Dutch log

Well, ok, so I don’t hate Macs, but this guy does. A funny article for all you Mac haters out there. Personally I’d like to spend some quality time with a Mac learning it inside and out. My mum has a Mac and I liked using that. I bought it for her. But still don’t know enough about them. I don’t like Windows, but I use it every day at home and at work. I write software that only runs on Windows in C#, a Microsoft invented programming language.
I use Linux all the time, mostly on the server but I ran Linux as my primary desktop OS for a long long time. But in the last 12 months my system has pretty much stayed running Windows XP because there are programs I use that don’t run in Linux, eg Visual Studio Express, iTunes, etc. Also, I tend to not want to tinker with my PC so much these days. I just want to read mail, surf the web, and refill my iPod with podcasts each day.
The funny thing is that even though I’m running lots of commercial proprietary software on my PC the only things I’ve had to pay for besides games is Windows. Everything else is either free (as in Beer), or Open Source.
If I was a non-Linux using/aware person and I got a new PC (with Windows bundled in the price) there isn’t much I’d need to buy once I’d connected to the Internet. If I didn’t know about OpenOffice maybe I might mistakenly think I needed to buy Microsoft Office.
Actually when I think about it, Open Office really is exposing a soft underbelly of Microsoft. One of the massive cash cows at MS is the Office application suite. They sell truck loads of it to corporations and small businesses. 90% of which most office workers don’t use. Especially the small/medium business types. Sure some companies use it to ridiculous degrees and have entire document and workflow management systems built around exotic VBA macro nightmares. But heaps of people don’t use a fraction of what Office can do.
If OpenOffice could pull a Firefox and really get its marketing up to scratch they could put a large dent in Microsofts revenue stream. Firefox is attacking a free product in the form of Internet Explorer and winning ground. Surely the Open Source community can have an even larger impact competing with software that costs hundreds of dollars. If there was a “spread OpenOffice” campaigns like Spread FireFox and a snazzy professional “Web 2.0″ looking website like mozilla.com for OpenOffice I’m sure more people would take OpenOffice more seriously.
Ah well, enough ranting.
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