Windows sucks !!!

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Windows sucks !!!

Postby originaltup » Sun Jul 06, 2003 5:17 pm

ma, eu tot am baiul asta. Cu toate ca tin XP-ul de vreo 2 luni ceea ce e o adevarata performanata pt un sistem de operare sa reziste atat la mine.

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Postby costin » Sun Jul 06, 2003 11:32 pm

Experimental s-a dovedit ca windowsul meu 98, in varsta de un anisor, are o durata medie de functionare de 5 minute, suficient pentru a-mi actualiza antivirusul. In vremurile intunecate, reinstalarea se facea la mai putin de o luna.
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Postby Thrawn » Mon Jul 07, 2003 12:38 am

Boala lunga, treaba asta cu windowsu
Da din cate stiu nici linuxu nu iti convenea
Asa ca ce sa mai zic - in threadul asta alte injuraturi la adresa winului si a lui nea Bill
Timp pierdut mah
Tot il folosesti
Am zis-o si p-asta!!!

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Postby originaltup » Mon Jul 07, 2003 12:44 am

Nope, nu-i timp pierdut. Am si eu unde sa ma descarc :twisted:
Parca vad ca apare si Tapirul prin zona :twisted: :twisted:

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Postby Dan » Mon Jul 07, 2003 12:47 am

Ok mah daca sucks asa de tare ia spuneti voi sincer din cele X ore cat avetzi pc deschis cate ore, notate cu Y folositi windozu asta care sucks?
La costin am vazut cat... :lol:
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Postby originaltup » Mon Jul 07, 2003 1:02 am

Nu e reprezentativ, windowsul e prost la modul absolut, dar relativ la concurenta e pe primul loc.
Sorry Costin, dar Linuxul nu e la nivelul windowsului. Calculatoarele sunt in primul rand destinate oamenilor normali, nu specialistilor, si oricum ai da-o windows-ul inca se foloseste mai usor. Un medic tre sa-si vada de treaba lui in care calcul sa-l ajute nu sa-si piarda zilele invatand intai calculator.
De exemplu, eu (care nu mai sunt incepator in windows), mi-am dat palme instaland un program in Linux si incercand sa introduc shortcut in bara de meniu, ceea ce in windows fac imediat. Am rezolvat atunci cu shortcut pe desktop dar ...

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Postby petry » Mon Jul 07, 2003 1:04 am

Pai ce pot sa zic "uneori" windows chiar sucks, dar in majoritatea timpului e baiat de treaba, cel cu nucleu de NT, in special pentru home use. Cui nu-i place poate sa il inlocuiasca cu orice altceva atata timp cat il tin "curelele" (a se citi hardware, nervi si rabdare), pentru ca are cu ce.

Iar pentru Dan in ultimele 2 saptamani X=336 si Y=7 (aproximativ) :twisted:

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Postby Dan » Mon Jul 07, 2003 1:26 am

Bre Windoaza mea mere impecabil...la mine Y e cam juma din X...
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Postby Thrawn » Mon Jul 07, 2003 1:28 am

Pai ce sa zic :hardware ar fi, rabdare asa si asa,nervi nu prea multi,timp mai deloc
Asa ca ecuatia e foarte simpla in cazul meu X=Y (exceptand mici momente de ratacire prin bios)cu Y=f(winXP)
Am zis-o si p-asta!!!

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Postby originaltup » Mon Jul 07, 2003 9:26 am

originaltup wrote:Astept evident si Linuxul care sa fie cu adevarat concurenta pt windows, adica pe sectorul de home user, dar cred ca mai am de asteptat macar vreo 2 ani
.

pune mana pe un Suse 8.2 , nu e free (vreo 80 $),da merita ....

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Postby cdarau » Mon Jul 07, 2003 11:11 am

originaltup wrote:Nu am pus mana pe un Apple pana acum sa vad ce si cum, ca din auzite pare a fi singura alternativa viabila (la ora actuala).
Astept evident si Linuxul care sa fie cu adevarat concurenta pt windows, adica pe sectorul de home user, dar cred ca mai am de asteptat macar vreo 2 ani.


