Re: Supporting MS, or not

[Steve Cohen <stevecoh@mcs.com>]

Chip Richards wrote:

> 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

You replied to Chris, but it may as well have been me.
My answer is "yes."  My life would be degraded in the sense that I'd have a lot
harder time
finding a job.  If I could somehow manage to get around that, I might have more
fun.  But the
only jobs I've been able to land were because I could program for the Windows
platform.
I have applied for jobs on unix platforms - I'd even prefer it, I think - but I
don't have the
experience and my resumes get into the circular file.

Recently, I got to put the GUI and the MFC aside for a little while and work on the
guts of the system my employer sells.  Just dealing with algorithms, logic, down
and dirty C++.  What a
liberating relief it was!  But the point is, I'm not in full control.  You may be,
and if you are, I envy
you.

I think constantly about what a hold one company has on me.  That's why I do what
99.9% of
the population would consider a self-indulgent waste of time - participating in
this discussion,
among other things.  I do it because I want to change these conditions.It isn't a
question of what system I buy.  After all, I buy a system no more often than every
four years.  And except for the "one developer at a time" thing you mention above
it doesn't make a
damn bit of difference in the scheme of things.

You almost sound as if you blame people like Chris and myself for perpetuating
Microsoft's monopoly.  But hey, there's a lot of us in this boat, and you're not
going to get anywhere by alienating
us.

You can use Microsoft OS's and even Microsoft tools on a daily basis and still be
committed to ending their monopoly.  I know I am.