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From: bnelson@netcom.com (Bob Nelson)
Subject: Re: Historic Opportunity facing Free Unix (was Re: The Lai/Baker paper, benchmarks, and the world of free UNIX)
Message-ID: <bnelsonDpqpz3.M1D@netcom.com>
Followup-To: comp.unix.bsd.386bsd.misc,comp.unix.bsd.bsdi.misc,comp.unix.bsd.netbsd.misc,comp.unix.bsd.freebsd.misc,comp.os.linux.advocacy
Organization: a computer running Linux
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References: <4ki055$60l@Radon.Stanford.EDU> <jdd.829261293@cdf.toronto.edu>
Date: Fri, 12 Apr 1996 08:23:26 GMT
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On Thu, 11 Apr 1996 22:21:33 GMT, John DiMarco wrote:
>> Why is it a good thing to turn a nice development operating system into a
>> glorified program loader? Easy: a platform to run applications -- and only
>> this -- is exactly what most users want. If no BSD or LINUX-based operating
>> system exists that does this in a straightforward and simple fashion, such
>> users will go elsewhere, as they have up until now. And where the users go,
>> the application developers follow. Then Gates and Co. will continue to
>> dominate the desktop application computing market with operating system
>> software that many - including myself - consider technically inferior to
>> most of the alternatives, free UNIX-like systems included.
Wouldn't such a plan really only serve to ultimately destroy unix? Is
not one of its primary strengths predicated upon the notion that unix
is indeed not _meant_ to appeal to "most users"? The use of Windows and
other Microsoft platforms by some should be of no concern to the unix
community.
Somewhat allegorically, the recent revisions in an American art form,
Country & Western music, designed to make it more palatable to broader
tastes, have so diluted the product that today's pop-inspired stylings
scarcely resemble the genre in its purest. Let unix not be Garthed! :)
--
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Bob Nelson: Dallas, Texas, U.S.A. - bnelson@netcom.com
Linux for fun, M$ for $$$...and the NFL for what really counts!
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