Microsoft and EU
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And that's Microsoft's fault how? The other browser vendors CAN advertise. I'm sure Apple makes enough money at least to advertise the Opera browser for Windows. But they don't. Microsoft's fault? No. Google? You think Google can't afford advertising? Really? Again, Microsoft's fault? No. Hell, I don't know the numbers, but I'd imagine even Mozilla foundation, despite being open source, could throw some money at some billboards. Ford Motor company is not forced to advertise for Alpine or Kenwood as replacements for their stock stereos. Why should Microsoft? They've never stopped you from downloading alternatives (I'm writing this from Chrome). I say again, if they're going to force Microsoft to give you a choice of browsers, why not go all the way, and force them to make the user choose ALL options? Then they truly get choice. Of course, installing Windows will become a 10 hour job, but hey, the EU will be happy.
Jamie Nordmeyer
Portland, Oregon, USA
http://www.feralcodemonkies.comMicrosoft is a monopoly and the rules are different than a "normal" business. How would you feel if you wrote an nice little utlity and was making a good living at it and Microsoft decided to roll its functionality into Windows to "enhance" it? How many do you think you would sell?
You measure democracy by the freedom it gives its dissidents, not the freedom it gives its assimilated conformists.
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The number of times I have had to tell people the difference between an OS, a Browser and a Search Engine!
------------------------------------ No Good Deed Goes Unpunished Clare Boothe Luce
Could you explain it to Google then please? They seem to have got a little confused on that point.
"WPF has many lovers. It's a veritable porn star!" - Josh Smith
As Braveheart once said, "You can take our freedom but you'll never take our Hobnobs!" - Martin Hughes.
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Is anybody else getting sick and tired of this garbage? http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091216/ap_on_bi_ge/eu_eu_microsoft;_ylt=Ah_C4OTFI2P5PnUCi_QYrJt0fNdF[^] What will they force Microsoft to do next? Offer us a choice of media players? Or calculators? Or notepads? Or spyware tools? If the EU had their way, a Windows installation would take 8 hours; not because of the amount of data being copied in, but because of the time it takes to get past the damn install wizard. This has gotten out of hand. Just about everyone today knows that IE is not the only player. The only ones who don't for the most part are grandparent who might be using their first computer, or someone in a 3rd world country that only has access to a open source computer anyway. I'm glad that the EU can't reach out of Europe. Trust me, I'm not saying Europeans are stupid. They're not. But the EU must think they are.
Jamie Nordmeyer
Portland, Oregon, USA
http://www.feralcodemonkies.comAgreed. The responce should have been two fold: Force MS to comply with the already existing web standards i.e. elimiante all the stupid IE workarounds in web sites. Secondly make sure that IE can be properly uninstalled without any consequence from their OS's. As that is an actual problem that does cause issues for the public, as they cannot choose a different browser as their bank's website is still coded for IE. That should have been it, there was no need to force a stupid ballot screen (with its hundreds of revisions (thanks to opera and its pathetic whinges))
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Microsoft is a monopoly and the rules are different than a "normal" business. How would you feel if you wrote an nice little utlity and was making a good living at it and Microsoft decided to roll its functionality into Windows to "enhance" it? How many do you think you would sell?
You measure democracy by the freedom it gives its dissidents, not the freedom it gives its assimilated conformists.
Um, browsers are free. They make their money from ad revenue, not from selling licenses. And thus, I say again, nothing, NOTHING, stops you from downloading, installing, and using another browser. If Microsoft went out of their way to prevent you from downloading other browsers, or made it an inconceivable nightmare to install one, THEN you'd have a point. But since they don't, I'm sorry, but I don't really see yours.
Jamie Nordmeyer
Portland, Oregon, USA
http://www.feralcodemonkies.com -
Distind wrote:
My real question about this though, where's Mac's browser selection screen. Can we at least enforce things evenly if we're going to enforce them?
The argument in the media is that Linux and Mac are not dominating the market. You're trying to approach this with logic, and that won't work here.
Distind wrote:
If that's illegal if it overlaps with someone else's product we're all screwed.
They didn't say that it was illegal, but that Microsoft was abusing it's position to push a product. And that was bad for the other browser-builders, and they stopped innovating their browsers because they could not compete. Again, don't apply logic here. No, they won't be sending funds to the Mono-project. It looks good when you can say in the news that you brought Microsoft to it's knees :)
I are Troll :suss:
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Could you explain it to Google then please? They seem to have got a little confused on that point.
"WPF has many lovers. It's a veritable porn star!" - Josh Smith
As Braveheart once said, "You can take our freedom but you'll never take our Hobnobs!" - Martin Hughes.
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Um, browsers are free. They make their money from ad revenue, not from selling licenses. And thus, I say again, nothing, NOTHING, stops you from downloading, installing, and using another browser. If Microsoft went out of their way to prevent you from downloading other browsers, or made it an inconceivable nightmare to install one, THEN you'd have a point. But since they don't, I'm sorry, but I don't really see yours.
