You have a real knack for quoting people out of context and making yourself look good

Sorry if that's what happening, I am simply putting in enough text to give folks an idea of the reply point. Since the entire thread is up there above my post I figure the context is all where it needs to be.

Anyway, apologies to anyone who thinks i was trying to manipulate their words.

You argue for Windows-xx as if it were an application NOT an Operating System

There are two points here...

• I don't see that the difference should bind the software maker to any more restrictive set of responsibilities.
• I do see that they are different, I just don't agree with you (apparently) on what that difference actually means.

most of which are inferior to their competitive equivalents

Funny, most of the popular Microsoft products are very competitive with the other products in the market. Word is without a doubt one of the best word processors on the planet, IIS is a strong and stable web server, SQL server is a world class database system and so on. I am a little unsure what inferior products you feel locked into.

This isn't an opinion, it is a fact, verifiable by public documents

This I am always confused by. When the courts come to a decision people don't like - then the courts are stupid. When it is one someone does like then they point to the courts as if that is the final word on what is real.

This is doubly confusing when software issues come in. When a court puts some poor guy in jail for a bizzare copyright issue there is a huge protest of how the court doesn't have a clue on tech issues - but when the court is anti-MS it is suddenly full with a clue?

Jackson was biased. The "public documents" you mention bring that out as well. In fact, his conduct of the case was one of the most strongly slapped down judgments in the last decade. It was a stunning embarrassment for the courts, and they rebuked him in strong language.

So I wouldn't rely on the court to tell me what is real.

We would all be much better off if MS were prohibited from integrating applications (like I.E., media player, etc.) with their operating system, thereby severely crippling competition in that area.

Why? Why in the world should I have to pay someone for something MS is willing to give me? Besides, media playback is a function that is deeply tied into an operating system - there is no reason for a media player to NOT be included in the OS. It would be silly to try and force it out.

I'll tell you what. When you get Apple to stop giving away Quicktime we can talk about forbidding MS from shipping Media Player :)

It is Internet Explorer by Microsoft (the kernel of which CANNOT be uninstalled).

I'll be very interested in seeing the source of that statistic... I wonder what versions of IE on what platforms... of course, IE is the most used program on windows if personal experience is any gauge so it would make some sense.

And no, you cannot rip out the HTML rendering engine of I from the newer MS OS's - nor should you be able to. You can use an alternate if you prefer but taking HTML/XML away from the XP UI would be the same as ripping QuickDraw out of MacOS... it just doesn't make any sense.

Have you ever right-clicked an image on the internet to save it, and found "unknown.bmp" to be the result?

Yes. it was a memory error failure condition. I do work as a support guy you know :)

Do you know WHY this happens - even now in I.E.6

Interesting, I never have seen it happen on IE 6. What OS has that happened to you on? A quick check on google doesn't turn up anyone else I can see having the issue with IE 6.

Are you aware that this behavior is INTENTIONAL on the part of MS, and that they never intend to fix it?

Again, I will be very interested to see the source for this conclusion... as I maintain a large number of systems that use IE it would be helpful to have some concrete information on this if it is as yous ay it is.

I think you need to take your blinders off, and look around.

So far, this conversation has been fairly polite. It would be nice if it could stay that way don't you think?

I don't have blinders on. I maintain and own systems that run MacOS, Linux and Windows. I have run Linux systems since the kernel was first posted to the 'net and Unix systems before that. I have run MacOS systems since they were introduced. I am not "blind" to the alternatives nor am a in Microsoft's pocket.

The simple reality is that Microsoft is providing a fantastic operating system at a reasonable price. It's unfortunate that that is annoying to some people, but there it is.