Nuke Richmond

From: John Tinker <jtinker_at_coin.org>
Date: Fri Jan 12 08:25:41 2001

"W.B.(Wim) Hofman" wrote:

> Folks,
>
> Can you expect to say to a housewife : This is a Linux cd. Install it on
> this computer and I expect you to have looked at these Internet sites by
> tomorrow morning? It would have to be some housewife!! Linux needs far to
> much work still to make it fit for the masses.
>
> Wim

Don't forget the opportunity lost due to M$ predations. Gates didn't invent
software. He pulled the rug out from under a lot of good effort, using
everyone else's work, but trying to protect his own. He poked his finger in
the eye of standards wherever possible. Standard layers will be the foundation
of future system elaboration. The fundamental contradiction Gates had to get
around, was that between "information age" and "proprietory software". It is
the "rising tide lifts all boats" problem. What is the value of wealth, unless
you are richer than the next guy? If everybody is rich, who will pick up the
garbage? When people started passing around copies of his BASIC, Gates
realized the problem, and the solution.

-- John Tinker
Received on Fri Jan 12 2001 - 08:25:41 GMT