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Al Fasoldt's reviews and commentaries, continuously available online since 1983

Leave Microsoft alone and stop glorifying Apple, reader says


Oct. 2, 2000

By Al Fasoldt
Copyright ©2000, Al Fasoldt

   Letter received Oct. 2, 2000.
   
   While it is painfully obvious in almost every column you write that you are anti-Microsoft, I believe you've finally gone off the deep end in this week's column.
   You are making this web page issue into some sort of World Wide Web Watergate. Microsoft is a Revisionist? Revisionism is the practice of one who favors the revision of an accepted theory. This is quite a jump you make in your unending quest to demonize Microsoft. How do you suggest a web page on the Choco-Banana Shake hang can be viewed as an accepted theory? One of thousands of web pages that Microsoft publishes gets by the editors and you turn this into some kind of Federal case.
   What would you do as a professional writer if a page you published was perceived as silly? Would you make it your home page and draw attention to your benign mistake to every visitor (wasting their time) or would you simply remove or revise the page?
   I see a web site like Microsoft's knowledgebase as a giant, ever-changing encyclopedia. In my job I use it almost every day for one reason or another - sometimes it's helpful, sometimes less so. But I would rather not have every other search turn up silly or inappropriate web pages just because you think Microsoft should not remove these pages as it exemplifies their propensity for fooling the American public.
   If you like Apple so much, then write a column about Apple computers. Instead you choose to point out in every other column that Apple computers "are immune to the viruses that plague Windows" computers. OF COURSE THEY ARE. Up until just a few years ago, Apple computers were immune to most applications software as nobody thought it was worth the trouble to write code for a computer that had single digit market penetration. Why then would some hacker write a virus that will cripple 3 percent of the home computers in the U.S. when they can write code that will bring down 97%?
   You just make no sense. I don't care that you are a fan of Apple -- that's fine - but you should write weekly articles on the joys of Apple computing instead of choosing to write these negative, hateful articles about Microsoft's products just because you are not a fan.
   In conclusion, I thank you for your time in reading my opinion and also thank you as I have learned some useful tips and tricks from your more constructive columns.
   S.J., via Road Runner
   
   
   Al Fasoldt responds:
   
   I am no more anti-Microsoft than a poison inspector is anti-arsenic. Microsoft was found guilty of abusing its monopoly on PC operating systems, and its behavior affects nearly every adult in large or small ways. Have I finally "gone off the deep end?" The "deep end" is a life filled with Windows crashes and programs that work poorly when they work at all. To assert that a journalist who covers computers and software should not take Microsoft to task for its behavior amounts is nonsense.
   As my article pointed out, all of us can do silly things. It's a straw-man argument to ask what I would do if one of the Web pages on my site turned out to be silly. I've suffered just as many slings and arrows of outrageous silliness as anyone else in the public eye, and I've never hidden from them. ALL of my articles, warts and all, silliness and all, are posted on my site. Anyone can read how dumb some of my predictions turned out to be, or how far from the mark some of my criticisms have been. I continue to write about these topics and speak out about them not because I have some special gift of "rightness" or some secret cache of magic power. I write about Microsoft and Windows and talk to audiences about them because people need to know what's going on.
   S.J. is not the first apologist for Windows who has tried to turn the laws of physics upside down. In his attempt to explain away the fact that Windows is extraordinarily susceptible to viruses, S.J. tries to make a connection between the number of computer users and the number of viruses. Since Windows has a lot more users, it has a lot more viruses. End of case, or so S.J. wants us to believe.
   But no one could believe such inane reasoning. Windows is susceptible to viruses because it is designed badly, not because there are a lot of people using it. Saying that the Macintosh is not vulnerable to Windows viruses is simply a statement of fact. Apologists for Windows usually know how much hot air they are breathing, but sometimes they get puffed up by their own blather. The notion that Windows is susceptible to viruses merely because there are a lot of Windows users can be de-blatherized rather simply. For the sake of S/J. and any other Windows apologists and for everyone who is not aware of the real design of Windows, I'll explain just one of the dangers:
   Because of the way Windows is designed, anyone who uses the default configuration for mail and Web browsing -- Outlook Express and Internet Explorer -- automatically gives up any right to privacy and safety. If you think I am exaggerating or if you think I am making this up, please pay attention.
   You probably use Outlook Express for mail -- if you are a Windows user (and chances are you ARE), you almost surely use Outlook Express (because that's the way a monopoly works). Listen carefully: Windows does you a big favor by looking for executable code in the form of VBScript in each pice of mail that comes in to your inbox. If you have NO MAIL in the inbox (if the inbox is empty), Windows does you an even bigger favor. It EXEXCUTES the code it finds in the first letter that comes in.
   Let me repeat. If your inbox is empty, Windows EXECUTES the VBScript code in the first letter to arrive in your inbox. (The Inbox is the place where incoming mail goes.)
   So that means anyone who wants to write a simple script (a series of instructions, shown as if it were text) can send you mail and do anything he wants to do with your PC. A brat in Bratislava can insert a tiny server program into your Windows PC that will then send out your credit card information, for example.
   Is this OK? If you are a Windows apologist, it's not only OK, it's heavenly. It's glorious. It's beauty and light and wonderfulness personified. Right?
   Give me a break, S.J. Wake up. Get a life. Learn how the world works. Stop pretending Microsoft is some kind of God. When a big company makes a big mistake, those of us who point it out are doing our jobs.