Hm. I'm a Little Perturbed…

alternateorg on November 20, 2000

I know that I always rip on the poor saps who have to use ALL Microsoft products for just about everything (MS Windows, MS Word, MS PowerPoint, MS CanOpener, MS ShoeMatcher, etc) but, I just looked at my Application Switcher, and I noticed something that kind of surprised me.

I have exactly 7 applications currently open: 2 of which are MS (Entourage and IE5), 2 of which are Adobe (Photoshop and GoLive), and 2 of which are Independently developed (Napster and Audion). The last one is the Finder, which doesn’t really count, I guess. So a full third of my non-OS apps are MS, and another full third are Adobe. I can’t believe that I rely this heavily on basically 2 software developers. Wow. I’d download Netscape and use it exclusively for both email and browsing, effectively getting rid of my MS product usage.. Oh, wait. I just remembered that relying on pre-beta software is a BAD idea, possibly worse than relying on MS.

Microsoft is full of shit, again.

alternateorg on October 30, 2000

OK, so we all have read about the people who recently hacked Microsoft …. According to this article, Microsoft is saying that the russian hackers that had broken into their servers were known to have been there all along… somehow I dont think they would have left them there with access had they known (unless they are to stupid to get rid of them). Microsoft seems to think people will believe *ANYTHING* they say to the media. I for one, do not believe a fucking word they say, ever, period.


Grrr.

I Choose Not To Choose er… Microsoft.

alternateorg on October 18, 2000

From MSNBC:
From the day the IBM PC was released in 1981, analysts have been predicting Apple’s death. When Microsoft released Windows, and again when they got it to work in version 3.1, analysts predicted Apple’s demise. When it was bleeding red ink in the mid-’90s the obituaries were written.

Nice. Not only is there a light at the end of this relatively small tunnel, there might not even be a tunnel at all.

You Have a Fast Computer. Now You're Fucked.

alternateorg on September 26, 2000

According to this article, if you have a fast computer (ie, 933 Mhz or above), and you run Windows ME or maybe 98, you might experience data loss when shutting down. Apparently, the OS doesn’t have time to save the contents of the cache on the ATA100 large capacity drive before the system shuts off. I wonder if this has something to do with MSWME being the shittiest OS ever made. I dunno, though. What’s worse is that the vendor of the offending machines ‘asks not to be named.’ Great. There’s a company that cares about its customers. And Microsoft insists that it’s a hardware problem, not an OS problem. It seems like no one can take responsibility for their crappy products nowadays:

‘… not specific to any operating system but has to do with larger hard drive caches in combination with fast processors,” says Greg Sullivan, lead product manager of Microsoft Windows Millennium Edition.

Microsoft on Thursday sent patches for both Windows 98 SE and Windows Me to vendors with systems at 933 MHz and higher.

While insisting the problem was not related to any specific OS, Microsoft acknowledges systems running Windows 2000 are not affected because that OS has a different shutdown architecture.’

So.. it’s not an OS problem, but you’re fixing it with an OS patch. Riiiight. If Apple pulled this kind of stunt, they’d be burned at the stake. Microsoft does shit every fucking day.

Supreme Court Disses The DOJ

alternateorg on September 26, 2000

Today, the Supreme Court granted an MS request to have the DOJ vs MS case hit a federal appeals court before appearing in front of the Supreme Court, if at all. What does this mean? You get to deal with Microsoft in its current state for even longer. Yipty-fuckin-do.

Microsoft 'Accidentally' Overcharges?

alternateorg on September 17, 2000

(from WiredNews)
Apparently, some MSN customers credit cards were ‘accidentally’ overcharged from $500 to over $1000.

‘By early afternoon, MSN said it had discovered the source of the problem — a glitch in its new billing system software.

“What happened was, MSN was in the process of testing a new billing system, and somehow an erroneous test script got sent out” to the credit-card-processing company in the wee hours of Friday morning, said Melissa Banks, a spokeswoman for Microsoft. ‘

When Bill Gates was questioned about the erroneous charges, he replied “You don’t think I got this rich by writing checks, do you?”
Those scripts, boy. They’ll bite you in the ass. Do you think it’s a coincidence that the spokeswoman’s name is ‘Melissa’? Heh. All of a sudden, my Earthlink account looks like it was a really good idea.

I Dare You

alternateorg on September 15, 2000

Try to find info on Movie Maker ( the iMovie ripoff included with Windows ME) on Microsoft.com.

Go ahead. Try it. We’ll wait.

So not only are their OSes impossible to use, but so is their website.

Huh?

alternateorg on September 14, 2000

From WiredNews: ‘Microsoft has released Windows Millennium Edition, or Windows ME, the first version of the Windows operating system designed specifically for home users.’

Uhm…. Huh? Do you mean to tell me that Windows 95 and Windows 98 were intended for PROFESSIONAL users?

Now, THIS quote is makes a little more sense: ‘But one outstanding application doesn’t compensate for the system crashes and slow performance exhibited on our test machines.
‘

Also, this one: ‘Windows ME also tested slower than Windows 98. ‘

‘The “Home Networking” wizard helps users set up file, printer, and Internet-based sharing over a peer-to-peer network, a worthy feature but one that has been a basic part of the Macintosh operating system for years.’

That makes sense. Why don’t you put out new software that’s SLOWER and WORSE than the software it’s supposed to replace? Why the hell is Bill Gates so fucking rich? These people should be BEGGING people to buy their software, not mandating it.

Check this out: ‘Some analysts think that ME is correctly targeted at less savvy consumers and does not offer much for experienced computer users.

“Windows ME is clearly aimed at home users. It doesn’t have the sort of cutting-edge benefits and features a sophisticated user would want or need,” said Victor Pagano, an analyst with Andersen Consulting.’

That’s cool. As a home user, I wouldn’t need STABILITY, or anything ADVANCED like that. I’m just an idiot with an internet account and a checkbook. I don’t NEED my computer for anything. I don’t really care that it crashes so much, I just need it for stupid shit in the first place.

OSX Beta To Be Released

alternateorg on September 12, 2000

This article has some interesting things to say on the upcoming release of OSX Public Beta. Nothing too new, however. It just states over and over again how important the success of OSX is for Apple. Remember the iMac? This will be better.

However, the article did say that it has ‘…advanced new technologies that pull it past Microsoft’s new Windows Millennium Edition…’ The implication of course being that the current MacOS is BEHIND Windows Me. Which is ridiculous.

Not Windows For ME

alternateorg on September 6, 2000

Microsoft is finally planning on introducing that steaming pile of dogshit known as ‘Windows Millennium Edition’ that should have been introduced alongside Windows 2000. Among the new features:

Plug and Play support (Wow! That’s awesome! I’ve never heard of THAT!)

Error Recovery System (I bet that would be a good idea, assuming the error recovery system doesn’t have errors, which it undoubtedly will)

‘…Improved Internet connectivity designed to make connecting Internet appliances such as Web-enabled refrigerators and ovens more efficient.’ (Great! Now my web-enabled toaster can flame my web-enabled oven on its newsgroups. And my web-enabled coffee-maker can browse the web and let me know via an AOL-like popup screen before I make coffee in the morning when Maxwell House is on sale on coffee.amazon.com. I just can’t wait!)

And the best part? The price! It only costs $209 for the full install! I love spending so much on my OS. That stupid MacOS is only $99, with a free version coming out. And the Linux thing I hear so much about is FREE. If it’s so good, then why is it free?