Eu nici macar nu a trebuit sa resetez PC-ul de 5 luni de cand m-am infratzit cu XP-ul...

Am pus mana pe un Apple acu vreo 2 ani in Frantza...mergeau foarte bine...iar ca design, transparentza totala la monitoare si moushi rotunzi...

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Postby petry » Thu Jul 10, 2003 1:13 pm

Noi probleme de securitate ale Windows-urilor (toate) legate de browsing :twisted:
http://www.microsoft.com/technet/treevi ... 03-023.asp

Iar pentru testarea vulnerabilitatii browser-ului puteti incerca si http://bcheck.scanit.be/bcheck/ (nu include test pentru problema anterior mentionata).

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Postby Dan » Thu Jul 10, 2003 1:48 pm

La mine n-a vazut absolut nimic....si a umplut pagina cu cretinozenii.... :lol: :lol:
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Postby originaltup » Thu Jul 10, 2003 3:07 pm

Nu l-am facut decat cu Opera ca la MyIE n-am reusit sa-i dezactivez blocatul pop-up-urilor dar nu a vazut nimic la testul ala complet.

PS. la mine Opera se identifica ca Opera, nu ca MSIE 6 cum vine ca default

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Postby Dan » Thu Jul 10, 2003 5:01 pm

Testat cu IE 6.0 pe win 2k3....0 warnings of 16...fara firewall...cu ala nu vede ABSOLUT nimic pentru ca nu face scan-ul... :lol: :lol:
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Postby Tyby » Tue Jul 15, 2003 3:38 am

Browser Security Test Results
Dear Customer,

The Browser Security Test is finished. Please find the results below:

High Risk Vulnerabilities 0
Medium Risk Vulnerabilities 0
Low Risk Vulnerabilities 0

New bugs keep coming! Sign up for announcements of new tests.

Questions about the test? Read the FAQ.

Still having questions? Send us your feedback.

Want to know how everyone else is doing on Browser Test? Check our statistics.


IE 6.x, Windows XP Pro SP1+
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May the best from your past be the worst in your future!

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Postby Scorpio » Tue Jul 29, 2003 12:02 am

Browser Security Test Results
Dear Customer,

The Browser Security Test is finished. Please find the results below:

High Risk Vulnerabilities 6
Medium Risk Vulnerabilities 4
Low Risk Vulnerabilities 1

New bugs keep coming! Sign up for announcements of new tests.

Questions about the test? Read the FAQ.

Still having questions? Send us your feedback.

Want to know how everyone else is doing on Browser Test? Check our statistics.

IE 6.x, Windows XP Pro fara service pack! :cry:
Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new!

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Postby Tyby » Tue Jul 29, 2003 1:48 am

asta inseamna oare ca nu ai nici un firewall pus? printre altele ...
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Tyby out!

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Postby originaltup » Wed Aug 13, 2003 10:47 am

http://news.softnews.ro/news/2/2003/August/4240.shtml

Cititi si bagati patch-ul de aici
E pe bune, stiu deja un calculator care l-a luat chiar in prima zi cand a aparut :shock:

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Postby Tyby » Wed Aug 13, 2003 11:03 am

Sorry, acu vazut mesaj ...

info aici:

http://med.pub.ro/forum/viewtopic.php?t=189
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Postby originaltup » Sat Aug 16, 2003 10:07 am

Microsoft kills Net address to foil worm

As part of its effort to stop the progress of the MSBlast worm, Microsoft is killing off the Windowsupdate.com address that the self-propagating program was set to attack.

Because the worm is programmed to attack only that address and not the site that it redirects to, the software giant has decided to eliminate the Windowsupdate.com address. The move is one of a series of efforts that Microsoft has undertaken to try to thwart an attack on its servers that was expected to be launched by infected computers starting Friday. "One strategy for cushioning the blow was to extinguish the Windowsupdate.com" site, said Microsoft spokesman Sean Sundwall. "We have no plans to ever restore that to be an active site."

