Re: SUMMARY _ This List

["Kendall G. Clark" <kclark@computek.net>]

  >     Finally, we have the MS Alternative stories. I do not think the
  >     USGovernment can redeem OS/2 or ought to establish Linux as a
  >     religion. 
  
  Well, as I've rarely met anyone on-line who gets under my skin in precisely
  the same way as Mr. Behrman, I'll limit my comments on his ``know-it-all''
  post to just the GROSS inaccuracies:
  
  No one in the MS alternative set has asked, at least on this list, or
  to my knowledge, the government to step in on their behalf; that's a joke.
  What some of us would like is the government to prevent MS from strong-arming
  companies like Compaq and Dell, so that they could one day possibly consider
  selling me a computer that I could run Linux on, and for which I didn't have
  to pay money for an OS I don't want or need. 
  
  Nobody wants the government to reinvigorate OS/2 or establish Linux as a
  religion. That's stupidly inaccurate and intentionally inflammatory.
  
  >     Finally, as to Discriminatory Conference Pricing, I and many dead
  >     Texans I admire have been "working on the railroad" for generations
  >     now, so I am against charging whatever the traffic will bear,
  >     amusing as I find impecunious geeks and dreadful as some, usually
  >     non-Southern, plaintiff or criminal defense lawyers can be.
  
  Finally, as I am also a native Texan, and the only impecunious geek who said
  anything originally about conference pricing, let me say clearly that I never
  used nor would I ever use the word `discriminatory' to describe that pricing.
  I did say that I for one, as a student, couldn't afford a thousand some odd
  dollars for a two-day conference. The organizers of that conference responded
  to me privately with a fee-waiver, and for that I'm grateful.
  
  I brought the issue up only to point out that there was more at stake in the
  cumulative case against MS than the purely legal aspects---a fact some on this
  list must be hard-pressed to comprehend---and that those other aspects might
  have a snowball's chance of being represented at the conference if the pricing
  weren't so ``corporate''.
  
  Believe me, if I had a spare thousand laying around the house for conference
  registration, I would be glad to spot my own fees. But full-time PhD work has
  a way of draining the discretionary funds...
  
  Best to Behrmann, if for no other reason than that he irritates me enough to
  cause me to post here regularly. One thing I do agree with him about is that I
  do think these issues important enough for healthy debate among adults.
  
  Kendall Clark
  
  --
  Linux is free. Life is good.