Re: [Off Topic] An EXCELLENT Microsoft Confidential document on
Hello,
Roberto Ripio <rripio@ctv.es> wrote:
| El Wed, 04 Nov 1998, Chad A. Adlawan escribi¢:
...
| >This is an excellent doc that was leaked out of MS on the future
| >issue of Open Source OSes like Linux, etc. The hosting WWW site
...
| As published, the document is edited by Eric S. Raymond, who has
| added very interesting comments. As has been pointed previously by
| other list members (thanks to them!) it can also be reached at
| <http://www.tuxedo.org/~esr/halloween.html> .
I've read the document last night, and I thought it hovered somewhat
uncertainly between Microsoft-bashing and traditional Internet
giving-kudos-where-kudos-are-due, between treating Microsoft as the
enemy and considering it a member of the comunity.
Compare, for instance, "This is an interestingly arrogant comment."
vs "Wow. This is an insight I never had".
Hmm, here's a thought: how about re-doing the comments in the "giving
kudos and constructive criticism" style, and sending it to MS?
That'd confuse 'em.
Say like this:
--c--
< This is a classic play out of the Microsoft handbook.
--
> While this appears at first sight to be a classic play out of the
> Microsoft handbook, there is a subtle but very important
> distinction. By releasing the source code, the program is
> immediately useful to a much wider audience than a binary-only
> distribution could be, due to the ability of the users to extend or
> modify it according to their immediate requirements.
--
(OK, so it's my first try at this.)
I don't think it could do any harm, because they can understand ESR's
comments just as well as we can anyway. There's no call to be nasty.
Does that make sense?
Jiri <jiri@baum.com.au>
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