On Thursday, Microsoft changed the Internet addresses that correspond to the Windowsupdate.com entry in the domain name service servers that act as the Internet's address book. One source familiar with the change said that the new addresses are no longer on the same network as Microsoft's other servers, thereby insulating the company's servers from any attack aimed at Windowsupdate.com. Sundwall stressed that the Windows Update service remains up and running, noting that the service never connected to Windowsupdate.com. Access to Windows Update is built into the latest versions of Microsoft's Windows client and server operating systems.

To get the latest patches, consumers can type in windowsupdate.microsoft.com or, as Microsoft would prefer, go to the main Microsoft.com page, where they can find information on downloading patches as well as on setting up a firewall and installing antivirus software. The worm is programmed to start attacking Windowsupdate.com at 12 a.m. Saturday. As a result, Australia was among the first countries to be affected, with midnight hitting at 7 a.m. PDT.

Full story @ Source

Source : CNet


sursa: http://news.softnews.ro/news/2/2003/August/4288.shtml

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Postby originaltup » Fri Aug 22, 2003 9:56 pm

Am trecut adineauri pe langa BCN si ce vad pe monitoarele alea multe de la ei: familiarul ecran albastru, cu o eroare "disk write eror" :D
Windows is the best :twisted:

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Postby originaltup » Sun Aug 24, 2003 3:14 pm

Microsoft Windows: Insecure by Design

Between the Blaster worm and the Sobig virus, it's been a long two weeks for Windows users. But nobody with a Mac or a Linux PC has had to lose a moment of sleep over these outbreaks -- just like in earlier "malware" epidemics.

This is not a coincidence.

The usual theory has been that Windows gets all the attacks because almost everybody uses it. But millions of people do use Mac OS X and Linux, a sufficiently big market for plenty of legitimate software developers -- so why do the authors of viruses and worms rarely take aim at either system?


Even if that changed, Windows would still be an easier target. In its default setup, Windows XP on the Internet amounts to a car parked in a bad part of town, with the doors unlocked, the key in the ignition and a Post-It note on the dashboard saying, "Please don't steal this."


Not opening strange e-mail attachments helps to keep Windows secure (not to mention it's plain common sense), but it isn't enough.


The vulnerabilities built in: Security starts with closing doors that don't need to be open. On a PC, these doors are called "ports" -- channels to the Internet reserved for specific tasks, such as publishing a Web page.


These ports are what network worms like Blaster crawl in through, exploiting bugs in an operating system to implant themselves. (Viruses can't move on their own and need other mechanisms, such as e-mail or floppy disks, to spread.) It's canonical among security experts that unneeded ports should be closed.


Windows XP Home Edition, however, ships with five ports open, behind which run "services" that serve no purpose except on a computer network.


"Messenger Service," for instance, is designed to listen for alerts sent out by a network's owner, but on a home computer all it does is receive ads broadcast by spammers. The "Remote Procedure Call" feature exploited by Blaster is, to quote a Microsoft advisory, "not intended to be used in hostile environments such as the Internet."


Jeff Jones, Microsoft's senior director for "trustworthy computing," said the company was heeding user requests when XP was designed: "What customers were demanding was network compatibility, application compatibility."


But they weren't asking for easily cracked PCs either. Now, Jones said, Microsoft believes it's better to leave ports shut until users open the ones they need. But any change to this dangerous default configuration will only come in some future update.


In comparison, Mac OS X ships with zero ports open to the Internet.


The firewall that's down: A firewall provides further defense against worms, rejecting dangerous Internet traffic.


Windows XP includes basic firewall software (it doesn't monitor outgoing connections), but it's inactive unless you use its "wizard" software to set up a broadband connection. Turning it on is a five-step task in Microsoft's directions (http://www.microsoft.com/protect) that must be repeated for every Internet connection on a PC.


Mac OS X's firewall isn't enabled by default either, but it's much simpler to enable. Red Hat Linux is better yet: Its firewall is on from the start.


The patches that aren't downloaded: Windows is better than most operating systems at easing the drudgery of staying on top of patches and bug fixes, since it can automatically download them. A PC kept current with Microsoft's security updates would have survived this week unscathed.


But hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of Windows systems still got Blasted, even though the patch to stop this worm was released weeks ago.


