Why I have concerns about Microsoft, A list, published in the interest of openness Options

[just_some_guy]

whether you like it or no, about 90% of the population is perfectly happy with windows or MacOS, and would throw fruit at you if you stood up infront of them and told them they would ahve to install their own OS's from now on.

Yeah, but here on Atomic, I am counting on a slightly more savvy crowd which can see the merits in my perspectives on these matters :)

But thanks to you and the preceding posters for your detailed responses. I did read all of them.

[TheSecret]

What were your thoughts in general? Have you reconsidered any of your arguments or points of view?

[just_some_guy]

Yes, I think on reading all of the comments I have probably softened my view somewhat, and some good examples were provided of how some of Microsoft's recent behaviour has been better than in the past.

That won't stop me making Microsoft jokes though, sorry :) Nor from generally believing that people can and should expect better customer focus from the world's largest software company.

In any case, exchange of opinions, and hopefully people will understand why I will ocassionally have a shot at them.

[Nich...]

Sorry, I know I'm a little late to the party, but I wanted to give a slightly more detailed response.


What is it you want MS to change? Is your issue with the corporate heads? Team leaders on specific areas of MS products? The actual coders who go through their products?

If one part of MS is making flipping windows and translucent window frame effects, it doesn't mean that they are responsible for there not being some big innovation in some other (or related) area of the OS/UI.

(Relatedly, I think I've linked to a blog entry in another thread, by an MS employee, who rightly pointed out that when changes are made to the OS that don't have some way for a user to easily notice - most commonly in the form of some GUI update - then the user often doesn't notice the update and complains - obvious examples being notepad and calculator, over the years)

As far as product pricing goes, I find it a little odd that you think every new product that comes out is something you have to pay for. If the cost:benefit isn't matching up, then wait for a future version, or (considering how MS seem to make their SPs work) even a patch to the current, new, version. Or even just wait for the price to come down (or, WRT Win7 specifically, wait for the actual release to come about to see the actual pricing, cf announced pricing). For a lot of people I know, the only reason they'd upgrade to every new version of Windows and Office is if they did so via un-paid-for means.

It sounds more-so like you have a problem with the direction certain people have taken MS, as a company, over the years. I don't really want to get into splitting hairs over what makes up a company, but I think a lot of your concerns have more to do with how the company has acted in the past, than how they necessarily act now.

This post has been edited by Nich...: Jul 8 2009, 12:53 AM

[TheSecret]

(Relatedly, I think I've linked to a blog entry in another thread, by an MS employee, who rightly pointed out that when changes are made to the OS that don't have some way for a user to easily notice - most commonly in the form of some GUI update - then the user often doesn't notice the update and complains - obvious examples being notepad and calculator, over the years)

I know calculator has had significant improvements, but I don't think notepad has. One of my major annoyances is that notepad still cannot understand Unix style text documents. It is such a trivial feature to add, and used by almost every other operating system.

[smakme7757]

I have to agree with Sir_Substance & kikz here:

Although here on atomic and throughout the world there are millions who love to toy with their PC there are 50 times that amount who just want a computer to work!

Step 1: Press ON
Step 2: Do work
Step 3: Shutdown

To put it in perspective there are millions of car users around the world who mod, change and tweak their cars but there is also 50 times the amount of people who just want to wake up in the morning turn the ignition and drive to work! Windows caters for everyone and everyone is NOT a computer enthusiasts or people with a deep interest or love for the computing scene.

Computers are put on this earth to help INCREASE PRODUCTIVITY not to slow it down.

[Squidy]

one question... why the fuck do people waste their good money paying microsoft to hire monkeys to develop their software when there are free options out on the market...

Because there are some things the free market cant do. I create music for example and Windows is WAY ahead of the Linux market in this area. If I switched to Linux for music it would literally make redundant loads of software I have and even cut down my studio by quite a lot. I'd compare it to blu-ray on a big plasma TV to watching beta videos on a black and white TV in this instance.

