Read on if you want to know where Microsoft, Windows 98, and Internet
Exploder is leading us in a handbasket. The article was taken from:
pbs.org
Take a billionaire to lunch: The real reasons
why Microsoft is so desperate to fold Internet
Explorer into Windows 98
by Robert X. Cringely
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"The check is in the mail."
"Of course I'll still respect you in the
morning."
We all know the standard list of lies, but
here are two more, straight from the mouth of
Bill Gates this week: 1) "The Department of
Justice is trying to deny product innovations
to computer users," and 2) "If the Department
of Justice is successful in keeping Internet
Explorer 4 from being bundled in Windows 98,
Microsoft could be put out of business."
Make a list of the product innovations that
have ever come from Microsoft. There is a
fantasy in Redmond that Microsoft products are
innovative, but this is based entirely on a
peculiar confusion of the words "innovative"
and "successful." Microsoft products are
successful -- they make a lot of money -- but
that doesn't make them innovative, or even
particularly good. I do documentary television
shows about the history of the computer
business, and it is amazing how Microsoft
executives retrospectively will acknowledge
how bad some of their products have been. At
the time those products were introduced, the
same executives claimed they were the best in
the world. How can this be? It's this
confusion of market success and product
quality, combined with a general lack of
respect and concern for users.
Innovations don't often come from big
companies, and when they do, it is generally
as a result of competition. Innovations
usually come from little companies that need
to innovate to make a place for themselves in
the market. What comes from big companies,
especially big software companies, are product
revisions. We don't ask for the revisions, but
they are nevertheless thrust upon us. Who
actually uses any features of Microsoft Word
introduced after, say, version 4? Yet new
versions continue to appear and we upgrade to
them -- not because we want ever larger, more
bloated software -- but because we have no
choice. Deliberate changes in file
specifications keep upgrading just so we're
able to read our own writing and share files
with others. It's a plot, a grand manipulation
of millions of users with the sole purpose of
maintaining corporate earnings growth. They do
it for them, not for us.
And it's not just Microsoft. Nearly every
software company does the same thing because
it's the best way to generate revenues after
the easiest sales have already been made.
There's a sucker born every minute, and more
often than not, he uses a personal computer.
Then there is Lie Number Two: Could the
Department of Justice, with its proposed $1
million-per-day fine and
not-all-that-sophisticated understanding of
the way the software business works, really
put Microsoft out of business? Of course not,
and Bill Gates knows it.
But emperors are different from you and me.
They can be self-centered and whine about the
most petty things, and for some reason we
listen to them. Emperor Bill can share his
ludicrous fear that the Department of Justice
will take out Microsoft with anything short of
a neutron bomb, and we listen to him. Some
people even sympathize. Poor Bill. Poor
Microsoft. But understand that sympathy is
unknown inside the Redmond hallways, that no
competitor there is ever given the benefit of
the doubt. Strength is all that matters at
Microsoft -- that is unless a little public
sniveling can regain some advantage. This is
theater, theater of the absurd.
None of this would make a bit of difference if
the software at the heart of this dispute --
Windows 98 -- was truly innovative, truly
useful or even truly functional. As it stands
at this moment, days or weeks away from Win98
being frozen and deemed shippable to you and
me, the software sucks. Worse still, it treats
us like fools.
Here's what I am hearing about Windows 98 from
inside Microsoft's developer and beta test
communities.
It isn't done, for one thing. Not even close.
Expect many bugs and many bug fixes long after
the product ships, and probably expect a delay
or two beyond Microsoft's promised second
quarter shipping target.
Then there are those innovative features of
which the Department of Justice seems to want
to deprive us. Take Win98's Active Desktop,
which is worse than a nuisance. Click on an
icon and the next thing you know, your modem
is dialing someone. That's great if you have a
dedicated T1 line, but a real pain if you have
a 28K modem. Then there's the new "subscriber"
service: Forget to turn your computer off at
night, and at 4am, it will dial up Redmond and
using their new Remote Administration service,
scan your DLLs and replace them at Microsoft's
discretion. Good luck trying to keep Netscape
Navigator running under that scenario. Plus,
how do we know what information is being
passed back and forth? And with all the Java
code being bounced around, you had better have
at least a 56K modem. It's obvious Microsoft's
programmers have T1 Internet connections to
their Fast Ethernet networks. Doesn't
everyone?
Install Win98, and the first thing you see
after rebooting is the Channels Bar, with
Warner Bros. and Disney logos filling half the
screen. How much dough did Microsoft get for
that sort of advertising? It's as if every
time I started my car, the radio played a
Shell Oil commercial first.
Using Internet Explorer 4, clicking the search
button routes everything through the Microsoft
server first. Talk about demographic manna
from heaven! Microsoft will know everything we
do, and everywhere we go on the Internet.
And then there's WinTrust: Microsoft is laying
the groundwork so that all electronic
transactions will go through Redmond. This may
be the real reason Microsoft is pushing IE4
onto the OEMs so hard.
Cybercash, online transactions, Internet
advertising. The browser is simply the front
door to these innovative services/profit
centers. The only way to make sure everyone
will see those centers is to make sure
everyone uses Microsoft's browser. Netscape
has no interest in enabling WinTrust, so
Netscape must die. Microsoft will gladly give
away the browser for free regardless of the
presence of Netscape just to be sure they can
control the online gateway. From a business
standpoint, this is sheer brilliance. But to
some folks it's Big Brother coming from
Washington state instead of DC.
But will Windows 98 run on our current
hardware? Not really. Remember how Windows 95
needed only a 486 and eight megs of RAM? Who
runs Win95 today with anything less than a
Pentium and 16 megs? Windows 98 currently
requires 340 megabytes of disk space and a new
useful minimum 32 megs of RAM, with 48
megabytes required to run as well as Windows
95.
Don't say I didn't warn you.
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