Part of this is users' fault. "Critical updates" are called that for a reason, and it's foolish to ignore them. (The same goes for not installing and updating anti-virus software.)

The chance of a patch wrecking Windows is dwarfed by the odds that an unpatched PC will get hit. And for those saying they don't trust Microsoft to fix their systems, I have one question: If you don't trust this company, why did you give it your money?

Microsoft, however, must share blame, too. Windows XP's pop-up invitations to use Windows Update must compete for attention with all of XP's other, less important nags -- get a Passport account, take a tour of XP, hide unused desktop icons, blah, blah, blah.

Microsoft's critical updates also are absent from retail copies of Windows XP, forcing buyers into lengthy Windows Update sessions to get the fixes since last year's Service Pack 1 upgrade. At least the version of XP provided to PC manufacturers is refreshed once a quarter or so -- and Microsoft says it's working to shorten this lag.

The lack of any limit to damage: Windows XP, by default, provides unrestricted, "administrator" access to a computer. This sounds like a good thing but is not, because any program, worms and viruses included, also has unrestricted access.

Yet administrator mode is the only realistic choice: XP Home's "limited account," the only other option, doesn't even let you adjust a PC's clock.

Mac OS X and Linux get this right: Users get broad rights, but critical system tasks require entering a password. If, for instance, a virus wants to install a "backdoor" for further intrusions, you'll have to authorize it. This fail-safe isn't immune to user gullibility and still allows the total loss or theft of your data, but it beats Windows' anything-goes approach.

Because Microsoft blew off security concerns for so long, millions of PCs remain unpatched, ready for the next Windows-transmitted disease. Microsoft needs to do more than order up another round of "Protect Your PC" ads.

Here's a modest proposal: Microsoft should use some of its $49 billion hoard to mail an update CD to anybody who wants one. At $3 a pop (a liberal estimate), it could ship a disc to every human being on Earth -- and still have $30 billion in the bank.

sursa: http://news.softnews.ro/news/2/2003/August/4428.shtml

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Postby sl0bizz » Sun Aug 24, 2003 11:51 pm

Ce ne povesteste un angajat MS cind firma e tinta reprosurilor:

