[KLUG Advocacy] Interesting . . .

[Robert G. Brown]

>Lisa was the first gui.  Palo Alto research labs at Xerox developed the
>first mouse (another thing attributed to Apple)
Lisa mighta been the first commercial GUI workstation, but Xerox and
Control Data had GUI worksations as far back as 1974, either as prototypes
or as field experiments, in universities. The architecture of this stuff
(event-driven callbacks, etc.) was firmly in place by the late 70's. 
Most everything else that came since has been packaging or refinements.

>> >Their inferior software was cheap enough to get  others to use it.  
>> For a period of time there software was hardly inferior...
>M$ marketed to and cut deals with the OEMs to saturate the market.
Both of these statements are true. I've touched on the latter in previous
posts. Pushing the install as far up the supply chain as they could was
a big step forward for Microsoft in particular and the computer industry
in general.

>>>They started out cheap to get everyone to have a piece  of it.  
>>A legitimate arguement to use Linux today. :)  There is nothing new
>>under the sun.
The new thing is that it is just about impossible to see how Linux can
become closed; with systems open "forever", people can make plans based
on a continued, low, stable cost structure.

>>>Then the prices started going skyward to the point it has the most 
>>>expensive software out there (and by no means is the BEST). 
>> Well, they are capitalists, so one honestly can't get worked up over
>> that.  They charge what the market will bear.  If the market finds in
>> unbearable (is that a pun?) it will go elsewhere.  Or at least that is
>> the theory, assuming the market is free.
The problem is that the market is not, for practical purposes, free. This is
why terms like "popular" cannot be applied to MS software, since "popularity"
implies free choice.

>And that brings us to today.  I am tired of hearing people get caught up
>in brands....
Brands have less place in a market where standard protocols and so forth
are, to a great degree, controlling factors. This is why many people in
the computer industry work so hard at establishing brands. Actually, we
take brands as marks of quality (IBM, Yamaha, SuperMicro) or the lack of
it (Packard-Bell, etc.).

>I don't care if your T-shirt says Tommy....
Yes, and even the fashion people adhere to standards, even as they hype 
themselves and their brand names.

>   What my point? Technology is the same way.  Consumers assume
>Microsoft=good. ...So they are not free to choose...
That's right. They assume that PC's are simply unreliable, and crash 
all the time. When I point out that I have a machine that's benn running
24/7 for a year, and that the limiting factor on reliability is the power
company (or more PC's than UPS'es), they think I'm from another planet. 
This is simply not possible.

>...because they are ignorant that there exist other choices.
Well, KLUG is a 501c3 organization, which is an "...EDUCATIONAL, cultural,
or scientific organization operated for the public good". I propose we 
go about the business of educating them.

>Best Buy offers no alternative OS...
They sell RH, SuSe, and Mandrake Linux in Portage, probably in other places.

><rant> A necessary evil is to have salesmen (and marketing).  I despise
>the "hey, your whats happening!" salesman BS.  Salesmen only suck oxygen
>that could be used by thinking humans or by internal combustion
>engines.</rant>

Now, now, Randy... get a grip. What did any salesman ever do to you that there
is such hostility? You might not (cough) value sales and marketing people
very much, but they do serve a couple of functions. Some of the most respected
people in the Linux community, are, in a strong sense, marketing people. You
might not see it that way, but it's true nonetheless.

>>Bobs point is right:  when it doesn't work it isn't M$ standing about
>>waving there arms.  It is a pack of MCSEs.
>Yes, and they are "certified" with the stamp of approval of Microsoft.
>Certified Angus Beef.
Which, with some horseradish sauce and asparagus, is *very* good!

That nice filled-up feeling is EXACTLY what a lot of people get when they
hire a CERTIFIED person to do work on computers, networks, etc. It is the
feeling of a posterior covered, since the onus of ensuring some minimum
level of service quality has, in some sense been outsourced. Microsoft
(and Novell, and Sun, and IBM, and Red Hat, and....) solve an otherwise
intractable staffing and support problem this way as well.

							Regards,
							---> RGB <---