[Nottingham] A surreal discussion

[Simon]

On 10/15/05, Martin <martin at ml1.co.uk> wrote:
> Folks,
>
> Here's a recent example for a comparison of views.
>
> Talking with a newsletter publisher last night, the conversation moved
> onto what tools were used and the value of 'good communication' to the
> masses and...

Well, they did create the first user-friendly word processing program
(aka Microsoft Word, first on the Mac) so I can see one point. Another
thing is they pretty much defined the modern operating system desktop.
Sometimes I really do wonder what KDE and Gnome would look like if
Windows 95 was never released, or didn't have a taskbar & start
button.

Kids these days only know Microsoft for a few reasons. One I can think
of is Microsoft offer schools massive discounts to use Windows and
Windows software on the computers, and they offer the schools a lot of
help and support. People still have this idea that Linux doesn't work
as well as Windows, and you won't get any support which puts a lot of
businesses off.

How many times have you heard people refer to there computer as being
Microsoft rather than a PC? Happens all the time. Thats good
marketing. PCs come with Windows ready to go, people tend to expect
this. "Linux? What's that? Like Windows? I don't need it, I got
Windows already thanks."

We all know Linux is vastly superior to Windows, and we know
businesses and schools could do better with open source software. But
Microsoft is a global brand with high visibilty that has become a
household name. That's why Rola-Cola will never be as big as Coca-Cola
:)

Erm, I think I drifted off topic a lot. Sorry.

Simon