Joe Wilcox, you should be ashamed of yourself.

Several days ago, I left a comment in his inherited Web site just to say that Microsoft hides some of its Vista weakness by secretly patching vulnerabilities. I even provided two links from very reliable source to support this. One of these sources was the Microsoft Blog at ZDNet. With further confirmations that this is true, I see no reason whatsoever why my comment should be removed. This leads to the suspicion that Microsoft Watch has turned from a professional Web site run by Mary Jo Foley into a Microsoft shilling dumpster. Several months ago, the site dropped its Windows server and had it replaced by Red Hat Linux. This is hypocritical, is it not?

It has become obvious (by admission) that many Microsoft employees visit the Web site and even comment without disclosure. I refuse to participate as much as I used to knowing that a site which once served me well has decided to lift and iron first and decide what is valid information and what is an inconvenient truth.

Knowledge is power.

Over a year ago I expressed my concerns about newspapers that wish to know too much about us. I mentioned the New York Times, in particular for its required registration process. These concerns now seem justified.

Barely a year after their reporters won a Pulitzer prize for exposing data mining of ordinary citizens by a government spy agency, New York Times officials had some exciting news for stockholders last week: The Times company plans to do its own data mining of ordinary citizens, in the name of online profits…

“Let’s all just pretend”

More mind control through exclusions of information and expression. China keeps chopping off bits of the Web.

Seems that the web is not only cause of youthful addiction to games, but also can cause people to think in non-socialist and non-communist ways. Clearly bad all around.

• As you probably know, Gates predicted that SPAM will have reached final demise by 2006. The vast majority of it is delivered from compromised Windows PCs and the prediction was made back in 2004. Bill Gates has been publicly whining about SPAM (again, sent from Windows zombies) which he receives himself, even though he has staff to do the filtering for him. It is like a country using nukes against a neighboring nation and then complaining about radiation that drifts across the border. To Gates, never mind the hundreds of millions that suffer from vulnerabilities—those that extract spam from Gates’ own creation.
• Windows is an alternative operating system, which some claim can actually replace Linux. Of course, it is unstable, prone to breakage or hijackers, and it will not run some of your favourite applications. This last statement is especially true when you come to consider its most recent version. I cannot envision Vista regaining any market share for Microsoft. Au contraire: it already drives many people away. Even aggressive lockin attempts lead to backlash nowadays, owing to the openness of the Web.
• Linux can import and export individual windows and treat them in a flexible way, owing to the way X server functions. Windows, on the other hand, is not modular, so remote connections are flawed from the get-go. Linux could (and can) mimic the same approach which is grabbing an entire desktop environment to be redrawn. This instantiates a whole new animal on the server and sips resources though.
• Prebundling remains a major concern as Microsoft now prepares to ‘pull a Netscape’ against VMWare et al. It happens endlessly. For example, by bundling a proprietary formats-biased media player in Windows, not only monoculture is encouraged. Web users who do not use Windows will face more encoded files that cannot be opened. It leads to a danger and circularity trap — a self-sustaining monopoly.
• Microsoft was wise enough to name their operating system in a way that makes them seem like inventors whose work is copied. Just describing this paradigm would involve uttering the word ‘windows’.
• Microsoft pays people to write Windows praises on the Internet. It’s a proven fact. One day everyone will look with contempts at pro-Windows ‘Internet trolls’ that advocated a dinosaur O/S and carry on bashing rivals. I had people fake my identity and do some nasty things under my name. I digitally sign my E-mail messages because of this. Me and my electronic accounts/sites are otherwise sensitive to social engineering. I had a couple of imposters in the past, but it’s more of a nuisance than a compliment. Being described as a transgendered person is no joy and the forgers have stooped pretty low in order to fuel slander. Subtly rude and ambiguous phrases like “artichokes on banana” are sometimes used. It’s just one that crossed my mind some time ago (just replace Arty with a girl’s name, please).

Macs and iPods — different company, same problems

VER the years, my love-hate relationship with Alexa has transformed into a hate-hate relationship. As many people exploit an already-fragile and susceptible-to-abuse system, Alexa traffic ranks usually lie.

I still remember the time when I discovered Alexa ranks. I soon discovered mistakes in their approach. Then, when Microsoft made its predatory deal with A9, Firefox got excluded from Alexa’s figures.

Months afterwards, as Alexa gained attraction and people treated it as though it really gauged traffic reliably, more Webmasters abused it. Vanity led to greed. Alexa began to lie more than ever before. Even Netcraft’s figures, which are not quite as famous as Alexa, have bcome more reasonable over time. Here is a new blog item that says much more on the topic.

If you have a site which is mostly for an audience of Mac users or maybe a site which attracts Linux users or even one which has something to do with open source software, you could have a very low percentage of your audience using Internet Explorer. Mac users really don’t have an IE option at this point and many people just don’t use it because of security risks.

Of course, Alexa only collects data from Internet Explorer. I think this sums it all up rather nicely.

Bill Gates arrested in his younger days (photo in public domain)

ET me make a seemingly spurious statement: Capitalism is about rival vendors competing with one another for the betterment of society (e.g. advancement in science and technology). It is not about monopolies that eliminate any attempt to compete, or simply absorb every threat to hinder advancement. Which leads me to discussing Windows Vista and monoculture…

There’s a certain arrogance in Vista. Yes, there’s a certain vain statement therein: what we implement will become the rule, or the ‘standard’ (de facto or otherwise). If case you have not heard, Hollywood and Microsoft have decided the control the users. This endangers our most basic rights. Never mind the backlash that conflicts with the “if you build it, they will come” field of dreams, which relies on a monopoly.

This whole scenario making of the rules reminds me of people who say “PowerPoint presentation” instead of “presentation” and limit format choice in conferences to just one proprietary (could be patented also) format that’s pricey to use, prone to breakage, insecure, etc. That gives me a compelling-enough reason to never say “use Google” but to suggest “Web search engines” instead. By limiting our choices at will we restrict improvement and punish ourselves in the long term. We naively hand over power to monopolies. And all evil empires begin small and rely on innocence and undeserved trust.

N this age when convenience is perpetually sought, will mankind care about other living species? Are they a priority? Are petty acts which demonstrate care, such as Dell’s latest initiative to plant a tree for every computer sold and encourage/assist disposal, truly helpful? And can this change the big picture? To me, it seems highly doubtful.

People seek the friendly mugs when the limelight turns to them. It’s about perception of those who surround us. Little gestures and niceties do not reverse something that progresses at a much larger scale. Meanwhile, our planet is being destroyed and lives are claimed in the process. Sometimes, this life which required hundreds of thousands years of evolution is never to be restored. It is sad really. Below is a short snippet from the article which stirred and led to this unannounced rant.

Experts estimate there are 15,589 species threatened with extinction. But a species is only accepted to have become extinct if exhaustive surveys in its known habitat range have failed to find any record of the individual.