[COMP] Re: [CTS] Windows 2000: 65,000 bugs


As the renowned political man of yore said; "There you go again."
I want to compliment you on such a passionate, intelligent
articulation of a position that many that many coding enthusiasts
embrace.
    I hope that you will nurture that fervor with a good solid
education that will provide you with the business acumen and
communication skills that will allow you to attract the talent
and financial backing that will be necessary to accomplish your
goals in the software industry.
    Sadly, for the Open Source crowd, there is no one on the
horizon to attract the money or the talent to make the concerted
effort necessary to advance Linux, of any particular flavor, to a
competitive position in the market place. This poses the
question...How can you even give away enough software and
support, without a revenue stream, to make it competitive?  If
Gates retired from his business...and became enthused with Linux
and decided to, as a lark, without a revenue stream, to advance
Linux to a greater share of the market place than his current
Operating Systems, he would run out of those billions of dollars
long before he would have attained his goal.
    I look back over the phenomenal growth of technology,
software, CPUs, memory chips, and manufacturing savvy and compare
it to the bigger overall picture of industrial growth from the
1900's on and I draw the following conclusions...There has never
been any progress made, that amounted to a hill of beans, that
wasn't accomplished  without varying degrees of ruthlessness. The
founder of Ford, General Motors, Chrysler, Standard Oil, The
Railroad Tycoons, The Steel Giants all were characterized as
ruthless business sharks, that thought not a whit of destroying a
competitor or competitors...by hook, crook or bloodshed.  In
hindsight it probably was a good thing for we would be wearing
swastikas or still cutting our grain with the hook and sickle and
wearing some kind of red garments.
    If you are still not convinced that Bill is a piker when it
comes to ruthlessness, just compare him to our forebears who
literally emasculated the Native Americans of all their worldly
posessions...Let's not forget those hearty pioneers who enslaved
a whole race...It was just as if  "Well..uh uh they weren't going
to do anything with all that land or their live anyway."
    Now if we want to we can get on with the business of life and
set some goals and accomplish them... or we can complain about
Bill.
I probably know less about The Window Operating System that most
of the people on this mailing list and I set here up to 18 hours
a day and I download countless programs, use Norton's Utilities,
a Virus Program, I don't click on attachments. I have used Win95,
now Win 98 and my old 100 Pentium just hums away day after day,
week after week and year after year and I can't  remember when it
crashed last other that a couple of years ago a memory chip and
one power supply.
I would aver that if you spent 5% of the time that you devote to
Linux that you could do the same thing.
It doesn't work for you because you don't want it to.  I would
hate to see a reference on your resume that I can't understand
how Windows Works.
    That being said, I have joined your mailing list...to see
what this here Linux is all about, stashing away all
the relevant posts and references.
    I am going to try to put together a robust mailing list
Server and plunk it down on the backbone. I am going nation wide
with Dial-up Access and a mailing list to every city in the
Nation.  Maybe Linux will fill the bill
    ...and I can't wait to try Linux...Thanks to you.

~`~`~`~`~`~`~`~`~`~`~`~~`~`~
Russell Griechen <*////////~><<
http://www.areamail.net/  Be your own ISP...and offer Web Hosting
and Dial-Up access for your clients neighbors and community.;
Comp Mailing List <computers@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>;
Breaking News; http://www.home.flash.net/~ecvogel/about.html
Home of the computertalkshop mailing list.
~`~`~`~`~`~`~`~`~`~`~`~~`~`~`~`~`~`~`~`~

----- Original Message -----
From: "John Madden" <weez@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <computertalkshop-list@xxxxxxxxx>;
<computers@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>; <systalk@xxxxxxx>;
<pethessa@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>; <root@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>;
<ccdennis@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Friday, February 11, 2000 10:42 PM
Subject: [CTS] Windows 2000: 65,000 bugs


