January, 1998

To the editor
MICROSOFT: The giant has rights too

Imagine how your computer would work had the DOJ got involved a few years
back. First, you remove the sticker that covers the on/off button. “Although
this system will run on regular power, you still must install batteries
because otherwise the battery companies would sue us for hurting their
business.” When you try to install a word processor from a CD ROM a message
comes up, “we can not install new programs off of a CD because the floppy
manufactures would sue us for hurting their business.” You slide in floppy 1
of 400 and a message comes up, “you do not have a file manager program
because programmers of file managers would sue us if we included one.” Every
step you take you have to buy this, install that, configure the other just
so you can write a letter to the editor. Even then you will still need to
buy an e-mail program so that you can send it. Of course, that program will
not be from Microsoft — they never got off the ground because the only
thing their operating system was allowed to do was display a message,
“please go buy another company’s operating system.”

It is hard to imagine not being able to access your floppies and CDs because
these are such basic tasks. The Internet is just another place to store
files, and in fact, some of my files are stored there and I would like to be
able to access them without having to buy another program to do so. A
browser is just a file manager — a file manager to the world. The point
being that the Internet has become for many — and will become for most — a
basic task. Just as Microsoft does not prevent you from installing a
different file manager, it does not prevent you from installing a different
browser if that is your choice. The ONLY crime being committed now is trying
to stop Microsoft from building an operating system that, out of the box,
can access the Internet. Microsoft has the right to — and indeed we would
not buy their products if they did not — make an operating system that
works with current technologies.

I for one, like being able to access the world when I first turn on a
computer. Our freedom of choice comes from the fact that we could always use
that access to download other programs — even another browser.

Respectfully,

Matt Carpenter
http://www.skyrunner.com
The Mining Company’s December 1997
Best of the Net for Jogging/Running