Here's the point of view of one small delusional cog in the Big Evil Machine.
WARNING: If you are extremely allergic to annoying rants, please don't read below!
Yes, you are right that there are lot of small things in MS products that could be better. Yes, there are small things people have been whining for the past five or more years that MS did not get into their products. And when people don't get what they want right away, they usualy complain. Rightfully so, even, I would say.
It is year 2003; the concept of Tablet PC was in the sci-fi movies at least
since 80-s and in sci-fi books at least since the 60-s. Sure Tablet PC can't be innovative. I mean, there are lot of *ix ink enabled tablets out there, aren't there? Or smartphone - it's been in the sci-fi for about the same period; Palm PDAs exist for the last 10 years; cell phones for about the same time. I am sure you can find a lot of "smart" phones out there, that would coexist with all your personal informational infrastructure.
The most important innovation that comes from MS imho is not the new
technologies. Yes, MS Research comes up with a lot of new stuff, but even more new stuff is being bought every year from other companies (along with them).
The true innovation is making everything work together and setting the baseline. MS products are so ubiquitos now, that anything that doesn't have comparable set of features just can't survive the market. But anything that has one more small feature is constantly compared with corresponding MS product and regarded as innovative, unlike the evil giant from Redmond. But nobody cares to even think about the fact that the baseline to which these products are compared is raising each year. And everybody fails to notice all the things just work now with each other.
Here's a day in my life:
After I wake up in the morning, I check my calendar to see if I have meetings soon, so I should hurry to work. I also check my email, of course. In there are couple of invites for new meetings that I accept quickly. I go to work and log on on my machine. My Outlook reminds me I have to do a presentation, so I go to the meeting. On this meeting I use a remote desktop to connect to my desktop computer over the wireless and run my presentation. Meanwhile, I receive a call on my office phone that is automatically routed to my voice mail. Which conveniently enough for me show up in my email. I see it in Outlook; I also notice the person that called me is on IM, so I shoot quick IM message in the presentation break.
When I go back to my office, I remeber I have to go to another building to pick up a book from a friend of mine. I lock my desktop again and go there. Meanwhile the same person that called me before, calls me again and the call is routed automatically to my cell phone. Why is it forwarded to me instead of going straight to my voice mail? Because there is no meeting request in my schedule in Outlook.
Unfortunately, my cell phone sucks ([sigh], I still can't afford good smartphone and have to use one of the free phones carriers offer), so I don't get the call. It lands in my cell phone voice mail, which I check once in a blue moon. But when I come to my friend's office, I use one of his computers to check my email and notice an automatic email that a phone call has been forwarded. I check my cell voice mail - the guy wants me to send my presentation to him and his whole team. Of course, I can't use Outlook, as I am not logged as myself and I don't want to mess up my friend's configuration, so I ose OWA to do that. Since the presentation is quite heavy - about 4 MB (several images and spread sheets embedded in there), I decide to create quickly shared workspace, post the presentation slides there and send an email with the link to all the guys. Meanwhile my fried tells me about this great Indian place he found and when I ask him about the phone, he beams it from his Pocket PC over IR to my phone.
I come back to my office once again just to see an email from a another friend of mine asking if we want to do a small get-together. I never remember this guy's phone, so I open my contacts and click a button. My phone dials him automaticaly. He asks me if we are free tonight and since I don't have a slightest idea about my wife's schedule (who ever does?), I just click another button on my screen and quickly get her on conf call.
It is time for me to leave my office and go home to get ready for the get-together tonight. I drop at home and while waiting for my wife to get there I quickly check the balance of our bank account. Actually, all of our five bank accounts and credit cards. I pay the bills with a few button clicks and I notice that we spent about $50 bucks more than our budget on dining out this month. Meanwhile, my wife comes home from the university and kicks me out of the computer to download from the digital camera the pictures she took with her friend at school. She prints couple of them with a click of a button and sends few others over email to friends of ours in LA. During all this one of my favorite bands - Jarabe de Palo - is streaming to our sound system.
The only fictitious thing in the scenario above is that I never made 4MB of
presentation.
Every single thing above has existed for a while in one or another form. At any time in the last five years one or anothe small or not so small company had have a product that would to one or few of these things. They would be regarded as innovative and ground breaking. But they wouldn't work with each other. Voice mail wouldn't go to email; IM presence wouldn't be shown in emails; printing digital photos would require converting from one format to another; setting a reminder for a meeting would have to be done by hand, because the invitation for it would be a plain text email; finding free conference room would require walking around the halls or asking the receptionist in the building to check in the spreadsheet; forgotten call forwards would disturb your meetings with a cell phone ringing and creating a shared workspace over web would require writing HTML and Perl scripts.
So, next time you start complaining about the multi-instant of crappy volume control on the systray, please remember all the small things that you take for granted and that work quietly around you to make your life such hell because you can't move the buttons from the taskbar to the systray. Yes, I'd love to that as well, but I would prefer if I could dictate my emails in Word, despite the fact that I barely speak English. I would also like a clock that has multiple timezones and better alarms, but I would prefer if I could search all my digital photos for particular person by just typing their name. Customizable favorite folders in Open/Save file dialogs would be great, but even greater would be if I could help my mother few time zones and about 16000 miles away with her stupid accounting software. Wait, I am doing this, courtesy of Remote Desktop.
Darn you Microsoft! When are you going to get these customizable favorite
folders in the Open/Save file dialogs?
Franci

sursa: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/win_tech_ ... sage/21608
(Nu stiu daca se poate accesa de catre nemembri)

Si punctul meu de vedere personal:
Microsoft e o deziluzie precum Matrix 2, adica puteti sa faceti ce vreti, ei vor face ce vor. Sint o companie privata si nimeni nu e obligat sa le foloseasca produsele.
Daca va asteptati la mai mult si sinteti deziluzionati, trebuia sa nu cumparati biletul, ci sa intrebati prietenii daca filmul e bun si apoi sa alegeti sa nu va duceti.
Iar in domeniul desktopurilor sint No. 1, deci fac ce vor si stiu ce fac.

