I'm not posting this under Nerd Culture because microsoft has been the attention of the entire world, more recently within the past few years through the media. Nobody ever used to think about microsoft much. When Windows 3.1 and 95 came out, it was kind of like a revolutionary operating system. As PC sales increased, Bill Gates became one of the 10 richest people on the entire planet. Still, nobody ever mentioned the company much. Microsoft's trouble began we people noticed that other competetitors in the computer market were getting slaughtered without standing a chance. Then it was first accused of predatory marketing by the united states government. They wanted MS not to force the use of their Internet Explorer web browser in their operating systems, and include other alternatives like NetScape Navigator (before it came under the hand of evil AOL becoming NetScape Communicator). Things just began to crumble since then. Microsoft's biggest problems came at the time of the release of their XP products and new XP labeled software (all of their XP products, not just Windows, but MS Office XP, FrontPage XP, etc..... and their software being free downloads like Windows Media Player 7.0, and their DVD decoder) The main issue here was spyware. With their XP retail products, online registration was required to use the product (they did this in order to prevent piracy, tracking down CD-keys). However, the entire operating system is loaded with secret spyware. Any searches you do (even local zone like on your harddrive, known as intranet), all of your web activity, any time you use Windows Media Player - all of the things you were doing, would be sent out to MS. They claimed they did this for marketing - in order to target specific products to the people most interested in them (i.e., if you watched action movies using Windows Media Player, they would send you ads about action movies, not drama or horror movies). What they didn't do, was tell people they were doing this. They did not mention it in their EULA (end user license agreement, when you signed the agreement to use their operating system, they never informed you they would be collecting confidental information from you). As a result, law suits have been filed because people did not give MS permission to obtain information from them. Now, what is going to cause them to go bankrupt? ......... *and the red carpet rolls* In my hotmail inbox, I have begun noticing more and more of this. MS sends you are member services e-mail about once a month. You can't block this mail, though you can delete it immediately. As I've read through these mails, MS has begun applying increasingly heavy pressure for its users to sign up with its deluxe package, meaning you pay for hotmail, in return, they provide you bigger e-mail storage space, and other benefits. They keep saying, we have a policy, if you do not access your e-mail account once every 30 days, it will become inactive - after that you will have to reactivate it. If it hits 60 days, it is gone for good, you'll have to sign back up again - and any mail is lost. So when is it going to happen that they push the limit to start requiring you to check your mail every 15 days, then a few months later, every 7 days? IMO, they are eventually going to mandate pay, and close all free users accounts. This has been the way with almost all free services. I remember Gamespot used to be free; but they weren't making money, so they changed. Yahoo Personals used to be free. Many free web hosting sites changed their policy. I believe gamespy used to be free I believe. Internet sites cannot rely on banner ads and pop-ups alone to generate money - either that or they become greedy. It starts out that way, but eventually changes. I remember how @home Networks and Excite.com went bankrupt, and were bought out by another company. BattleComm and Roger Wilco voice chat services shut down because they weren't making money and didn't want to charge. If MS makes this move with Hotmail, no one on earth is going to buy a single piece of MS software for eternity. There are SO many hotmail users (it is probably the number one free e-mail service on the web), and people except free e-mail. That would be the last straw for MS. Hey hey, I guess we will all switch to Linux or Lindows eh? Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image! Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!
tracking what? uh-oh clarentavious, no more "special files" HEHEHEHE..... although i think if hotmail does everntually work its way down in days.. it will take longer... hasn't it always been 30days? maybe it used to be more.... i sure wish my mouse would get a job.... for all this traveling it does on the internet.. im sure getting tired of paying for it. Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!
I don't really want to get into an argument about microsoft again... but.... You must be joking, Why would everyone stop buying their products. I didn't read it all, it was too long and it is very early here, but perhaps the idea of having to log in every 30 days seams like a very good one to me. That way all of the unused email accounts could be deleted. hang on i just thought of a question... What is sciforums hosted on? if its a windows server perhaps we would have to stop looking at it.
