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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and do not publish them.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?




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