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Re: worth a read



> If they continue with this trend (remember their DNS address extensions
> to PPP?) the OSS community will always have to play catch-up.

Well, I personally cannot say this extension is Bad Thing (TM), if they
had published info on it (did they?).

> Until recently, the Internet was dominated by free software (Apache) and
> software made by smaller firms (yes, Netscape is small compared to MS).
> That's why Microsoft had to play by the rules and implement open
> protocols and standards. Now, when they practically own the browser
> market, they are moving to proprietary protocols -- they already have
> their own Java extensions, DHTML, etc. 90% of all personal computers
> (and that's probably understatement) already support these extensions.

The frightening part of this thing is not Microsoft being good or bad, it
is the recent flood of "programmers" or "computer specialists" whose motto
is - "I use Microsoft products not because it's good -- for I know it
isn't -- but because I know nothing else and I'm not going to learn".

 From the other end, more and more people, even among PHB's, understand,
that proprietary protocol means hardlinking to a single company. That
means, if you don't like interface or features of some proprietary-made
product, you are toast.

More dangerous thing is API-open protocols. I mean, when protocol is
closed, while API and DLLs (win32-only, surely) are freely available. This
may even look close to Open Software, for people that don't know what the
latter means. And look as Free Software for those 90%+, who still
understand "free" as "zero money". In fact, it's our common luck that
Microsoft has ignored Internet for so long, or HTTP and SMTP where part of
OLE protocol and God knows how Unix and Windows computers could
interoperate or how normal human being could understand how the darn thing
works. 

-- 
frodo@sharat.co.il	\/  There shall be counsels taken
Stanislav Malyshev	/\  Stronger than Morgul-spells
phone +972-2-6245112	/\  		JRRT LotR.
http://sharat.co.il/frodo/	whois:!SM8333