring the
entire global network to its knees. The dominance of one system means the
dominance of one exploit. We need more diversity to maintain security of
our systems. If MS continues to grow and stamp out the alternatives, we
will continue to be in very very bad shape and we will continue to see
mass e-epidemics occur. No matter how secure MS makes their products,
there will always be vulnerabilities found.

-Eric

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