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                           Issue #1 - Page 5 of 13 
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Microsoft: How bad are they?
----------------------------

Ok guys, here's one of everyone's favorite topic, and everyone's love to hate
company (not oracle or apple), but microsoft.  with the launch of the xbox in
november, and the launch of windows xp in october, microsoft looks to take more
and more of the market.  you might think this article will be another microsoft
bashathon, but this is really in their deffense.  
	
not all monopolies are bad, look at the united states postal service, it's the
biggest monopoly (it's owned by the United States government, so it's ok) but
it's a good monopoly because it's fast, cheap, and efficient.  if microsoft was
let to do what it wanted, we would have network admins with less stress, not to
mention protocols will be the same, and software developers will be able to
write programs for just one platform.

don't get me wrong, i like to use linux, and have accustomed myself to the
ease of use (i wish) and feel of it, but it still has a long way to go if it
wants to be used by everybody.  lets take an os, um, BeOS, no laughing, please.
if BeOS was the most widely used operating system, i would have no problem with
them being a monopoly.

not all monopolies are good, of course.  take AT&T for example, it owned most of
the market, but it got to the point where they could raise their prices where
you would have have to pay $100 a minute just to make an interstate call. they
were broken up into the "baby bells".  the standard oil company had a monopoly
too.  but they were broken up also.

if microsoft were broken up, that wouldn't really do anything because the
companies would not work against each, but work with each other.

i may sound really conservative, but i'm liberal, so liberal that i've been
called a socialist, but i enjoy the capitalist lifestyle.  i'm not saying all
monopolies are good, but there are a few that we need, and microsoft is one of
them.

Prodigal|son
amlouden@home.com