Everyone But Microsoft Consortium
Everyone But Microsoft ConsortiumA bunch of companies who are prepared to do absolutely everything to become the next Microsoft, including spouting around the idea that they are the last bastion of mankind against Microsoft's dark armies.
In 5 years time, this page might be more aptly named EveryoneButAolConsortium?. May 2004: Ha!
Or maybe just some people who'd like some fair market competition. There isn't a shred of evidence that any of these companies are working to move themselves into a monopolistic position. There is a very real possibility that these companies are trying to bulldoze the hill instead of trying to get to the top of it. -- PhilGoodwin
There isn't a shred of evidence that any of these companies aren't working to move themselves into a monopolistic position either. Thus, the cynical view wins.
Of course they are. Until recently (the Thirties depression, in fact) monopoly, or at least oligopoly, was considered the natural business condition, and the argument was that consumers benefited: a monopoly supplier was relieved of all the overheads and "inefficiency" associated with competition, and this saving could be passed on to the consumer. There is evidence that after the break-up of Standard Oil, prices for petroleum products in the US rose considerably. Similarly with engineering metals after the demise of US Steel.
In the sixty years since that crash, entirely fantastic FreeMarket theories have become the orthodoxy. So, of course, most business managers denounce any attempts by their competitors to control a market as an evil monopoly, whereas their own acquisitions, cross-subsidies and aggressive marketing are lauded, being simply them taking advantage of the "level playing field".
We have no reason, a priori, to assume that LarryEllison or ScottMcNealy are any more or any less interested in getting their own way than BillGates. He just got there first.--KeithBraithwaite
Someone has noted somewhere on the MicroSoft pages that the US DOJ is not interested in MS being a monopoly, but in them unfairly taking advantage of that position.
Yes, that is the anti-trust statute, isn't it? Monopolies are not illegal in themselves, it's anti-competitive behavior that is illegal. And busting a monopoly is one way to discourage anti-competitive behavior.
And so we come to an impasse. In the present, monopolies are good for consumers, because they cut down on overhead, but, once a monopoly figures out it is one, they begin to exploit that position, raising prices and lowering quality. In addition, they slow progress, because they lack the incentive to create new products that cost money to research and may or may not pay out. -BethanyAndresBeck
Have you tried to install any of these products? For some reason they never quite seem to work right and they put you through hell to let you see this. It is obvious that Microsoft manipulates Windows. I know I would.
Sam, why do you need to defend your favourite products with a stab at the LinuxOperatingSystem? I do not claim that it is perfect, but your comment is highly exaggerated. H*ll, even I can install it! Go figure! Anyway, the nice thing about installing Linux is that you only have to do it once... -- StephanHouben
A gun? No. Its FearUncertaintyAndDoubt (a tactic learned from IBM), and it's held to my boss' head, not mine. Maybe StarOffice will start to compete with MicrosoftOffice sometime soon. WordPerfect is dying the death of a thousand cuts. And so on. --Keith
My school uses Microsoft Office because it came on the machines. Why would they pay more for something they already have?
Did your school get Microsoft Office for free, or was it bundled into the price of the machines? Perhaps they could have saved money buying machines without software included. However, for me, the issue isn't price. The issue is control. I don't like the amount of power that I give up when I run software that is leased from Microsoft (or Sun) ... I'd rather use inferior software which I truely own and can impact the future of.
Indeed, one benefit of free/open software is in the long view. Five years from now, half of your knowledge of a microsoft product will be gone when they change for no good reason. With open/free software, they don't change just to change. You'll also still have access to it without having to pay (or beg your employer to pay) -- LT
re: we come to an impasse... Yes, we do don't we. Personally, I have a lot of problems with Word only when I try to do things that my experience with industrial strength doc. prep. systems and my training in DTP and my hobbyist enthusiasm for typography and the (pseudo) mathematical nature of my documents lead me to want to do by reflex. I'm sure that if I were in Word's target market, non-technical secretaries, I'd have far fewer problems. My guess is that Wiki folk are just that bit more sophisticated than Microsoft is prepared to bother with. --KeithBraithwaite
I don't know; I see lots of folks struggle with Word. Not because the software is inadequate (surely Word has more features than most need), but because it doesn't fit into their metaphor. Your metaphors are listed above; their metaphors may be yellow legal pads or maybe typewriters. They may have to LearnAnewMetaphor in order to effectively use Word.
Never ascribe to conspiracy what can adequately be explained by stupidity.
Sun is trying to find a way to make money from a hot technology that they gave away. This to be expected---the business case for free software can make a lot of sense for small companies like Red Hat, but it's still awfully hard for a big, successful company like Sun to explain to shareholders.
In the process of trying to do those things, they are being clumsy, thoughtless, inconsistent, and sometimes downright stupid. That's to be expected, too---Sun has always been good at certain kinds of technical things, but crummy at marketing and customer relations (except in the case of a few really good customers that they focus all their attention on).
Last year I'd agree with you; this year I won't. Sun really has it together this year. I think I read somewhere that Sun fnarfs up everything in odd-numbered years, and just blows everyone away in even-numbered years. Or something like that.
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