All Things Microsoft > Microsoft as a Company

Who stands behind the terrorists of September 11?

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Calum:
well if i remember right the only fully functional operating system seriously on the go at the time IBM/Gates did their deal would have been UNIX and its variants. am i right? realistically i think there must have been some more systems kicking about out there but they would have been hobbyist affairs, much like DOS was until Gates marketted it to IBM aggressively.

Now correct me if i am wrong, but AT&T were not allowed legally to sell UNIX? something like that anyway, i know that's not totally right because a lot of universities et c bought licences (open source, but strictly non-disclosure). At that time there was no free software foundation, GNU didn't exist, The Berkeley people had not finished their UNIX-alike operating system and were still using utilities and apps of their own devising on a central UNIX OS, am i right so far? i am not too up on my history so somebody please correct or append if you can.

So the reason Bill Gates did his deal with IBM was first dumb luck, but mostly aggressive marketting. contrary to popular belief being in the right place at the right time is not entirely about luck. Gates was in the right place at the right time because he is a mercenary entrepreneur. He sold licences to an operating system he had not even bought yet to IBM, and got away with it, purely because all the other people who had an operating system to call their own were either too laid back to try and sell to IBM, or uninterested in the moneymaking side of things, interested more in actually developing the technology.
Gates proves his colours a few years later when he screws IBM over when it suited him, pulling out of OS/2 and leaving IBM high and dry. He did the same to Apple . Gates is a businessman, he saw a market and aggressively elbowed his way in there. In the US the hard facts should lead people to admire his determination. And i do not say that to slight the US, just saying Gates is from the states so ther eyou go. The conservative party here think in much the same way in some respects, the liberal government that got such a majority in australia is not entirely dissimilar (smooth veneer on top when it's going okay, dirty tricks and lies as soon as the going gets tough).

Also, void main i know how you feel about Gates being associated with the US, we all have our cross to bear. For my part i can't stand it when Scotland is mentioned in the same sentence as "Great" Britain...

drg:
Well, Bill Gates was too stupid to finalize DOS as it should be; therefore, he spoiled it and implemented it everywhere he could. Since that time Bill Gates spoiled everything he legally or illegally acquired/touched. The man who leads the industry has no brains of his own!  (Yes, he is a good mercenary entrepreneur but not a professional). When MS DOS met competition that was better than MS DOS, what did Bill Gates do?  Yes, played dirty games that they did not expect. They were too decent to compete with the young evil. If a neophyte in computers and programming such as Bill Gates, who did not even finish college was able to invent spoiled DOS - any average professional would do it much better without spoiling it. Because of Bill Gates

Calum:
good post, drg, now:
 
quote:Originally posted by drg:
Well, Bill Gates was too stupid to finalize DOS as it should be; therefore, he spoiled it and implemented it everywhere he could. Since that time Bill Gates spoiled everything he legally or illegally acquired/touched. The man who leads the industry has no brains of his own!  (Yes, he is a good mercenary entrepreneur but not a professional). When MS DOS met competition that was better than MS DOS, what did Bill Gates do?  Yes, played dirty games that they did not expect. They were too decent to compete with the young evil.
--- End quote ---
Bill Gates is a much better entrepreneur than you think in that case. If he had perfected DOS, would there be any reason for people to keep buying his product? At the time it was considered much more normal and acceptable to copy software and there were a lot less checks and balances to stop people doing it too.
Ever heard of planned obsolescence? well Microsoft's software is programmed obsolescence.

 
quote:If a neophyte in computers and programming such as Bill Gates, who did not even finish college was able to invent spoiled DOS - any average professional would do it much better without spoiling it.
--- End quote ---

This is my point. Richard Stallman, take him for instance. He set up the free software foundation not long after bill gates set up Microsoft. Which of them is more successful? which of them is more respected? which is more well known? Even many *nix users think of RMS with disdain. He is a good programmer but did not have the nasty ruthlessnes and sense of timing that Gates has.
 
quote:Because of Bill Gates’s incompetence in computers – not only does the industry have huge losses, but the whole country.  Every year the losses are $11 billions (they are growing), because poorly designed Windows are everywhere (extra security, protection, …  ;)  .
--- End quote ---

Not true. Through windows, Microsoft is deliberately increasing the bloatware so new hardware needs to be bought (the old being too slow or not having enough memory to run the latest version), having such a shitty system that many third party security 'suites' need to be bought, and now they are coding hardware and software together, to make people buy new software for each piece of hardware and vice versa. All this gives the economy a HUGE boost. How many companies would not exist now if not for the 'incompetence' of Bill Gates? If not for planned obsolescence and the need to make systems do something that they cannot do out of the box, the IT economy would have collapsed under its own growth a long time ago.
 
quote:Does the government know about it? If I know - they must know too. Therefore, there are two logical conclusions - either the government is too stupid, or they are under Bill Gates’ power. Thus, politics of the U.S. are defined by … (whom?).
--- End quote ---
Politics in any country are defined by who's got the most money. Pure and simple.

