What is Digg?231 Comments
- Redsblog, on 01/19/2009, -7/+88Why are people surprised Microsoft wants to discredit Linux?
They are in this business to make money... - meekrob, on 01/19/2009, -0/+57I remember getting emails from this "Get the Facts" campaign, they were pretty outrageous. As a Systems Admin for a large MS reseller I remember some pressure to replace our Linux firewalls and mail servers with Microsoft products. They were even willing to buy the first round of licensing. They came off as panicky and willing to do anything to "win".
- greener, on 01/19/2009, -3/+57I think Gandhi would have used Linux "First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win."
- inactive, on 01/19/2009, -22/+71The fact is: Linux is getting more user-friendly with each release while Windows is moving in the opposite direction.
- vulcanius, on 01/19/2009, -5/+42What kind of dumbass starts a business to make money?
- onefix, on 01/19/2009, -7/+36I just see repackaging of the same old stuff.
* TCO - They still tell you "our software may cost more, but you'll get your admins cheaper". And give pretty little graphs with no comparison of Windows vs Linux downtime.
* Reliability - They redefine reliability as "ease of use".
* Security - They use a few comments about security, and then proceed to use they used the same flawed logic as used before. Red Hat for instance contains at least 2 browsers (Firefox & Konqueror), 2 office suites (OpenOffice & KOffice), a photo editor (GIMP), various shells (bash, ksh, csh, zsh), many compilers/languages (GCC, Python, Perl, PHP, etc), multiple servers (dovecot, postfix, apache, openldap, ssh, etc) and WIndows is well, Windows. Because Windows doesn't include nearly as much software, all of the vulnerabilities in Windows tend to be nasty OS level bugs.
* Interoperability - They also have the nerve to mention interoperability...but you know something...Linux and Mac OS X get along just fine, it's always Linux and Windows or Mac and Windows that have the problem...mainly because Microsoft keeps trying to change the standards.
Everything else just seems to be a "Linux is hard" argument. They may have repackaged the old FUD, but it's still the old FUD. - oxdeltaxo, on 01/19/2009, -2/+27No its obvious what MS wants, is it so hard to believe that MS would do this for money?
If you were in charge you'd want to protect your market share too. - hugolp, on 01/19/2009, -3/+28Yes, but its good to remind to the people that MS is lying and buying lies to discredit linux, so people are aware that they should not believe all they read about linux.
- grungegbunny, on 01/19/2009, -8/+31Be afraid. Be very afraid.
- Phocion55, on 01/19/2009, -0/+21You're thinking desktops. "Get the Facts" was geared more toward enterprise/servers.
You don't run a multi-million dollar "Get the Facts" campaign for the hell of it..... - dbzssj44676, on 01/19/2009, -4/+25MS no longer has a monopoly on PC OS's, perhaps its time to end the price gouging.
- Phocion55, on 01/19/2009, -5/+25Oops...you must have taken a wrong turn on the Internet then, since this is the LINUX section.
Need some directions? Start here: http://www.oprah.com and then hang a right at http://www.sesamestreet.org/home - jbmcb, on 01/19/2009, -4/+22OSX is superior at some things
Linux is superior at some things
Windows is superior at some things
zOS is superior at some things
(Free)(Open)(Net)BSD is superior at some things
Solaris is superior at some things
The world isn't black and white. - klitzbtc, on 01/19/2009, -2/+20The real fact is, that as you (and most of us) grew up, we weren't satisfied with the lame user experience that is most if not all of the Windows operating systems. We grew out of just using the desktop as a gaming machine and required security and stability, and found solace in Linux.
The major desktop interfaces (KDE/gnome/MS) are incredibly easy to use, and I would never say that Windows Vista is dramatically less user-friendly than XP or 2000. I personally think Vista has a great design, and a relatively user-friendly desktop, the problem is the core workings of the operating system. I also personally think, that on a fundamental level, the core components of the OS are flawed and on a grand scale it's a horrible piece of software, but that has nothing to do with user-friendly...ness...ish.
If MS took some time to rework the kernel and overall design and structure of the OS then they could have an amazing OS on their hands, but they'll continue to keep stacking ***** on top of *****, and ergo release more *****.