[michael.jenkin]

i have recommended linux operating systems to new users for years, heck they dont even have to worry about virus/malware protection, the constant bloating with the file system, massive patches... etc They have found linux easier to use than microsoft based systems and havent had a single problem with it.

i find your suggestion that users generally find linux easier then windows very odd.

you see, i too have tried to use linux, and i find it much harder to use the windows. anything more advanced then browsing the internet invariably requires use of the terminal, and i find your claim that new users could possibly find the terminal easier to use then a well structured GUI they have used in some form their whole lives rediculous. i dont deny that linux is a viable, powerful, workable OS. but its far less user friendly then windows and miles behind MacOS when it comes to new users.

if all your users do is write word documents and browse the web, maybe they do find it nicer to use then windows, but i bet the first time they went to install a program and had to go three rounds with the synaptics package manager, they wished they had windows and its double-click-the-installer simplicity.

certainly, your claim that none of your clients have ever had a problem with linux is utterly ludicrous.

I also find it weird that Linux is easier than Microsoft.


I have been actively in IT since the late 80's. I started with DOS 3.3 and have worked with Amiga/Digital Research Gem desktop, Solaris, Sun, BEOS, Novell 4.11/5, C64, OS8, OS9, OSX and then through Windows 3, 3.11 and up til now on Win7. I was one of the first Linux Beta testers back in 1990 at UniSA and have since been a 5 time awardee of the Microsoft MVP award and even worked in Redmond. I think I have a very good understanding of trends and what people like.

I think that this topic is fantastic. I think there is some real truth to all sides of this argument. I must say, from my own experience, Microsoft provides a solution people are happy with and it is simple to use. It is not as simple as the Mac OS however, you can do more with it and it has many ways to do the same thing. This is where the Mac OS is both better and yet worse.

I feel the adoption of an operating system comes down to three basic classes of people

-Technically advanced
-Want to get a specific task done with no fuss
-Wants it to be familiar and simple with a little fuss

(This might be over simplifying)

Technical advanced people like to try new things, like to look at alternatives, like to seek answers and love to play with Widgets (Compiling Kernels, learning some basic scripting tools and playing with the OS to make it better for themselves).

Specific task people turn on their computers to do a task, write a letter, send an email. They don't care for torrents and have no idea what WinZip is for. They are more efficient as they have specific goals, don't explore and want straight forward ways to do things and
only the option of one way to do it. (This fits most Mac people .... not all. I don't want to put everyone into boxes, just generalising).

Finally there are the windows users. They want to install it, boot it up and be compatible. They like to dabble a little and they like the wide variety of software they can download. they like having drivers that just work. They like that they can get to things in more than one way and that it is a little more complicated than a Mac but the world of Linux scares them. They don't want to have to locate config files, edit settings or learn a new Linux OS every time they see a new distribution. They don’t have the time or patience to learn.

So the question is, what is the demographic of the world ?

-Technically advanced people ?
-specific task done with no fuss people ?
-familiar and simple with a little fuss people ?

I would say windows is the clear winner at the moment as they fall into the third category and Microsoft is pandering to that need. I can't say I blame them.

I feel qualified to make these statements from my background. I have learnt all about the various products out there and had to use them.

I have been a column contributor to MacWorld Australia for the last 6 months and have a Mac at home (And many PC’s running everything from OS/2, Linux through to Windows and Emulators). I have worked very closely with Microsoft. I ran two Novell servers and two Red hat Enterprise servers Rel 4 servers at work and I have lots of Windows 2003/2008 servers out there running at clients sites with Mac and Microsoft clients.

As for Malware, exploits and viruses ... I recall some of these issues back in 1990 when I was using a DEC Vax system and Sco Unix. As an OS becomes more popular, so do the attacks. Mozilla and Mac OSX have both become more popular lately, as have an increased number of attacks on those.

Nothing is safe.

Seriously, I think it is time people realised that there are alternatives out there, it does not make yours wrong or right. Different people have different needs, different computers and different OS's are better for different people. Yes Microsoft makes money however .. That is their right. They are a business with Shareholders and budgets. They need to make money so they can pay their developers for Windows 8 or Windows 9 when it comes out

[Nich...]

In terms of Microsoft abusing their monopoly - explicitly with IE - I'd like to ask if people think they did the same thing with TCP/IP stacks?

I remember back in high school, one of the library computers (running some variant of windows - 3.x, if not 95) was old enough that you had to manually load the TCP stack. Trumpet, maybe?

From vague memory, MS later integrated a port/version of one of the BSD stacks, before later re-writing their own one.

