Ubuntu blues

[Eric Dunbar]

> Also, as for this 'Linux is more difficult to exploit' stuff, I don't
> really believe it to be honest. It doesn't really matter anyway since
> the main problem is USER CONSNETED SPYWARE INSTALLS. Please tell me
> how Linux is going to stop this? How can you stop someone installing
> spyware.deb or whatever when they type their password and press OK -
> answer? You can't.

There is one advantage to OSS -- once such spyware starts appearing,
there will be a whole army of programmers ready to tackle the problem
_as soon_ as it appears. With Micro"SoftOnVirusesAndSpamware", its
users are at the mercy of the good graces of anti-spyware writers, or
of the ransomware writers who sell the uninstallers for their own
apps, because it doesn't seem like Microsoft is quick to do something
about the complete gridlock that characterises the Windows internet
computing experience.

(as I noted recently... at www.download.com the top Mac downloads were
for P2P software and in the top 5 there were _non_ piracy-related apps
(i.e. not media players, compression apps (yes, I know they have
important non-infringing uses)), for Windows, the top spots were
(overwhelmingly... an ORDER OF MAGNITUDE greater than P2P) for
anti-ad/spy/spamware software followed by P2P-related apps. No room
for non-P2P-related apps in the top five! Not that Mac users are more
upright computing citizens, they _certainly_ aren't... piracy has
always been a serious problem on Mac because applications were (and
still are) _much_ easier to copy from computer to computer without
having to do installs... no DLLs, no registry entries, no libraries
hidden deep in the *nix hierarchy, etc.)).

Eric.