Supporting MS, or not

[Chip Richards <chipr@tomquartz.niestu.com>]

On Sun, Jan 25, 1998 at 11:13:44PM -0500, Christopher Pall wrote:

   I think a consumer boycott is always a good method to wake up a company.
   Except that consumers need to do it, which is fairly unlikely to happen in a
   substantial way.  How do you raise an effective boycott against Microsoft?

You do it by ceasing support of Microsoft.  Stop buying their products, stop
developing for their systems, stop telling people about them and talk up
something else instead, start asking vendors for software and hardware for
other systems instead of Windows.  Doesn't matter what--Linux, OS/2,
Rhapsody, it isn't terribly important, as long as it isn't Microsoft.

You do it by doing it, by deciding that *today* you will do it instead of
tomorrow.  You do it one user, one journalist, one vendor, one developer at
a time.  You do it by eliminating things like these from your email:

   Delphi Programmer ...
   X-Mailer: ... (Win95; U)

Chris, ask youself what would happen if you stopped supporting Delphi, if
you stopped using Win95, if you bought your next system from Promox or VA
Research instead of Dell or Gateway, if you stopped funneling money into
Microsoft and the companies that support them.  What would happen if you
stopped today?

Would you die?  Would your quality of life be significantly degraded?  Would
you have less fun?

If the answer to those questions is "no", then what are you waiting for?

If the answer is "yes", then stop and think about what a hold one company
has on you.  One company not particularly known for its compassion.

-- 
Chip