It's not the Gates, it's the bars.

[DrJon]

Never being one to want to pay for much, I've been a member of the Free Software Foundation for quite a while now.

When Vista was about to be launched, I also joined Defective by Design and Badvista.org.

All joking aside, I've had my doubts about Gates since the days he was involved with his two mates and PCDOS was trundled out. I cannot remember the details now it was so long ago, but Gates went off on his own with a mysteriously similar product called MS-DOS if I recall correctly (I guess there should be an 'allegedly' in there somewhere).

Ever since, those who use Windows as an OS have been alternately delighted and disgusted by, not only its performance and shortcomings, but its increasingly dominant role in the techy world.

Lately, of course, there is the rather disturbing DRM debacle which Vista in particular seems to have as a root service almost, prohibiting people's freedoms even further.

How nice it was then to have just received an email from DBD with a link to a news item on that illustious body, the BBC's, website.

Written by none other than Richard Stallman, it is well worth the read - especially if you like Windows ;)

Follow this http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/7487060.stm

[lwyau]

Bill Gates, along with Paul Allen, wrote Basic (which BTW was licensed by Apple as "Applesoft basic" in the original Apple computers), which proves to be the only "innovation" Microsoft ever produced.

MS-DOS was acquired from Digital Research, who foolishly declined IBM's invite to provide the operating system for the then new PC. Virtually all Microsoft products from inception have been brute-force rewrite of someone else' innovative ideas.

Windows is collapsing under its own weight -- Microsoft simply keeps piling more and more stuff on.

Conversely, Apple threw out its OS and started from scratch with Jobs' Next machine OS, which is built on a very reduced set of kernel codes. It was a matter of survival for Apple and they had to do the complete overhall. Today, Apple release OS updates frequently, and uses the SAME kernel codes works on iPod and iPhone.

[DrJon]

I like Apples now - OSX seems to be based on the BSD kernel.

Actually, I always thought that Gates and Allen purchased an operating system called Q-Dos, which had been developed by Tim Patterson while working for Seattle Computer Products, from them for $50,000. They renamed it MS-DOS, and thanks to some subtle reverse engineering, delivered it to IBM, renamed as PC-DOS. Patterson later left SCP and actually went to work for Gates at Microsoft in 1981.

The OS which Digital had was called CP/M, (or CP/M 86) which was virtually the same as Q-dos, and it was Gates who referred IBM to Digital when they were looking for an OS. IBM screwed up the deal with Digital so Gates sold them 86-DOS (later renamed as PC-DOS) for a one time fee but insisted on keeping the copyright!

The Apple basic, although important to the future of GUIs generally, later became the famous Apple front end, but that gui was, in fact, developed by Xerox PARC; it's alleged that Gates and MS 'copied' various ideas from this gui for the first Windows release (Damn, I even remember using it!).

All in all, I think that history has showed us the true value of the Free Software Foundation (free as in freedom [of choice]). It is driven by people with a desire to make technology work for us, not to make incomprehensible amounts of money for just a few.

When the Amrican Courts threatened to fine Gates $1M a day if he did not do as they had ordered recently in the MS divisional thing, I'm told he simply said that it was fine as he earned $57M a day anyway!

While I have a sneaking reagard for his cavalier attitude to the Courts, I still suffer because of his product....

Ah well, at least for the real work I have my free Centos :)