I remember at one point, reading about the various versions of the Amiga OS (especially post 3.0) where they included one or two versions of a time-limited TCP stack for you to try out. It made me wonder why on earth you wouldn't just ship one with the OS - either free, or officially licenced - because it seemed like one of those things you kind of expect an OS to come with by default, to make your life easier in terms of getting on with doing stuff. Which is how I sort of see MS shipping no IE for some versions of Windows in Europe, these days.

ie, why do I not hear people decrying MS for shipping a default TCP/IP stack with Windows, and 'stifling the competition'?

[magnumxy]

It's hard to respond to a post like this without sounding like one is defending Microsoft...

*snip*

They constantly fix bugs because they're found in the wild. I challenge you to write software that will work on 100% of PCs on the planet. There's billions of them. Not to mention the billions of billions of different ways people are going to bend it. You can't address every bug, vulnerability, etc in a debugging think tank, it's just not possible.

Your main argument seems to be other companies do the same (bad) things therefore MS is safe.
The problem is that MS is one of the few companies in the world that has a total monopoly on a market, this means that MS have no incentive to change their ways.

What is it you want MS to change?

Kill Steve Ballmer?

This post has been edited by magnumxy: Jul 12 2009, 10:45 PM

[kikz]

The problem is that MS is one of the few companies in the world that has a total monopoly on a market, this means that MS have no incentive to change their ways.

That's bullshit. Even if you're talking about OS's MS doesn't have a total monopoly. Desktop OS's even. MS do a shitload more than OS's, anyway...

[strifus]

I dont think Mr Ballmer was the problem. It was Mr Gates. Ever since he took the helm, things have changed. So we will just have to wait and see what happens.

[just_some_guy]

That's bullshit. Even if you're talking about OS's MS doesn't have a total monopoly.

Microsoft have an effective monopoly in the OS and office apps markets.

[Sentrinox]

I think it's related to backwards compatibility..

[strifus]

I think it's related to backwards compatibility..

+1 to that. One of the reasons MS software enjoy said "monopoly" is due to good backward compatibility. I am pretty sure that they can innovate but they wouldnt do it at the cost of backward compatibility.

[HokeyWhiteBoy]

As mentioned above... for most users it is a moot point.

As an example. if I walked around the office and replaced everyones copy of Office 2007 with version 1.0, I recon one person would complain that it <i>looked</i> different... and no one else would even notice the lack of features.

[magnumxy]

That's bullshit. Even if you're talking about OS's MS doesn't have a total monopoly.

Microsoft have an effective monopoly in the OS and office apps markets.

what he said ^

[michael.jenkin]

In terms of Microsoft abusing their monopoly - explicitly with IE - I'd like to ask if people think they did the same thing with TCP/IP stacks?

I remember back in high school, one of the library computers (running some variant of windows - 3.x, if not 95) was old enough that you had to manually load the TCP stack. Trumpet, maybe?

From vague memory, MS later integrated a port/version of one of the BSD stacks, before later re-writing their own one.

I remember at one point, reading about the various versions of the Amiga OS (especially post 3.0) where they included one or two versions of a time-limited TCP stack for you to try out. It made me wonder why on earth you wouldn't just ship one with the OS - either free, or officially licenced - because it seemed like one of those things you kind of expect an OS to come with by default, to make your life easier in terms of getting on with doing stuff. Which is how I sort of see MS shipping no IE for some versions of Windows in Europe, these days.

ie, why do I not hear people decrying MS for shipping a default TCP/IP stack with Windows, and 'stifling the competition'?

Wow, Trumpet Winsock. I thought people forgot all about them. I threw out an old Ozemail signup disk (Floppy disk) that was just a branded Trumpet disk, just the other day. I thought I was the only one on thet planet that remembers those days. Remember the Netbeui update for Windows 3 and then 3.11 with TCP/IP ?

Whilst it was crappy, it paved the future and helped push TCP to the masses ( along with Unix/Linux)

[michael.jenkin]

As mentioned above... for most users it is a moot point.

As an example. if I walked around the office and replaced everyones copy of Office 2007 with version 1.0, I recon one person would complain that it <i>looked</i> different... and no one else would even notice the lack of features.

I have 3 copies of Office 2 on 5.15" disks (Double Density) and 2 or 3 copies of office 4 on 3.5" HDD (15 disks in a set from memory) - all legal and looking for a home ... if you have the disk drives.
Maybe time for a field test ?

[iamthemaxx]

Heh, even I can remember trumpet and netbeui :p