[sclug] I'm a Paper Clip - Fly Me.

[Neil Haughton]

> No, what did it for me was:
>
> - constantly being patronised by the GUI. "Hi there, I'm 
> Clippy^WWindows. The file 
> 'experimentIveJustWrittenWhichDoesntWork.exe' is a program. If you 
> delete this program, [FUD FUD FUD]. Are you sure you want me to do 
> what you just fscking well told me to instead of what I think you 
> should have [you incompetent moron who ought to be drooling at a TV 
> instead]?" That, and its habit of concealing important information 
> from you, and / or translating it (lossily) into luserspeak, so that 
> you have to translate it back into real terminology before you can 
> work out what it's saying. My thankfully brief exposure to XP 
> indicates that both of these problems are now a lot worse. (Please 
> excuse the venting, my exposure to XP was quite recent. Ugh!)
>
> - the equally constant feeling of low-grade paranoia, caused by 
> knowing that the OS vendor is basically an enemy, and the product 
> infrastructure design of low quality. If I install this minor driver 
> patch, will my system come back up again when I reboot, or will I be 
> looking at a 3-day unscheduled outage while I reinstall and 
> reconfigure everything? Will the next service pack send all my 
> personal details back to Redmond? Is there something really evil and 
> invasive buried in the enormous EULA for this security patch I need? 
> Am I going to be coerced into upgrading to a new version I don't want, 
> which is worse than this, which will cost me a lot of money, and which 
> will be loaded to the gunwales with invasive DRM which will try to 
> take my machine away from me?
>
> The first point might not apply to the average user, but I'd say the 
> second ought to - the DRM aspect in particular. The point at which I 
> thought I might have to "upgrade" from 2000 to XP was the point at 
> which I actually decided to upgrade to Linux instead.
>
All valid points, I agree, but I doubt if they make much sense or carry 
much weight with the average lay Windows user. It's all what they have 
come to expect - it's what computers do, innit? Just the way it is, and 
life's too short to question if things can be improved. You could say 
that's been the genius of MS marketing. Rather like the days (if you can 
remember) when Mother's Pride and Watney's Red Barrel were widely 
accepted as quality products. :-) Yup, believe it or not, that was once 
the case.

Encouragingly I see that  several  Windows-oriented computer magazines 
are now carrying Linux sections.  Small sections, mostly, but at least 
it's getting an airing amongst the curious, and the general readership 
is getting the idea that there is an Alternative.  

Neil