Date: Thu, 25 May 2000 09:10:51 -0500 (CDT) From: Brennan W Stehling <brennan@offwhite.net> To: Generic Player <generic@unitedtamers.com> Cc: Mark Ovens <mark@dogma.freebsd-uk.eu.org>, questions@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: IE for FreeBSD Petition Message-ID: <Pine.BSF.4.21.0005250858310.47584-100000@home.offwhite.net> In-Reply-To: <000901bfc4f7$21df1ee0$0100a8c0@x>
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I use MacOS and FreeBSD as an alternative to Windows and Microsoft software because I prefer it. I also do it to avoid MS software because I do not wnat to support that company in any way. Conversely, I purchase (not pirate) copies of MacOS to support Apple. I also purchase FreeBSD products from cdrom.com and clothing from copyleft.net. It is all about voting with my dollar bill. The reason MS stays on top is that people keep on buying and using their software. The create proprietary formats and people call them the standards (Excel for spreadsheets and Word for word processing). With that in place it is hard to alternatives to gain ground unless there is an element which simply does not use MS software and uses alternatives like Star Office, Gnome or KDE applications. Having IE on the FreeBSD platform would allow MS to extend it's hold into Unix world. They want to control the development of HTML to the next revision and add on their own proprietary extensions regardless of what the W3C has to say or what specs they publish. And when IE takes up 80% of the market, there is no need for them to listen to a standards body, they become the standards body and can lead the rest of the industry wherever they want to take, always leaving everyone behind because they suddenly make their extensions proprietary and do not publish them. (ala kerberos) In order for the future of the software industry to become balanced under real standards the users of the software must vote _with their dollars_ and tell MS and others who hope to be MS (AOL) that they will not tolerate being abused any longer. (high priced, low quality software which is full of security holes that they claim are features.) Sure the "MS Sux" attitude is childish, but if these people presented themselves in a better way, perhaps you would agree with them. Brennan Stehling - web developer and sys admin projects: www.greasydaemon.com | www.onmilwaukee.com | www.sncalumni.com Microsoft: Will you get a macro virus today? http://www.greasydaemon.com/noms/ <- Why avoid MS? To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-questions" in the body of the message
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