From: nobody@REPLAY.COM (Anonymous)
Date: Fri, 20 Mar 1998 22:19:40 -0800 (PST)
To: cypherpunks@toad.com
Subject: Re: Micro$not Ba$hing
Message-ID: <199803210619.HAA08464@basement.replay.com>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain


Eric Tune wrote:
> Out of all the things I've heard said about Bill Gates, about
> Microsoft, (both as the Evil Empire and as a God-send) this makes
> about the most sense.  Truthmonger has it right.  

At the risk of having list members speculating that this anonymous
post is being sent by Toto/TruthMonger in order to gloat his dropping
Pearls of Wisdom upon those with weak connections to the ClueServer,
I would like to compliment Eric Tune on his recognition of my...Uhhhh,
I mean *TruthMonger*'s sense of Reality.

 > The ONLY significant in-roads that anyone has made with a Unix
> environment is Linux and BSD, and all the wishing in the world is not
> going to make it more palatable to "John Q. Public".  Unfortunately,
> Unix is a lot harder to learn for someone who started out in DOS or
> Mac software, and it's not near as user friendly.  What could be the
> incentive to NOT take Win95/NT/MacOS/OS2, which all have wide software
> bases, as opposed to the closed world of Unix?  John Q. Public doesn't
> want all this trouble, he just wants his kids to be able to research
> their history reports on the web, and for himself, to download a
> little late night skin pics when the wife is late from bingo.  He's in
> control of how the computer game is played these days, even if he
> doesn't understand it.

I *love* UNIX/Linux, but I have no illusions that they comprise a
viable option for John and Jane Q., unless they are provided at a
reasonable price, with GUI's that are usable by people who desire
to be able to use a computer without becoming a dweeb/guru/expert.
 
> Microsoft shouldn't be blamed because they were smarter than the rest
> of the industry, and when they couldn't be smarter, well, buying the
> other company works too.  Every one of you would do it the same way if
> you were Bill Gates running the largest software empire in the world,
> whether you would like to admit it or not.

This is exactly what the Anti-Micro$not Coalition is attempting. Instead
of making their software available to M.E. Tarzan and U. Jane at a
competitive price, they are attempting to prevent someone who sought
and got (Hey! I'm a poet...) their business from offering them even
more affordable software extensions to their basic operating system.
If providing the end-user with the tools to use their modem and the
InterNet is an anit-trust violation, then shouldn't the same concept
apply to OS vendors who provide tools for their customers to use
their printers, etc?

The much maligned 'Sheeple' desire only to have an OS that provides
them with the tools to use the products that they purchase from 
computer vendors.
The fact that Macintosh suffered in the marketplace from offering a
complete package for more money, while the PC vendors offered a more
affordable package which required additional purchases of software
to accomplish the same ends, is not a reflection on the stupidity
of J&J Q. Public. It is a reflection on the ignorance/unwillingness
of Apple to properly advertise the discrepancies in entry-level costs
versus end-result costs.
Tire companies are taking advantage of the shennanigans of their
competition by pointing out that their prices include such 'additional
items' such as valve stems, balancing, air, etc. Apple and Sun were
not constrained by Micro$not from doing the same thing.

Many of the UNIX/SCO systems that I sold to my customers were the 
result of my explaining cost-benefit ratios which I had to analyze
for myself, with no help from those actually producing/selling the
product.
As a former vendor who sold operating systems which were in comptetion
with DOS/Windows, despite the fact that their manufacturers were not
actively seeking my business, I feel no compunction in calling them
to task for attempting to suppress their competition by calling upon
the government to make them quit giving the public what they desire.

Sincerely,
...uuuhh...I can't remember what persona I am posting under...