 
quote:Maybe I am not completely right but if we will miss the danger – G.W. Bush can easily enter the country into WW III because the domestic corporation(s) could stay above him. (Is everything under control and there is nothing to worry about?) The majority people missed Hitler in 1939 before WW II. We can repeat the same mistake again – we would have miss Hitler II again.
You may read “How IBM helped the Nazis” to get an idea about what is going on nowadays. (What do you think – the moral of “money bags” became better now or are they foxier?)
--- End quote ---
You jump to many conclusions. IBM were under contract to the nazis. they got the choice whether to tender for this contract or not, am i right? and they decided, ethics aside, they would go for it. It was a different world back then. No UN, No NATO. The British army still officially used germ and chemical warfare against enemies. Analogue telegraph was the height of communications. A different world...

Microsoft are, as far as i know, being offered no tender from, for instance Iraq. He could write a program to help them develop nuclear weaponry! that would set Iraq back at least 20 years...
I don't think, in this day of enhanced communication, that Gates would in any way take part in international politics in case it came out in the wash, regardless of his actual ethics (such as they are).

[ September 24, 2002: Message edited by: Calum ]

pkd_lives:
Hmmmm...

I have to ask what The agenda is of few of these newer posters. There is a start with suggestions that Bill Gates is somehow responsable for 9/11. Please don't insult my intelligence. I do not for one second believe this, there is not 'evidence' to back it up, and most of the statements are heresay, inconclusive and in some cases outright defamatory. IF such a thing were true then you would need hard evidence to convince this board. We are smart people, not the sort to jump around believing any statement that puts those we hate in a bad light.

M$ is a monopoly, not a 'super-monopoly', they have abused their power with browsers and on the desktop. They have no server monopoly.

Bill Gates and Microsoft have been to court many times. The company has been convicted of piracy. It has given large sums of money, product and services to the Peruvian goverment, and Norway (I think), in exchange for certain benefits. I would call this Bribery but it is NOT bribery by legal definition. I feel that with all the court cases they have lost there is evidence to support that they do business in an underhanded way that warrants investigation.

Now big business in general has a large effect on the world, and yes it influences politics, but a war would not Benefit M$ in anyway. It would instead boost their competition. That M$ strongly lobby various Senators, Govenors, Ministers, etc. is not a point that will be argued, and yes they do it to get their point of view put before the voting electorate of the govening body. This is big business practice. I consider it wrong and immoral but it is not illegal. And yes by using persuasion of those in power they can get laws past that are maybe more favourable to them.

And with regard the anti USA statements. I know most of you out there are not racisit fascist types, you are using generalisations that you may not realise are wrong. Many of you may be suprised to know that many many Americans DO NOT consider the money grabbing success story to be good representation of the country. In fact more Americans are chilled out relaxed, intelligent and very very welcoming and considerate of other people, than foreign media sterotypes would have you believe. It's the same as Soctland and Kilts (or GB), dutch and EDAM and Windmills, Greeks and Philosophy and ouzo, etc. Sterotypes and generalisations are wrong. I am afraid I stick with Void Main on this. It does SOMETIMES feel that these statements are critical of the US instead of the protagonist under debate. Now critising the US under circumstances that are applicable, i.e passing stupid laws that will further Palladium - well now that's part of the reason we are all here.

Calum:

quote:And with regard the anti USA statements. I know most of you out there are not racisit fascist types, you are using generalisations that you may not realise are wrong. Many of you may be suprised to know that many many Americans DO NOT consider the money grabbing success story to be good representation of the country. In fact more Americans are chilled out relaxed, intelligent and very very welcoming and considerate of other people, than foreign media sterotypes would have you believe. It's the same as Soctland and Kilts (or GB), dutch and EDAM and Windmills, Greeks and Philosophy and ouzo, etc. Sterotypes and generalisations are wrong. I am afraid I stick with Void Main on this. It does SOMETIMES feel that these statements are critical of the US instead of the protagonist under debate. Now critising the US under circumstances that are applicable, i.e passing stupid laws that will further Palladium - well now that's part of the reason we are all here.


--- End quote ---
i am very glad to hear you say this and i agree thoroughly. i will however stand by my previous statements, because there is a big difference between a stereotype and the basis for a society. Capitalism is an ideal. The 'American dream' is an ideal, that many Americans live for. How many other countries make their four year old kids worship the countries flag every day?

Anyway, the point is that i think the US would officially stand up and say that the American dream is an ideal that America still stands for to this day. That is not a stereotype, and whether or not a large amount of Americans choose to be the sort of people that don't revere this idea, this is still the official line of their country. If they want people to change their attitude about Americans, they must take an active hand in their own affairs and, for instance, vote in a government that will not say hasty things about the American dream if that's not what they really believe in. In much the same way, anything i have to say about England's dominance over Scotland is sour grapes until the Scots actually work up some gumption and use their votes for a change to become a European country in their own right.

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