Jamie Nordmeyer
Portland, Oregon, USA
http://www.feralcodemonkies.comWell, if you can't see it, I'm not going to waste any more time explaining it to you. I hope Bill doesn't turn any corners too quickly and break your nose. :laugh:
You measure democracy by the freedom it gives its dissidents, not the freedom it gives its assimilated conformists.
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Well, if you can't see it, I'm not going to waste any more time explaining it to you. I hope Bill doesn't turn any corners too quickly and break your nose. :laugh:
You measure democracy by the freedom it gives its dissidents, not the freedom it gives its assimilated conformists.
OK, whatever helps you sleep at night. It is my honest and professional opinion that the EU wasted everyone's time with this. Nothing stops you from downloading another browser. Nothing. If you're ignorant of how a computer works, and of your choices, then you most likely don't give a damn what browser you're using anyway, as long as it'll let you check your email.
Jamie Nordmeyer
Portland, Oregon, USA
http://www.feralcodemonkies.com -
OK, whatever helps you sleep at night. It is my honest and professional opinion that the EU wasted everyone's time with this. Nothing stops you from downloading another browser. Nothing. If you're ignorant of how a computer works, and of your choices, then you most likely don't give a damn what browser you're using anyway, as long as it'll let you check your email.
Jamie Nordmeyer
Portland, Oregon, USA
http://www.feralcodemonkies.com -
Well gee, if you think a browser is an e-mail client, that's wall we need to know.
You measure democracy by the freedom it gives its dissidents, not the freedom it gives its assimilated conformists.
Yahoo! Mail, Live Mail, GMail, Hotmail, etc, etc, etc. Yes, you can install and use a POP3 client, but their primary UI is a website, and the aforementioned people will use them, not knowing that they can download a program, much less how to attach one to the POP3 and SMTP points of the site. So yup, the browser can be, and usually is, an email client. Heck, I'm an IT professional, and I use the web front end for my email.
Jamie Nordmeyer
Portland, Oregon, USA
http://www.feralcodemonkies.com -
Um, browsers are free. They make their money from ad revenue, not from selling licenses. And thus, I say again, nothing, NOTHING, stops you from downloading, installing, and using another browser. If Microsoft went out of their way to prevent you from downloading other browsers, or made it an inconceivable nightmare to install one, THEN you'd have a point. But since they don't, I'm sorry, but I don't really see yours.
Jamie Nordmeyer
Portland, Oregon, USA
http://www.feralcodemonkies.comJamie Nordmeyer wrote:
Um, browsers are free. They make their money from ad revenue, not from selling licenses
IE isn't free. You have already paid for it with your windows license, just as you've paid for Safari with your Mac license. Apple has the advantage of leeching the good work from other people (Safari is a spin-off of open source browser(s)), and still getting paid for it. Not that this has much of a relevance in the discussion you guys have, but it's naive to believe that IE is free.
-- Kein Mitleid Für Die Mehrheit
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Jamie Nordmeyer wrote:
Um, browsers are free. They make their money from ad revenue, not from selling licenses
IE isn't free. You have already paid for it with your windows license, just as you've paid for Safari with your Mac license. Apple has the advantage of leeching the good work from other people (Safari is a spin-off of open source browser(s)), and still getting paid for it. Not that this has much of a relevance in the discussion you guys have, but it's naive to believe that IE is free.
-- Kein Mitleid Für Die Mehrheit
Touche! :) Valid point. Firefox and Chrome both run on Windows and Linux, so I suppose you could say that they're free. But you still have to pay money for the hardware to run Linux on... so maybe they aren't free at all after all. :laugh: OK, if you've already got a computer, and paid for the license to run Windows, or installed Linux, then they're free... or something.
Jamie Nordmeyer
Portland, Oregon, USA
http://www.feralcodemonkies.com -
Is anybody else getting sick and tired of this garbage? http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091216/ap_on_bi_ge/eu_eu_microsoft;_ylt=Ah_C4OTFI2P5PnUCi_QYrJt0fNdF[^] What will they force Microsoft to do next? Offer us a choice of media players? Or calculators? Or notepads? Or spyware tools? If the EU had their way, a Windows installation would take 8 hours; not because of the amount of data being copied in, but because of the time it takes to get past the damn install wizard. This has gotten out of hand. Just about everyone today knows that IE is not the only player. The only ones who don't for the most part are grandparent who might be using their first computer, or someone in a 3rd world country that only has access to a open source computer anyway. I'm glad that the EU can't reach out of Europe. Trust me, I'm not saying Europeans are stupid. They're not. But the EU must think they are.
Jamie Nordmeyer
Portland, Oregon, USA
http://www.feralcodemonkies.com -
Could you explain it to Google then please? They seem to have got a little confused on that point.
"WPF has many lovers. It's a veritable porn star!" - Josh Smith
As Braveheart once said, "You can take our freedom but you'll never take our Hobnobs!" - Martin Hughes.
:thumbsup: :laugh:
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