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Bill Gates: "Someone decided to trash the one part of Windows that was usable?"

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21–30 of 219 posts

Re: Bill Gates: "Someone decided to trash the one part of Windows that was usable?"

#21
I remember reading this when it first came out, at a time when I was still on Windows. I remember thinking, "Finally! Microsoft products are bound to improve after a letter like that from Gates."

Two years later, nothing about XP had changed, and I moved to OS X, just in time to avoid Vista...

So, while the letter is, itself, excellent, I'm not sure how much it did to help out Windows in the long run. (Maybe Windows 7 represents a change.)

Re: Bill Gates: "Someone decided to trash the one part of Windows that was usable?"

#22
post #8

If Gates had maintained a dictatorial death grip on his company like Steve Jobs has, MS probably could have made some decent products. It's one thing to yell at the people who made this system via email. It's quite another to never allow them to ship it in the first place .

You're right and the anonymous commenter on their site said it well:

"The Steve Jobs version: "If the MovieMaker download site isn't working by tomorrow at 6 am I will come down there at 6:01 am an choke the living ___ out of all of you.""

Re: Bill Gates: "Someone decided to trash the one part of Windows that was usable?"

#23
post #7

I tried to download it - their new simple solution is to include it as part of Windows Live. So I want a simple movie editor to clip 5secs off the beginning of a home movie - BUT to do this I have to sign up for an MS specific hotmail account, create a windows passport (I thought they had abandoned that?) get Windows messenger, windows photo viewer and be included in a whole bunch of MS specific social websites. So I…

I guess in the bubble over at microsoft they assume everyone that uses windows will defiantly want windows live anyway.

Ok take 5 minutes to learn the following, and you won't make the mistake again:

definitely. def-in-it-ely Always say it like this as you type.

Re: Bill Gates: "Someone decided to trash the one part of Windows that was usable?"

#24
post #14

Seriously though, is all of this fixed in Windows 7, or are people just hyping that up because it sucks alot less than any previous Windows iterations? I don't think I've _ever_ seen a process that convoluted, and I've been using Linux OSes since _before_ the advent of dependency-resolvers like yum and apt (i.e, the bad old days of "RPM hell").

Here's Eric Raymond on Cups for a Unix perspective. http://www.catb.org/~esr/writings/cups-horror.html

I got to this bit:

> LaserJet 6MP attached to it via parallel port.

That got me looking for the date this was written.

Re: Bill Gates: "Someone decided to trash the one part of Windows that was usable?"

#25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes it's all fixed in Win7 if you just want to roll over and let it force you to use IE and Bing and Hotmail for everything. As soon as you try not to use IE suddenly you can't do anything

Only time I ever used IE was to download Firefox when I first installed windows 7. So, I have no idea what you are talking about. My experiences haS been great.

Try using Outlook web access, or windows genuine advantage or MSDN download in firefox

Re: Bill Gates: "Someone decided to trash the one part of Windows that was usable?"

#26
post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guess in the bubble over at microsoft they assume everyone that uses windows will defiantly want windows live anyway.

Ok take 5 minutes to learn the following, and you won't make the mistake again: definitely. def-in-it-ely Always say it like this as you type.

Perhaps a true windows believer would 'defiantly' want Windows Live ?

Re: Bill Gates: "Someone decided to trash the one part of Windows that was usable?"

#27
post #8

If Gates had maintained a dictatorial death grip on his company like Steve Jobs has, MS probably could have made some decent products. It's one thing to yell at the people who made this system via email. It's quite another to never allow them to ship it in the first place .

You're right and the anonymous commenter on their site said it well: "The Steve Jobs version: "If the MovieMaker download site isn't working by tomorrow at 6 am I will come down there at 6:01 am an choke the living ___ out of all of you.""

Jobs may well provide more severe threats than Gates, but I still think there's an important distinction between firing/choking/maiming employees and refusing to ship (or canceling) a product.

Re: Bill Gates: "Someone decided to trash the one part of Windows that was usable?"

#28
post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guess in the bubble over at microsoft they assume everyone that uses windows will defiantly want windows live anyway.

Ok take 5 minutes to learn the following, and you won't make the mistake again: definitely. def-in-it-ely Always say it like this as you type.

I thought we were de-finite-ly geeks around here.

Re: Bill Gates: "Someone decided to trash the one part of Windows that was usable?"

#29

I tried to download it - their new simple solution is to include it as part of Windows Live. So I want a simple movie editor to clip 5secs off the beginning of a home movie - BUT to do this I have to sign up for an MS specific hotmail account, create a windows passport (I thought they had abandoned that?) get Windows messenger, windows photo viewer and be included in a whole bunch of MS specific social websites. So I…

You know, no one took away the check boxes that let you choose which Windows Live programs you want to install when you're trying to run the installer. The installer doesn't even download any of those apps if you leave them unchecked. If you don't want Messenger, Photo Gallery, or even to sign up for a Windows Live ID, you don't have to get/do those things.

Most people find that this is actually helpful, though, because signing up for (or using, since the vast majority of folks already have one) a Live ID enables a bunch of convenient features like easily uploading your photos and videos (either to Microsoft's services or to Flickr, YouTube, Facebook, etc.) And most users who use Movie Maker also want to, for instance, organize their photos. Let's not forget that iLife also comes as a suite for a reason.

On the other hand, signing up for a new throwaway account just to trash Microsoft... yeah, that's classy.

(Usual disclosure: I work at Microsoft.)

Re: Bill Gates: "Someone decided to trash the one part of Windows that was usable?"

#30

Seriously though, is all of this fixed in Windows 7, or are people just hyping that up because it sucks alot less than any previous Windows iterations? I don't think I've _ever_ seen a process that convoluted, and I've been using Linux OSes since _before_ the advent of dependency-resolvers like yum and apt (i.e, the bad old days of "RPM hell").

Microsoft has gone a long way to address their first party problems but as soon as you choose to install a third party Windows application all bets are off. Most Windows apps still lack a way to automatically update themselves. They still pollute the start menu and add/remove programs menu. Application installs still take too long.
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