[mdlug] Cracks in the Evil Empire

[M. D. Krauss]

On Wed, 27 Jun 2007 19:09:37 -0400
"Joseph Vartanian" <jvartanian at gmail.com> wrote:

> On 6/27/07, Ingles, Raymond <Raymond.Ingles at compuware.com> wrote:
> >
> > > From: Joseph Vartanian
> >
> > > *  The software firewall is now bi-directional
> > > *  IPSec and domain isolation are now integrated into the firewall
> > > *  IE now runs in Protected mode (sandboxed)
> >
> >  Somewhat better security out of the box, okay. I don't see much
> > that couldn't be done with 3rd-party stuff before, though. All the
> > rest that you mention are really only useful for corporate
> > management. End users won't care about that stuff. Still surprising
> > that it took that long just to get that stuff.
> 
> You're right.  While this stuff is important to IT people, most users
> wouldn't care.  But lets be completely honest here.  End users want to
> be able to browse the web, listen to music, watch videos, type a few
> documents, chat with their 5,000 myspace friends, and do it all with a
> pretty GUI.  Everything else only matters to people like us.

Yes, but in terms of adoption, what matters to corporate management is
what matters to the market.  People are most comfortable using a system
that they already know, and most people learn what they need on the job.

> If you look at it that way then Vista, OSX and various Linux distros
> already have everything they need in an OS.  No matter what anybody
> adds to an OS, it doesn't matter.  So now can somebody name anything
> in Vista that most end users really need that MS didn't already give
> them?  Same goes for Linux...what does Ubuntu lack that end users
> really need?  Nothing.  Good marketing just makes end users just want
> more features that they'll never use.

Hmm... Ubuntu (and others) lacks support for high-end games. Vista and
XP lack real stability and security.  I know someone will say that the
average user doesn't care about stability and security, but they do
when their computer starts crashing.  We really need a jazzier word for
it.  Something like "nocrashocity!"

> And in reality, many companies are reluctant to go with Vista because
> they think it's too different for their employees (training issues).
> What if MS had made even more changes.

Yes, but they will be forced to upgrade eventually.  In this light,
Vista is a great opportunity for GNU/Linux, if the message can get out.
"Tired of being forced in to massive organization-wide upgrades?
Upgrade just one more time, to *whatever-flavor* GNU/Linux, and be
done; or upgrade to Vista -- and then in a few more years do it all
again."

Matthew