> To all the folks willing to let Mr. Gates continue to rule
their lives:
>
>
http://www.zdnet.com/zdnn/stories/news/0,4586,2436920,00.html?chk
pt=zdnntop
>
> And to anyone willing to break free, and use software that
isn't
> released with known bugs:
>
> http://www.linux.org
>
> Nuff said?  Sorry, but this article made me sick, and their PR
response
> to the leaked memo made me even more angry.  What right do they
have to
> do this?  Oh, and then charge you 300 bucks for it?  I'd like
to thank
> Linus, Alan, and the thousands of other programmers out there
who put
> their blood, sweat, and tears into an operating system that was
built
> from the ground up to be a decent piece of software, and to the
method
> (open source) that has brought us to the top of the IT world.
>
> There's simply no excuse for the sort of things Microsoft does
to the
> user community, and hopefully, they won't be allowed to do it
anymore.
> The problem, as I see it, is something of a snowball effect:
once you
> run Windows, and use Windows software, you feel as though you
have no
> choice, and that anything else is insufficient, or too
difficult.  You
> create excuses, because "it's ok," and "everyone else uses it,
so it
> can't be bad."  But would you buy a car that had no steering
wheel?  Of
> course not.  The fight to force MS to write decent software
starts with
> you: you hold Microsoft (and any other software company, for
that
> matter) by the purse strings.
>
> I'm sick of it.  Maybe some blood vessel somewhere in the
middle of my
> brain will burst someday, and all of the stress and frustration
this
> situation causes me will have been for nothing.  Who knows...
But many
> of you know me pretty well, and you know I can't just sit
around and
> watch these things continue.
>
> There are alternatives: all the software you could ever want is
> available for FREE, for a FREE operating system, built on
stability,
> reliability, and correctness.  All the help you could ever want
in
> adjusting to this alternative and amazing environment is also
available
> FREE, on the internet.
>
> I've got a challenge: I challenge each and every one of you to
think
> twice the next time you go to buy a piece of software.  Stop
and
> think: "Am I really going to get my money's worth here?  Are
they going
> to screw me over with bugs?  Do I care to do anything about
it?"  If
> your local government were to, say, allow your children to just
watch TV
> all day in school, would you stand by and let such an atrocity
take
> place?  Of course not!  You'd complain!  So why run poor
software, on a
> poorly written OS, that was released with thousands of known
bugs?
>
> Take a stand folks, and user by user, bit by bit, change will
happen.
> You'll look back on these days and wonder why it took so long
to change
> things.  The challenge: install an alternative OS (sure, Linux
is great,
> but it doesn't *have* to be Linux) and live with it for two
months.  Use
> all the software you like; go ahead- it's all free.  Enjoy the
speed,
> stability, and flexibility.  Got problems?  Ask on a mailing
list,
> newsgroups, a local LUG, or from  your nearby always
willing-to-help
> guru.  After those 60 days, go ahead and try to go back to your
old OS.
> You'll be amazed at how much your view on computing has
changed.  Email
> me your experiences, tell me about your problems, how you liked
it, how
> you didn't, ask questions, whatever.  I'm setting up a mailing
list
> (details later) just for this sort of thing.
>
> Some people look at me strangely when I speak my views on
certain
> commercial software, because after all, I'll someday be in the
job place
> writing it (yeah, still in college here).  It's really
perfectly
> logical: At the current rate, all crappy commercial software
will be run
> out of the market by free software, which is usually
technically
> superior.  Thus, the market for poor software will decrease,
and
> companies like our favorite Redmond campus will be forced to
either
> straighten up, or go out of business.  This puts a strangle on
the
> market, decreasing my chances of getting a job.  By increasing
the
> quality of software now, competition in the market will become
fierce,
> and high competition is the strongest kind of market, and that
means
> lots of jobs for me, and better software for the consumer.
>
> Am I an advocate?  Absolutely.  A zealot?  Hopefully. :)
>
> John
>
>
>
> --
> # John Madden  weez@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx ICQ: 2EB9EA
> # Sys-Admin / Webmaster, Avenir Web: http://avenir.dhs.org
> # LANdb: Network Admin Database - http://avenir.dhs.org/landb/
> # "A kernel compile a day keeps the blue screens away."
>
>
>
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