Sursa nu e softnewsdotro, ci Washington Post; daca ar fi fost "nativa" de la softnews, ar fi avut o valoare "inestimabila".
Daca va prisosesc sau va trebuie obiecte, incercati Freecycle Bucuresti. Daca nu va trebuie nimic, ma supar.

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Postby costin » Sun Aug 31, 2003 4:34 pm

Micro$~1 vrea bani pe messenger.

The MSN Messenger ban of outside clients and cited security issues might be explained by yet another Microsoft move. The company's Internet unit, MSN, contacted third-party providers like Trillian and Odigo with a suggestion to buy access licenses. From the ZDNet article: 'Running an (IM) network is expensive,' said Lisa Gurry, group product manager for MSN at Microsoft. 'We can't sustain multiple other people's businesses, particularly if they charge for certain versions of their software. We're introducing licensing processes for third parties like Trillian.'
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Postby originaltup » Sun Aug 31, 2003 11:49 pm

Stupid Microsoft Tricks

I had no idea when I wrote in last week's column about the lawsuit between Burst.com and Microsoft that there would be a public hearing on the case this week in Federal Court in Baltimore. Evidently, nobody else knew it, either, because there is no mention of the event on Google News or anywhere else I looked. This must be a relief to Microsoft, or was until you started reading this column about 20 seconds ago. You see, Microsoft did not come through the hearing very well as whole new levels of anti-competitive behavior were claimed by Burst AND ACKNOWLEDGED BY MICROSOFT -- levels that will likely haunt Redmond in many legal cases to come.

This was, to my knowledge, the first public hearing in the case. Anyone off the street could walk into the courtroom and watch the fun. That also means everything that took place in the hearing is now a part of public record and will remain so no matter what happens with the rest of the case. To even allow this hearing to take place appears to have been a terrible blunder on Microsoft's part. Or maybe it was just one in a long line of calculated risks. From the outside looking in, the risk appears to have not been worth it, but only Microsoft can know for sure.

To recap the overall case for the third time (you'll find two previous columns under the "I Like It!" button on this page), Burst claims that Microsoft negotiated in bad faith for over a year, then stole Burst's patented technology for increasing the efficiency of video and audio streaming. "Bursting" is protected by a total of 37 U.S. and foreign patents. A jury will decide later this year whether or not Microsoft is infringing Burst's patents and whether Redmond actively stole Burst's technology despite having a nondisclosure agreement in place. This all has yet to be proved.

What doesn't have to be proved is what was stipulated in this week's hearing. The hearing came about because Burst felt Microsoft was not divulging all the documents it was supposed to as part of the discovery phase of the case. Discovery is where each side asks the other for pertinent information and documents important to its case. Among other things, Burst asked for copies of all Microsoft e-mail messages concerning Burst during and shortly after the time when the companies were trying to negotiate a license for Microsoft to use Burst's intellectual property.

Microsoft handed over the e-mail messages on a disk, and when Burst's lawyers had printed all the messages they filled 140 boxes. That's a lot of messages, but not surprising for Microsoft, where the business culture of the company literally happens on e-mail.

When Burst's lawyers put the messages in order by date and time, they claim to have noticed a peculiar phenomenon. There were literally no messages from approximately one week before until about a month after all seven meetings between the two companies. This meant that either Microsoft completely suspended its corporate e-mail culture for an aggregate period of 35 weeks, or there were messages that had been sent and received at Microsoft, but not divulged to Burst.

Presented with this charge in court, Microsoft's attorneys acknowledged that the message gaps existed. The messages had been erased by the half-dozen Microsoft employees involved, both from their PCs and from the mail servers. There were no backup copies. The reason for this mass erasure, it was explained, is that Burst technology was unimpressive and not of interest to Microsoft, and the e-mails were simply not worth keeping.