I hate some of the practices that MS uses. I guess my biggest peeve is that of MSN. Once that thing is on your computer it is dang hard to get off. It signs on to its net when you open IE or MS mail and I for one don't want it. (I am constantly signing out when I open e-mail) You are not provided with an uninstall and if you try to close it while in e-mail you get these irritating messages about closing e-mail if you do. Nor do I appreciate the spamming for something I don't want. Further while this thing is operating in the background my internet access is slowed down quite a bit. Something else I don't want. I hate these practices...
sjmarsha your response has no meaning until you have read my post. It is about MS requiring pay for the use of hotmail, and closing out accounts for people who don't want it for free.
Notes on the topic You're kidding, right? Revolutionary how? Win95 was a cool operating system when it was first introduced in the early 1980s. Quite frankly, I figured the XP difficulties and the Hailstorm collapse were well-deserved public embarrassments. Try being an Apple user someday. Do you remember when Bill Gates argued that the Internet Explorer was "part of the OS"? Well, one of the ways he did that was to tell Apple to include it as part of the OS or else it wouldn't ship for Mac. So now, we don't get our IE updates through Microsoft the way you get other software updates from their manufacturer (menu option within application). We get our IE updates as part of the OS updated from Apple. Strange, eh? And then when you stop and think that IE is not part of the operating system, it's kind of sick. I would accept that IE is part of my OS except for the fact that it does not work cooperatively with the OS. I have four separate browsers right now, and one of them is set to the default. No matter; Microsoft programs open IE exclusively, and disregard the settings of the OS, and at every IE update it overrides the settings and makes IE the default browser. This application behavior is most unwelcome, but it's what many of us are used to from Microsoft, a company that could care less if it sells a functional product. My brother, a MS fan and our house administrator keeps telling me to set my computer for file sharing. I got out of his way and let him try. For four hours. You know, he can work Linux and MS really well, and he's not the most technical networker I know, but there is nobody in my personal acquaintance whose LAN at home runs as well. Here's the problem, though: between him, my usual Apple tech, and even a developer at Microsoft, for all the times I'm told this networking problem is fixed, for every Microsoft OS my brother uses for his boxes, his damn server can't see a Macintosh. We've tried it with two separate Macs, and on ... 3 different operating systems of late (98, 2K, XP). I keep hearing from Microsoft fans how good the networking is, but I have yet to see it. Of course, I kept hearing how easy XP was to install, but a basic exchange that came after hearing that was, "Yeah, but you're a paid tech, right?" Yes. "Well, what about the person who isn't?" They should call someone who is. Maybe XP has gotten more friendly since then. But I would ask Windows users to consider what they would think if they went to CNN and their Windows media player could not play a WMV news article because Windows was not allowed to play back a specific range of codecs, and someone was paying the websites to do so? I mean, I'm a QuickTime user, and there are QT feeds that no version of QuickTime on an Apple will run, but which run just fine on the Windows boxes in the house. Think about it: imagine AT&T paying everyone off so that you could only use AT&T-branded telephones. Or stopping at a gas station and finding out that the gasoline is no longer good in your car? We'll have our answers, though, as states force Microsoft to cough up the code. I think everyone will be more than a little freaked out when we all find out everything that MS has been up to. Of course, I don't have a whole lot of faith in society right now, so I wouldn't be surprised if they just shrugged, rolled over, and asked if they could have another one, sir. The day that Gates and Ballmer are in prison, I will celebrate. In the meantime, I think the idiocy of the software market will pose problems for companies like Microsoft. I heard they're sitting on $30 billion in cash, so even the worst disasters won't kill them. But Apple users get to watch this interesting drama play out. Start with mp3's. Someone pointed out the largely-recognized but rarely-stated principle that the mistake of the record companies insofar as music piracy was concerned was putting the music in digital format. At the time, though, few could imagine what we're doing now. But think about how hard it is to guard something digitally. And then think about the kid who waltzed into a store with an iPod and stole MS Office for Mac. Every Apple user knows his reasons: 1) it's too expensive to buy, and 2) it's Microsoft, so what obligation to conscience does he really have? Whether you agree or disagree with the propriety