I don't know, I think everyone's gone a bit far here...

[Gordon Woodhull <nodrog@ix.netcom.com>]

  If someone's baiting you, it's your responsibility, and the key to your
  credibility, to still respond reasonably.  Flame wars get us nowhere.
  Charles Kelly's "nazi" comment speaks for itself...
  
  Personally, I was hoping that there would be some reasoned discussion on
  this list of 
  1. Why Microsoft is so damn big.  Is it simply because this is a new
  industry which has had no time to mature, or is it the conspiracy, or has
  society approached the "information age" all wrong, or what?
  2. How we hope to escape complete monopoly.  Yeah, Linux is a nice idea,
  and with another decade of work it might have as intuitive a document
  interface as OLE or OpenDoc, but that would probably destroy what is best
  about it.  I think it really is best for techies and not everyone is going
  to be a techie...  
  	Apple may make a comeback, and I will be excited if they do, but I don't
  see why we should be waiting for some other corporation to save us from
  Microsoft.  So,
  3. What is Microsoft's *legitimate* role in the marketplace?  We can assume
  they are not leaving unless something catastrophic happens to them.  It has
  always been a hated, often second-rate software company, but somehow it
  became the most powerful company too.  There must be some place it could go
  where it could actually become a respected member of society.  (And not
  just the sniveling respect for the rich that seems to have cropped up since
  Gates put his book out.)
  
  So that you all know my biases from the start: I am an ActiveX developer, I
  chose to learn this technology about a year and a half ago because I am
  interested in electronic publishing, interactive documents, or whatever you
  want call the new medium that the Mac introduced and Microsoft continued
  (or appropriated, if this kind of technology really can be owned).
  	I'm going to this conference to try to get some answers to the questions
  I've posed above.  I hope it's not going to be just another flame-war, I
  think I already get the idea about why people hate microsoft.  
  	I have also been learning a lot from this list, but 5 flaming messages per
  hour just won't do.  I doubt the list managers are going to kick the
  Microsoft supporters out, or the somewhat less mean-spirited people who've
  replied to them, after all this is about democracy, right?  But please,
  take it offline or something, and let those of us who really want to
  discuss do that..?
  
  Thanks,
  Gordon Woodhull