As a longtime Microsoft watcher, I have to jump in at this point and wonder why, if the technology was of no interest, Microsoft took seven meetings over two years to decide this? The en masse nature of this erasure is also interesting because every involved Microsoft employee choosing to erase exactly the same messages over seven perfectly identical time periods seems hardly coincidental. Why didn't they erase all messages relating to Burst, not just the 35 weeks? And it would be interesting to know if messages concerning every little company that negotiated unsuccessfully with Microsoft were also erased on such a schedule. There must be dozens or hundreds of such companies. That would be an interesting thing to know.

It is too bad there were no backup copies of the erased messages. One would think a company like Microsoft would be more careful. Then one of the Burst lawyers pointed out testimony from a hearing in the Sun v. Microsoft antitrust case where Microsoft representatives said all e-mails were backed-up on more than 100,000 tapes that are held off-site. Surely the lawyers representing Microsoft weren't aware of this because if they had been, they wouldn't have said there was no back-up.

So the judge ordered Microsoft to produce the missing messages. The employee PCs, the servers, and the off-site backup tapes have to be searched and soon. The Microsoft lawyers complained that would be like finding a needle in a haystack. The judge reminded them that it was they who had put that needle in the hay.

And that, pretty much, was the hearing. It never got around to the other Burst complaint about discovery, that Microsoft was withholding some messages as privileged attorney-client communications simply because a Microsoft lawyer was cc'd on the message. This latter technique was invented by the tobacco industry long before there even was e-mail. Back in the 1950s and 1960s, they would make sure a company lawyer was present at every important meeting simply to keep out of court anything said at the meeting. I have to wonder how many smokers needlessly died because of that technique.

What happens next with Microsoft and Burst is interesting. In a few weeks, Microsoft will either find the messages or not. If they do find the messages and produce them, whatever is in those messages becomes part of the case. If they don't find the messages and the case goes to trial, the judge will tell the jury that Microsoft deliberately withheld and destroyed evidence. Juries are generally unimpressed by such behavior.

Those are the facts of the hearing. Now I have to wonder what the heck is going on here? What could have been in those messages that was so bad for Microsoft that half a dozen people coordinated a mass erasure of 35 weeks worth of e-mail? And why would Microsoft even take such a risk?

Well, I don't know what was in those e-mails, though I'd be inclined to guess it was something along the lines of "Let's steal this cool stuff from Burst." But I do have a fairly good idea why Microsoft took the risk. It was a calculated risk. Burst.com was a little company about to run out of money at a time when dot coms were folding by the hundreds, their patents sinking from sight. If Microsoft bought a license from Burst, it would be propping-up the company and helping Burst to survive. But it wasn't in Microsoft's interest for Burst to survive because Burst's technology was cross-platform. If Burstware had run only on Windows, Microsoft might have felt inclined to buy a license. But Burstware also ran on Solaris and Linux, and that threatened to weaken Microsoft's plans to have Windows dominate digital entertainment delivery. It made more sense to let Burst die and then duplicate the technology based on what had been gained in those seven meetings and from materials acquired from Burst under a non-disclosure agreement. At least that's the way it looks to me, I could be wrong.

The only problem for Microsoft was Burst did not die. The company shrank to two employees, raised enough money to continue operating for two to three years, then found lawyers willing to take the case on contingency in exchange for a healthy chunk of any damage award. The lawyers are assuming all the financial risk, but they also have a chance to earn a payday worth hundreds of millions of dollars.

"Why would a company like Microsoft do this?" asked Richard Lang, who is Burst's CEO and half the company workforce. "We were a little company. Microsoft could have had our technology for almost nothing, but instead they stole it. We called them on it, and they could have settled at any time, but they didn't. They stuck their heels in and won't give an inch even now. The only way I can make sense of this behavior is that they need to win no matter what the cost."

Richard hasn't been watching Microsoft as long as I have. There are a couple factors interacting here. It isn't that Microsoft needs so much to win, but that they are desperate not to lose. The company functions in part by encouraging paranoia. "Sure things look good now, but that could change in an instant." That was Microsoft's primary defense in its case with the Department of Justice -- not that it didn't have an effective monopoly, but that it had what it thought was a fragile monopoly. That's why Microsoft needs a war chest of nearly $50 billion because that instant could come and the cash would be needed.

