off: here's a small news flash for MS Products Users

[andy baxter]

M. Fioretti wrote:
> On Mon, Jan 21, 2008 12:23:55 PM -0500, Richard (cms0009 at gmail.com) wrote:
>   
>> Well, for those of you whom use Microsoft Products... at work.<sick>
>>
>> this might change you mind....(to push linux even more)
>> http://technology.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/tech_and_web/article3193480.ece
>>     
>
>   
> Using this story to bash Microsoft or push Linux would be a mistake.
>   
I don't agree - I don't run linux /just/ because of disliking MS, but it 
is one reason. People decide to use free software for many different 
reasons, and one of mine is that I don't like that fact that MS use the 
power they have as one of the world's largest technology companies to 
push the direction of technology in directions that I consider harmful 
to society.
> With all respect, the statements above seem a clear example of "if you
> have a hammer, all problems will look like a nail", that is of geeks
> who like Linux and FOSS so much that they see everything which isn't
> done or solved with Linux/FOSS as bad or defective, and may end up
> with _damaging_ FOSS diffusion.
> Sure, a Microsoft project is the subject of the story, but what does
> the real problem in the article has to do with Microsoft, proprietary
> software or software patents themselves, for that matter?
>   
What do you think the 'real problem' is? I think that part of the real 
problem is that we live in a capitalist society where most of the 
important decisions about the future  direction of technology are in 
practice made by people whose lives are shaped by the need of large 
corporations to return profits to their investors, regardless of the 
wider social implications of what they are doing.
> If that software were GPL and ran on Linux, would it be good?
No, but I think that the kind of people who are drawn to working on FOSS 
projects are probably on the whole less likely to think of developing 
technology in this sort of direction.
>  No, of
> course, the problem is if and where there are laws that _allows_
> employee monitoring at that level, never mind how it's done.
>   
The laws allow pretty much any kind of abuse that hasn't been thought of 
yet. This is actually better than the other way round - imagine if we 
could only do what the government had decided was allowed, and 
everything else was forbidden. The problem is that corporations are the 
ones setting the agenda, and government is left running along behind 
trying to patch things up, when they even bother to try.

andy