of such a position (I mean, yeah, even I believe it was wrong, but that's not going to stop me from cheering that one) there are signs on the wall. Apple introduced iPhoto for a simple reason. Nobody should have to pay hundreds of dollars for Photoshop when they're not utilizing its full power. It's not like iPhoto or iMovie are tremendously powerful, but in aiming to make the computer the center of a digital lifestyle, Apple knows that they can't ask you to pay an additional $1200 in software to make your computer run. Hence, these small applications that work. So think about it: digital theft, Apple undermining software manufacturers by providing cost-effective options for the user .... Apple users have friends at a group called Omni, who are working to create software that will (hopefully) replace Microsoft on the Apple platform. With the BSD-derived kernel, though, OSX promises much to open-source developers. The days of paying $150 for a browser are over. $40 bucks will get you something that A) is written native to the OS (IE is not), B) is faster, and C) shows signs of fixing its extant problems quickly, which cannot be said of MS. I've had OSX for over a year and MSIE still cannot properly display the Sciforums website. We even got an IE update not too long ago. No help. So what's going to happen is that the day Microsoft falls, there will be a development war that will set the tone of computer use for decades. It will be a free-for-all and a buyer's market, in which thousands upon thousands of developers, freed from the Microsoft chains, will flee the Redmond Refuge and start building good software. Digital media can be stolen; the days of $500 software suites for the average user are almost over. By the way: a question for any Microsoft fans. What's the point of getting a live video stream if you can't watch it? Why, for instance, does Windows Media Player allow you to bury tags that launch the browser over the display? It's really quite stupid if the video playback is interrupted over and over and over again. It wouldn't be so bad if WMP was like QuickTime, where you had more flexible navigation within the video file. But it's not, so the result is that as soon as the player comes up, you see choppy video while a new browser window launches and covers the player window. I don't run into that problem with QT. I don't run into it with Real. Microsoft customers exist for the benefit of the company. It's quite obvious that they don't want to do business with you unless you're ready to open your whole life to commercial examination. Quite obviously, we all ought to be ashamed. We're not good enough consumers, and we make it too hard for companies to make money. After all, it's not like the video stream itself is important; the ability to advertise is more important than providing content or even the requested data. Notes for SJMarsha Ask Porfiry about the servers. In the meantime, check out his other website, X-Life. Logging on every 30 days? Was that a (cough!) Hailstorm issue? Unused email? What if you're on an extended hike through the Himalaya? Toward that end, 90 days seems a little more reasonable, but if I recall, the current problem with Microsoft is that its defenders like to think in silly ideas like the problem being having to log on every 30 days. LIke Yahoo, for instance. I have my browser set to make me log in every time I use it. But that should not mean that I should have to log in every 8 minutes. Funny ... I only have that problem with IE. Neither iCab, OmniWeb, nor Opera have that problem, and they're all betas. Think of it this way: I use a beta browser because Microsoft Internet Explorer is both inadequate for and offensive to my needs. As one associate of mine--a developer--noted of his employer, Microsoft: Microsoft is great if you're a developer. The new OS (XP) is great for developers. Of course, if you look up to the general part of the post, this is also one of the several developers, techs, and otherwise, who admitted that the only reason their XP install went well was because they were paid techs and developers. Commerce ... IT departments ... tech assistants ... developers ... you ever notice who's left out of the Microsoft universe? Consumers. As a consumer, you are taken for granted. Your only job is to give the company money. The rest of it isn't their problem. So it seems to me that between a poor consumer focus, bad software, and innovative ineptitude, people will start looking for ways around Microsoft and, lo and behold, those ways do exists. Microsoft has never cared a whit for consumers; the only value of the consumer is represented with a dollar sign. That's why they've succeeded. And that's also why they'll fail. Remember the old adage that it takes money to make money? The money taken is yours. The money made is theirs. If the product worked, that would be one thing, but Gates and the X-Box team showed with Halo that if there's one thing Microsoft can do, it's ruin a good product. Lower standards: the benefit you reap from your Microsoft dollars. thanx, Tiassa Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!