EDIT: First suggestion I'd make is to MS is separating the larger components of the OS instead of integrating them into one huge nightmare: Desktop, Hardware Interface, Kernel, blah blah blah... making them modular rather than bloated. Then they don't need to release 15 different versions, simply offer different modules to be installed for software customization. - mooninite, on 01/19/2009, -0/+17Actually I believe we are in the beginning of the "they fight you" stage. Microsoft has quietly entered this stage when they financially backed SCO into the dozen patent lawsuits against Linux companies (IBM, Novell, etc).
- inactive, on 01/19/2009, -2/+19You care enough to post and bury.
- Myztry, on 01/19/2009, -0/+17I you can't dazzle them with brilliance - baffle them with *****.
- Phocion55, on 01/19/2009, -1/+18Right. Normally when I come across something on the front page that doesn't interest me, I scroll by it.
But hey that's just me. - HyperJack, on 01/19/2009, -0/+16Good job you don't have to pay for this:
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/for - inactive, on 01/19/2009, -0/+16You can pay Canonical for support if you wish to, you will get far better support for your money than what you get for your microsoft dollar.
- Aadain, on 01/19/2009, -3/+19Well, they had two choices in competing with Linux: build a better product that is better than Linux in all ways, or lie about Linux and make it appear to be worse than their current product. They chose to lie. We can certainly chide them for that choice.
- Beatmiser, on 01/19/2009, -3/+18Ahh Digg, where reality and fact driven argument gets buried in favor of anecdotal evidence and personal preference.
- twiztidsinz, on 01/19/2009, -1/+16Have to pay four what?
Four dollars?
Four head of cattle? - Dustin00, on 01/19/2009, -0/+15CNet -- aren't these the guys that brought us the review "facts" on Kane & Lynch?
- cesclaveria, on 01/19/2009, -0/+14this campaign was aimed at servers, not desktops.
- Zaeboes, on 01/19/2009, -1/+14Your biggest problem was that you were tied down to a certain piece of software (Guitar Pro) while you were thinking of switching. If windows did what you needed it to do with a specific program that doesn't have an official linux version, why would you think switching was a good choice?
- yurimxpxman, on 01/19/2009, -1/+13<sarcasm>Yeah, cause programs like ktorrent don't work, since they come pre-installed with your OS.</sarcasm>
- smotpoker, on 01/19/2009, -2/+14The surprise isn't in the desire, it is (for many people) in the dishonesty (fraud, bribes, conspiracy, etc)
- cawpin, on 01/19/2009, -0/+12I can't think of one version of Linux that I have to pay for. All of the enterprise distros have free versions as well.
- cesclaveria, on 01/19/2009, -0/+11"I'm sorry if I offend you by saying that" no you are not and do not worry about us, we are not so touchy.
And I think many vendors are catching up to the cloud computing craze you are talking about, many of the new netbooks seem geared towards that and many of them come with some kind of linux. - chrisbeh1, on 01/19/2009, -8/+18Have you seen Mac's prices?
Business 101: make money. - 3leggedHorse, on 01/19/2009, -2/+12The biggest tool MS has against Linux is that it's free.
You tell most people they can have a free OS, and their answer will be whats the catch.
Most people believe nothing in life is free.
I use Ubuntu, and that thought crosses my mind still. - HawgFrog, on 01/19/2009, -4/+14OSX is unix based. If you go to their terminal most of the commands you are used to using with linux are available. Apple is much more linux friendly than MS.
- Terasiel, on 01/19/2009, -1/+11The reason I prefer Linux servers right off the bat is that sick little business plan Microsoft has going where they want businesses to pay them "licensing fees" for nearly every single network entity within their intranet, despite the fact they almost always have their own internal IT department that is responsible for keeping the networks running.
Paying for the right to use something you bought with the equipment your already own is a special kind of stupid. - pilobilus, on 01/19/2009, -0/+9The problem is, we all have to live with Microsoft's engineering failures, because we all use the public Internet. And guess what, these failures appear to be present by design, not by accident. It appears that rather than working in good faith to reduce or eliminate security problems, Microsoft "manages" them to produce the highest rate of system failure - and replacement sales - that can be maintained without literally driving home users en masse to pay the extra for Mac.
