Microsoft Must be held accountable.

[Keith Mastin]

<quote who="Lloyd D Budd">
> On Fri, 2003-10-10 at 12:38, Keith Mastin wrote:
>
>> > But shouldn't MS be held responsible for the ridiculous ease with
>> which these people can compromise Windows software?
>>
>> Why? Read the EULA. You are not forced to purchase, or to use the
>> software.
> Actually, based on discussions here and everywhere, people do seem to be
> forced to "purchase" MSWin.  *Once* those people have chosen many PC
> retailers -- ie it seems absurdly difficult to get a refund for OEM
> MSWin.

No, they are not. They are required to purchase M$ if they buy an
off-the-shelf name brand box, but that is not the only option. I build
whiteboxen, and I gotta tell ya that 90% of all the residential desktops
get a copy of M$ installed as a part of the deal. I don't have an OEM
license, so the customer pays the full nut if thats what they want (I do
make a subtle advisement against it).

M$ is deeply ingrained into out society. Get used to it. The situation
isn't likely to change until there's a viable and reasonably secured
desktop-ready version of linux (lindoh$ is just as junky as M$
security-wise) ready to roll with a big corporate name behind it. Will it
sell? Yes, if the profit margin at the retail end is better than for M$
-outfitted system (M$ had a LOT of room to maneuver price-wise) AND
there's a strong commercial-strength telephone and Internet support
available.

M$ has it all over on *nix as far as the gui goes... I understand that
everything is compiled directly into their kernel for speed and
integration. Makes for a huge monlithic kernel, but IE and the desktop are
fast and smooth as silk compared to X.

Another thing that would help the linux world, and I haven't heard too
much noise about it, is a gui interface for writting code like they have
in VB. Get all those scrip-kiddies busy learning how to break into a real
OS. :)

>> There is no guarantee that [MSWin] will work.
> Just because it is written does not make it so... the validity of EULAs
> appear to regularly be legally threatened/disputed, and the decisions go
> both ways.  Depending on the legal implications you would have to  prove
> that there was negligence, maliciousness, etc, and quantify the damages
> incurred.

That happened a little while back... umm... IIRC it was related to
properly securing all the information that users were storing on MSN, but
it could have gone deeper than that.

> It does seem that the professional opinion is that MSWin needs to
> (continue) be help accountable in areas like interoperability and
> security.  How to hold them accountable is where the professional
> opinions diverge.

M$ is a big money maker industry-wide, and not just for themselves. Most
of my computer services revenue is from malware disinfection and OS
re-installation after crashes or hax. Another big request is replacing
those broken windoh$ network servers with stuff that works.

Now get this... I can replace a windoh$ network server with *nix and never
have another problem with it. The only revenue that comes in after that is
maintenance or upgrades. If I put windoh$ on the box, it will definately
come back to fix something, probably sooner than later, generating revenue
indefinately.

What I cannot seem to do is stop making attempts to put *nix on every
machine I run into when I know if I put windoh$ on all of them I'de soon
be a rich man. :\

Cheers y'all...

-- 
Keith
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