'I believe gamespy used to be free' /seriously horrified/ you mean it's nto anymore??? but, it's only been a few months since I last used it, i was just about to start again, that sucks!!! /sigh/
Well there might be a free version if it (there has been in the past), but they don't like to advertise it even exists. It is free, but they force you to watch advertisements, and you have limited features (full users who pay have more options). The whole network (Gamespy, which is a part of Fileplanet, and all Planet sites, like planet-half-life.com) is screwed. They have taken over alot of gaming stuff. They only time I had to use Gamespy was with Heroes 3. Because Mplayer, heat.net, and all of the other services don't exist anymore (there is no other free match making service that exist except for won.net, which became affiliated with Flipside). They all closed down because they weren't making money (banner ads don't work! Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image! )
I just skim read your text and can only see your extrpolation of events, in other words YOUR opinion of what someone else is going to do?!? correct me if i am wrong but it would be a horrible world if we all did THAT! All I can see here is a bunch of people who have grabbed hold of the anti-microsoft bandwagon and don't really know what they are talking about.
Don't know what they are talking about? Uh, no; not quite. IMO that would be you I don't like microsoft because their software is a pain in the butt to work with, and I do not like their spying practices, among other things. You have been registered since March of 2002 here on sciforums, and I haven't seen any meaningful posts from you. Would you like to share with us all of the knowledge you have? You have computing and student in your profile, and computer related sayings in your signature, yet I have not seen you post on the Nerd Culture forum, of which I am the moderator BTW. You've had nothing productive to say in this post so far. May I ask you this? What do you think will happen if microsoft mandates pay for hotmail? And why is it in every one of their member services e-mails, they keep pushing more and more for people to buy their deluxe package, and keep tightening the policies (like all messages in the sent items box will be deleted after 30 days regardless of anything, a policy that just took effect this month). If you don't have anything productive to say about the topic, then post on another thread.
You are getting a service from Microsoft? Yes or no? You currently pay through advertising?Yes or no? Microsoft, as the owners of the service wish to change the way you pay for the privalege?Yes or no? Do you, as the user have anybearing at all, or any choice at all in the way you are paying or the way you are going to pay? NO. That would be a matter of opinion and i do not rate yours very highly. The day you do better, you can complain. And one last thing. The day that YOU start up an e-mail service for hundreds of thousands of people, you can decide your own rules. OK?
sjmarsha... Look, what kind of a response was "set up a free email service for millions of users yourself"? It is not the kind of arguments commonly accepted in Sciforums, I don't think. Your arguments have absolutely no substance whatsoever. I must agree with Clar here. I remember when Hotmail used to give out 10 megs for free. Now it's "Pay for 10 megs mailbox". Doesn't that suck. And the monthly emails from MS are indeed irritating. The failure of the US gov to rein in Microsoft is possibly the most embarrassing gov't kowtow to big business since Coolidge. MS must remember that it was once a tiny privately owned company, with overwhelming difficulties in the days Lotus ruled. It has to respect the budding companies. It obviously isn't, considering how it uses Windows as a club to hammer out competition. Look, when I stepped into BEst Buy to pick out Operating Systems all I saw on the stupid shelves were Windows. All over a huindred freakin bucks. Now is that normal? I tell you, not even one of those itty little O/S's made by tiny companies. The whole shelf was covered with Windows XP. It all shows that MS is not using fair marketing practices. The gov't should've split it up into MS Illinois, MS Pennsylvania, MS New York etc. Its failure to do so says a lot. I'll wrap this up with an Asian proverb. It refers to what MS is doing riight now. The frog hath forgotten that it too, was once a tadpole.
A note. Windows XP is even more of a pain in the ass. It assumes that the user is some two bit halfwit barely out of kindergarten. The fact that it hides away all the important stuff, like "My Network Places", "My Computer", "DOS Prompt" etc is really irritating. MS caters to computer illiterates. Such inelegance, too. Perhaps the solution is to educate the American public on the use of Linux...
Ok, fair enough. But I think right now, most of the world is fed up with MS. And I think if they mandate pay for hotmail, that's going to be the last straw.
Probably get my head shot for this but........ perhaps it was designed for americans? You gave us a saying and i think i would like to close my contribution to this thread by saying one of my own. "Don't bad mouth others who do as you would if you were in their situation."