Promulgated by Bill Gates ever since he read John Walker's essay "The Last Days of Autodesk," this fear has been very effective as a company motivator, but in the process it has turned Microsoft into a monster. That's where the second factor comes into play. It's that e-mail culture. Bill and Steve lead primarily by edict. Most Microsoft employees never see them, many will never meet them. So the kids are trying to follow a standard that is set by the tone of e-mails. But e-mail is not reality. E-mail is a world of distorted values where it is easy to go too far, and easier still to read things wrong and go even further.

I doubt that Bill Gates told anyone to destroy Burst.com, but I KNOW Bill Gates told the people of Microsoft that the company's future lay in digital media and that cross-platform products were, by their very nature, a threat to Windows hegemony. It is only a short step then to erasing e-mails because doing anything less would be helping to kill Microsoft, not Burst. It's them or us, right?

Not really.

http://www.pbs.org/cringely/pulpit/pulpit20030828.html

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Postby sl0bizz » Mon Sep 01, 2003 1:40 am

1.de la CNet
http://news.com.com/2100-1025-1026595.html

With little fanfare, a federal judge has issued a critical ruling supporting a patent lawsuit against Microsoft brought by InterTrust, a digital rights management company.
In a crucial preliminary hearing aimed essentially at setting the ground rules for the trial itself, Judge Saundra Brown Armstrong ruled strongly in favor of InterTrust Technologies. The company is suing Microsoft on 144 counts of patent infringement, contending that Microsoft products ranging from the Windows operating system to the Xbox game system violate its digital rights management patents.
No decision has been made on whether Microsoft actually has infringed on InterTrust's patents. But the so-called Markman hearing was a critical stage, at which definitions of terms and the scope of the patents were decided. Patent attorneys say a decision in favor of a patent holder greatly improves a lawsuit's ultimate chance of success. Armstrong's ruling was issued on July 3.
Digital rights management technology, more commonly known as "anti-piracy technology," is meant to protect content such as songs and videos from being illegally copied. Microsoft has moved aggressively to dominate the emerging field. InterTrust contends that in doing so, Microsoft infringed on its patents.
In the interim, a joint venture owned by Sony and Philips Electronics bought the struggling InterTrust, which is now focused on licensing its intellectual property.

2. tot de acolo
http://news.com.com/2100-1012-5062409.html

A federal court in Chicago has ruled that Microsoft must pay $521 million to a Web technology company and the University of California after finding that the software giant's Internet Explorer infringed on their patents.
The company, called Eolas Technologies, originally filed suit against Microsoft in 1999, alleging that the Redmond, Wash., giant infringed on its patents when enabling Internet Explorer to use plug-ins and applets in the software. The company's technology was first outlined in a patent application in the early 1990s.
Martin Lueck, an attorney with Robins Kaplan Miller & Ciresi who represented Eolas, said the jury likely was swayed by internal documents from Microsoft. The specific patent from Eolas was not mentioned in the documents, but Microsoft executives had described the necessity for technology that conformed to the outlines of the patent.
"Microsoft executives talked about the need to have a browser that would serve as an application delivery platform," Lueck said.
The University of California will receive 25 percent of the proceeds from the verdict, while Eolas will obtain the rest, minus legal fees and costs, Lueck said. The university owns the patents for the technology, which it licensed to Eolas in 1994. Eolas has one formal employee, Mike Doyle, who is a former University of California researcher.

Si ne mai miram noi de ce stringe bani Microsoft...Ca sa plateasca pretioasa proprietate intelectuala pe care ei o respecta!
Daca va prisosesc sau va trebuie obiecte, incercati Freecycle Bucuresti. Daca nu va trebuie nimic, ma supar.

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Postby Tyby » Mon Sep 01, 2003 2:25 am

FRANAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!

Voi atzi luat-o rara? De unu' shtiam de mai demult, dar ceilaltzi?! Ce, va e greu sa datzi link-ul in post shi sa facetzi un scurt rezumat in romana?!

E forum de DISCUTZII, nu http://www._whatever_CNN.com ...

THREAD CLOSED!
formerly known as gaurika ...



May the best from your past be the worst in your future!



Tyby out!


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