NastyGram to InfoWorld

Story: Gates undaunted by LinuxTotal Replies: 0
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AnonymousCoward

Oct 03, 2004
3:24 AM EDT
Date: 03 October 19:16:24 Subject: You're talking about the same man who... ...didn't even see the Internet coming, so shipped the first edition of Windows 95 without a web browser.

Quoting from: http://www.infoworld.com/article/04/10/01/HNgatestalksmuseum...

> As far as Linux goes, Microsoft has seen other potential threats to > its dominance come and go, Gates stressed.

If that truly represents what Trey Gates believes, then he's stuck somewhere between GandhiCon 1 and 2, while the rest of his company is just passing GandhiCon 3.

http://www.faqs.org/docs/jargon/G/GandhiCon.html

> OS/2 was supposed to kill us

_Microsoft_ once called OS/2 a killer product on their own (Windows, no less) packaging. Is this doublethink? Go figure.

> Unix, in faltering, has lacked the advantage that Windows has had in > that it comes from one vendor and has one set of instructions, Gates > said.

That's true on its face for a change, and I call to witness the CodeReds, Slammers and other symptoms of that dangerous monoculture.

> In the area of grid computing, Gates said not all situations are > applicable for grid,

Translation: "we don't have a real product there yet." If they were actually competitive in the field, he would sing a different tune.

> "The bad news is this malware [or malicious software] thing is so bad," > he said.

See above, under "monoculture" - and possibly "irony" and/or "chutzpah".

> phising

This is a grammatical error, the term is "phishing".

> "We ourselves are not going after the e-voting market or the nuclear > reactor control market," Gates said.

That's a relief! However, they _are_ going after the nuclear aircraft carrier market. Oh, well, win some, lose some, I guess.

Paul, none of what Bill opined here was news.

Gartner inadvertantly revealed last week that (if their figures accurately represent real life, which is doubtful) Linux has slashed illegal software copying by at least 20% in many Asian countries, all by itself.

That _is_ news - it's an approach to so-called "software piracy" which actually works, and doesn't build resentment of the organisations implementing it, nor cause hardship for the end-users.

However, the few news outlets which reported it (including InfoWorld, http://www.infoworld.com/article/04/09/29/HNlinuxpiracy_1.ht...) blindly pitched it as if Linux had somehow _contributed_ to the problem.

Why this fascination with Microsoft and their viewpoint? Why are the pointless, outdated and generally wrong prognostications of a rich man, or the empty sensationlism of an attention-starved consultancy considered newsworthy, while the real world-changing news consistently whooshes right underneath InfoWorld's radar?

Pharmaceutical companies owned by Bill Gates act to block South Americans from shipping cheap generic anti-AIDS drugs to Africa, and it's not newsworthy. On the other hand, Linux advocates are helping those same Africans cross the Digital Divide, claw their way towards economic independence, and it's still not newsworthy. There's even a whole computer game on the topic (http://home.gna.org/oomadness/en/slune/), and still silence from InfoWorld. Yet you publish this inane "Bill's not scared" article. Hello?

Cheers; Leon

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