OT! Re: Nuke this off-topic flamefest!

<<snippage>> Amen. A lot of the blame for Microsoft's dominance (aside from the illegal predatory tactics) lies in the fact that the buying public has just accepted substandard, buggy products for years, and continues to do so. I've seen quotes from Ballmer that said "We'd rather ship a buggy product on time, and fix it down the road, than miss a ship date." The kind of errors and bugs that ship in MS "final" products would bring scores of lawsuits and bankruptcies in any other industry, but the computer-buying public just says, "I know it's buggy and not really finished. I know it'll cause problems and probably isn't compatible with my other software. That's OK. It's from Microsoft, so I have to have it because it's the latest thing...you just go ahead and fix the flaws when you have time. Here's another boxful of cash. Oh, and while you're at it, let me know when the next beta is out, and I'll send you another boxful of cash for that, too." It's a great business model. If the automotive industry could get away with selling partially-finished, problematic cars for full retail price, and demand that you pay full price for a new one every two years, don't you think they'd do the same thing? That's the only thing Microsoft has "innovated". All their products are bought, stolen, reverse-engineered, "borrowed", or otherwise derived from someone else's work. The ability to sell crap, and sell it consistently, while gaining market share and making more profit than half of the world's countries put together, is true marketing genius. They've gotten everyone to say, "Yes, sir. May I have another?" Paul Braun WD9GCO Cygnus Productions nerdware_nospam(a)laidbak.com "A computer without a Microsoft operating system is like a dog without a bunch of bricks tied to its head."