Polemic®

A professor at my college came into the technology committee meeting (of which I was the student rep) and harangued us for not eliminating Windows-based systems from campus in favor of Macintoshes.  This was in 1996 or 97.  This professor was a self-styled anarchist and hated corporations and did not want us to support Microsoft anymore. 

I timidly point out that Apple was a for-profit corporation too, wasn’t it?  My insolence at making such a suggestion was returned by a condescending and unprofessional tirade.  Apparently, he realized my point later on when he became a big Linux advocate. But at that time, Linux just wasn’t ready for anything, especially writing papers and doing school work.  Heck, at the time, the Mac could barely do that–most people were still using PINE for email on campus and exchanging file formats was a bitch.

I would have gone on to make that point if I hadn’t been dismissed by the guy as a corporate sell out consumerist douche that I did understand that Microsoft was engaging in monopolistic tactics and that I did not approve of that, but didn’t see a realistic alternative.

(Realistic was a word that essentially made you a fascist at Pitzer College, though.)

But at that time, Macs were going nowhere and their higher price did not justify their slightly better user interface, nor did that interface make up for the lack of support that existed.  Up until about 1995, I used Macs and preferred them for everything except gaming.  Starting again in 2002, I resumed using Macs and have ever since. 

The reason is, during those time frames they were better.  During the middle frame they were not.

I say that to say this: Microsoft makes some really good products.  They also make so really shitty ones.  For example, as much as I hate Sun’s Java, I don’t think making up your own version, and then when that gets eliminated replacing it with the .NET framework that is limited to Windows machines makes any sense.

It may not work as well, but I can write Cocoa applications that work on Linux and Windows—there’s no legal barrier there.  I can’t do that cross-coding for .NET.  The same can be said of ASP or a number of other Windows technologies.

Most recently, they tried to hoodwink that international standards organization into approving their file format that only their software can realistically read.  But it didn’t work and it’s not working because their iron grip on standards is evaporating, partly thanks to Linux, but mostly thanks to Apple.

But I wouldn’t say we should do away with everything Microsoft makes, nor should we replace the now-leading edge Apple as the monopoly.

The history of the personal computer has been a history of competing platforms being eliminated when one hits a critical user mass because the different systems can’t talk to each other.  Now that that is no longer the case, and different systems can communicate with open standards, there’s no legitimate excuse to have platform competition.

Trust me, if Windows 7 is better than Snow Leopard, I’m using it.