[ale] OT: submit your own anti-trust complaint against Microsoft (trollicious)

[Jonathan Rickman]

On Friday 12 September 2003 11:23, synco gibraldter wrote:

> you're right -- i hate that.  i couldn't get ANY laptop vendor to send
> me a laptop without preinstalling software on it.  but i don't blame MS
> for making dell do that... i blame dell for putting windows on there
> and jacking the price up by $700 or whatever they do.  though i'm sure
> MS loves these kinds of deals, i think the bottom line is that dell
> does it because 1) the markup is outrageous for their volume on windows
> software and 2) most people wouldn't know what to do if they had to
> install an OS on their new machine.  yes i hate it, but blaming ms for
> it is like a person who refuses to wear a seatbelt getting mad at a
> seatbelt manufacturer for allowing the car manufacturer to put it in
> there by default.  i know this analogy is far from parallel, but you
> can see the absurdity.

Look, I don't want to insult you, but I can't see any way around it. Have 
you been on Mars for the last 5 years or are you completely dense? 

> i think the university systems bought their way into MS -- you think
> the universities are making money from buying ms software?  i don't
> think so.  i think the university's though process was more like: "what
> OS is used and known by most people?  which OS has most of the software
> used in business [ms office junks, etc.]?"  of course they would love
> to use all linux and pay for nothing, but would all the students
> happily switch over to learn/use linux?  probably not man.  i've tried
> showing people what linux is and how to use it and they have been
> disinterested.  MS is made for monkeys and, unfortunately, we live on a
> planet of monkeys.

Again, are you deliberately playing stupid or just out of touch with 
reality? 

> this is actually (no offense) your first truly relevant point -- that
> ms is the 'default' and is accepted BECAUSE of their past activities. 
> but at the same time, linux has caught up very quickly and is
> continuing to catch up.  in the not-so-distant future, we're going to
> see an average, everday, end-user-only person being able to operate
> linux and do all the needed tasks for their job (or at home, even). 
> but you have to admit that right now, there is absolutely no chance
> that an average person would even know what they're looking at working
> with linux  -- the learning curve is much more steep and the GUI is not
> standard or easily integrated yet.  MS had a huge head start in the OS
> department... linux has caught up VERY quickly and is still gaining
> ground.  when linux surpasses win in usability (and like i said: i
> don't expect it to be more than a few short years), we'll see the
> shift.  until then, that, in my opinion, is the reason why the world is
> still in windows.

This paragraph gives me some indication that you are not just a troll, but 
my earlier question remains...<sigh>

> i would say that if you put ms in MOST other businesses, serious
> competition would have popped up by now and swatted away their huge
> market share.  this we clearly agree on... but back to our differences:
>  i think other companies have been unable to create competitive
> software because ms meets user expectations in such a complete way. 

I'd be more than happy to debate this issue with you until the cows come 
home, but first you need to come out from under the rock you've been 
hiding under for the past 5 years, hit google and educate yourself on the 
anti-trust case against MS. Until you have half a clue about what is 
going on, I don't feel it's worth my time to present the entire case to 
you. Perhaps others will respond point by point, but at this juncture I'm 
not convinced that you're not trolling. As they say on Usenet...PLONK!

-- 
Jonathan Rickman
Key ID: 0DF501FF