Stop the Outlook worms (commonly called e-mail viruses) and those 40 million or so botnet zombies - arising from problems Microsoft could have repaired years ago if they wanted to - and folks like me will stop working to inform the public about their evident malfeasance - er, I mean, discredit all their hard work. - BeatPunchbeef, on 01/19/2009, -1/+10Because, closed-source programs in general stifle innovation. It hurts you and me.
Linux distros may net be the most user friendly OSs but the amount of progress in the last three years has been amazing. That is because anybody can jump in and make it better.
Dislike something in Windows? Hack it or suck it up. Dislike something in Linux? Write something better and let everybody use it and tweak it to perfection, it may even become part of the next distro release.
Sounds pretty good, eh? - cesclaveria, on 01/19/2009, -6/+15anecdotal experiencie, a far recurring experiencie by many new users.
The Linux distributions like (K)Ubuntu, Fedora, Mepis, etc are getting easier to use and prettier every 6 months and soon the only thing Windows is going to have going for it is the fact that everyone is used to it. - bassophonic, on 01/19/2009, -4/+12my next door neighbor Klaus uses linux to code financial software. stephen hawking uses macOS (look at recent pics). my idiot boss uses windows.
that says it all for me. - MonkeyFarts, on 01/19/2009, -0/+8twiztidsinz:
Oops... you must not realize there's an SETTING in the OPTIONS to stop showing ANY LINUX/UNIX TOPICS from showing on the FRONT PAGE.
Dur! - sauron256, on 01/19/2009, -3/+11Wait - how long ago was the Get the Facts campaign?
- onefix, on 01/19/2009, -4/+12It's easier and faster for me to deploy a new Linux server than it is for our Windows guy to deploy a new Windows server.
As far as day-to-day admin tasks, all of my stuff is command line driven, so I can make one long command and he has to search in a GUI for most of what he wants.
A lot of this argument is based on the idea that "Linux is hard"...I say if you think that, then you don't belong administering a Linux server. - inactive, on 01/20/2009, -1/+9What century are you living in dude ?
GNU/Linux is no longer the geeky CLI-based OS it was in the early-90's. It's a full blown fault-tolerant, modular, stable and secure operating system with a choice of desktop managers. The installers of many leading distros (openSUSE, ubuntu, Fedora) are entirely graphical and do an outstanding job in detecting and configuring all hardware. On top of this, one has a choice of good quality FOSS to compliment their OS. It's a win-win situation when choosing Linux.
The only downside is gaming - but real computer users don't use their PCs for gaming, they use a console. - FredFredrickson, on 01/19/2009, -4/+12This stuff happened 5 years ago. Time to move on, I think.
- srg13, on 01/20/2009, -0/+8He meant Microsoft trying to make them switch to windows products by giving them free licenses is the panicky part
- yurimxpxman, on 01/19/2009, -3/+11cesclaveria, correction: "and soon the only thing Windows is going to have going for it is the fact that everyone *used* to use it"
- flashingcurser, on 01/19/2009, -0/+7TCO -- It's funny, in big windows shops the linux/unix guy gets no love, especially not in his paycheck. The whole idea of a linux admin making more than his windows counterparts is laughable.
Reliability -- Are they kidding? I've had a debian mail server up for years without a reboot.
Security -- Great point, the nice thing about linux is that ALL of your programs get updated when you do an update.
Interoperability -- The only reason that linux isn't interoperable is because MS has bastardized the protocols involved-- netbios, dns, kerberos, ldap etc... - EthylAdded, on 01/19/2009, -0/+7They can't rework the kernel, it will break too many things. That's the hazard of being the front-runner for so many years, there's too many hardware/software dependencies now, too many tangled relationships among billions of lines of code both in and outside MS. They also can't afford to throw everything out, like Apple, and just start fresh. And that means MS is fated to be an evolutionary deadend.
But then, that's probably the fate of all companies, sooner or later. MS had their run and it was a good one. - inactive, on 01/19/2009, -2/+9Actually Apple supports lots of open source projects. So make sure you know what you're talking about before you come across as an uninformed fanboy :)
- bluechild, on 01/19/2009, -0/+7There is nothing wrong with paying for software. People need to live. The problem is when it comes to open standards and open source. The first one is much more important to me, the second is good.
- JonForTheWin, on 01/20/2009, -0/+7It is free because your uptime is worth everything.
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