To all those who think Microsoft revolutionized technology
by
, 03-07-2010 at 04:38 PM (2321 Views)
As you probably know by now, I am a Micro$oft hater. I hate their business practices, their loathing for healthy competition, and their software, with the exception of the command line, Minesweeper, and Solitaire. Needless to say, it irks me when people say that Micro$oft was the "pioneer" and we couldn't have done without them. Here are a few debunkings I've done, some of them researched, others kind of obvious:
Myth #1: Microsoft made the first microcomputer operating systems.
Actually, CP/M was a standard and was quite commonly used long before MS-DOS. MS-DOS was actually spawned by an earlier operating system, called QDOS, which Microsoft copied.
Sources:
CP/M - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
MS-DOS - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Myth #2: Microsoft made computers more accessible by providing cheaper PCs.
Microsoft does not make PCs. It is a software company.
Myth #3: Microsoft invented the GUI.
The precursor to the GUI was invented by the Sanford Research Institute, using hyperlinks that could be selected with a pointing device. The idea was later improved upon by Xerox PARC, and debuted in their Xerox Alto as early as 1973. The Amiga 1000, which had a pretty spiffy GUI for its time, was released in 1985, a few months before Windows 1.0.
Sources:
Graphical user interface - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Xerox Alto - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Picture of the Amiga 1000's GUI: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedi...iga_1000DP.jpg
Myth #4: Windows is the only good OS because nothing runs on Mac or Linux.
Two things wrong with this statement:
1. Applications software developers write software for the operating system, not vice-versa. Software vendors could make their products work on Linux if they wanted to, but they don't bother, because Linux is not popular enough and they wouldn't make enough money. When this happens, it is the applications software, not the operating system, that is defective.
2. There are plenty of alternative applications that run on Mac and Linux (the one area where this isn't true - and this is the only good reason to use Windows - is PC games). There is also Wine.
Source:
Wine (software) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Myth #5: Windows is the only operating system. No one uses Linux.
If you look at the trends you will see that where more power, speed, or security is needed, people will generally use Linux over Windows. This is shown in the statistics for usage share of supercomputer operating systems, which show that 89.2% of the fastest supercomputers run on Linux.
As for servers, here are a few websites that use Linux, according to Netcraft:
www. amazon .com
www. yahoo .com
www. google .com
www. youtube .com
www. barackobama .com
www. flickr .com
wikipedia .org
codecall .net
www. cnn .com
www. nasa .gov
Myth #6: Microsoft made the software that 90% of people use, therefore it made computers more accessible.
This is like saying "Over half of Americans voted for Obama, therefore Obama founded the USA." Just because a company is the most successful - in this case a monopoly - does not mean it got there first. Let me ask you this: Do you honestly believe no one would have PCs if Microsoft didn't exist? Or would they still have PCs, but just use an operating system other than Windows?
And the last one, which isn't really a myth, because it's opinion, not fact:
#7: When Microsoft makes dishonest attacks against Linux, they are merely "fighting back" after being pushed around by everyone else.
Excuse me. Did anyone miss the 90s?
Well, M$ fans, feel free to berate me. I've done my research, and it's there as clear as day.










