(e-mail address removed), Kerry at
(e-mail address removed) wrote on 1/14/09 10:25 PM:
[snip]
and pulling the plug on Office would of course hurt
the Mac.
Do you really think so? Desktop applications aren't as necessary as they
used to be...the desktop isn't the center of the computer user's universe
any more. Besides, there are more options available for the Mac today than
before. Also, even if MS decided to stop supporting Mac applications, Mac
users who really wanted to could always run Windows applications on their
Intel Macs.
Fortunately, they are under the watchful eye of the
competitive watchdogs in the States and more particularly the EU.
They've already run into tons of problems on the anti-competitive
front, have been fined millions of dollars in the EU and I would
suspect that may help keep them in check.
I don't think that's true. During the trial here in the US, MS had the gall
to "doctor up" their PowerPoint slides, to make it seem that Explorer was
somehow "integral" to Windows. When they got caught, they essentially
blushed a little and shrugged their shoulders.
They lost the case. But, knowing how to lobby, and understanding the
political cycle at least as well as they do the business cycle, they waited
till the next election, and succeeded in getting a more "friendly" set of
ears to hear their appeal.
MS could get away with murder if it wanted to.
But their behavior,
historically, has often suggested otherwise so what happened with you
does suggest a reason to be concerned.
I wholeheartedly agree.
--
Version: 2008
Operating System: Mac OS X 10.5.4 (Leopard)
Processor: Intel Core 2 Duo
Email Client: POP
I don't think we're disagreeing at all. However, the reason I feel
that the pulling of Office would hurt the Mac is that it is a core
application. I was reading that even with all the alternatives, I
believe the number was 78% or 73% of all users use Office for
compatibility and functionality. Functionality can be obtained
elsewhere but if you need to be fully compatible and I really do then
you need to use Office. The loss of Office would be pretty bad (and
I'm sort of understating this). Further, I really can't find anything
that matches Entourage's capability native to the Mac. So, yes I run
Office under Parallels and Windows XP. Outlook is definitely not going
anywhere unless Microsoft itself goes under and that won't happen in
my lifetime. Outlook is a good application and I've tested it through
fully to ensure it sync's properly with my handhelds, a Palm TX and a
BlackBerry Curve and it certainly does. However, although this works
fine, it really does tax the machine. I go into Office for Windows
only to reference past work and information. I don't create new
information there as I want to live in OSX. And, in fact, I've lived
in OSX nicely up until Office 08 and most specifically Ent08 was
released. Since that day, my Mac computing has been fraught with
frustration. It just hasn't been as much fun (not that my Mac is
supposed to be fun but I like to think of it that way).
Oh and you are right about the US as a competitive watchdog and they
haven't been that good (this is a political statement and I really try
to avoid these but this might change with the Obama administration as
Bush's admin was way too pro business as the current financial crisis
demonstrates) so that is why I referenced the EU. The EU has been very
tough with Microsoft and even with Apple and their DRM (note that
Apple has finally convinced the labels to get rid of this) and the EU
will continue to be tough with Microsoft (this has been more around
Windows, the access or lack thereof to the API's in the Windows
environment that Microsoft's developers have and the loading of
software into the system that reduces competitiveness). The EU is
almost as strong or possibly stronger economic engine than the US and
maybe even NAFTA so I would think Microsoft would pay attention to
this trading block but they certainly have spit in their face and
defied court rulings even after having payed multi-million dollar
fines only to be fined again if they didn't comply (this is why I say,
Microsoft loves to use what they used to say IBM did in the 80s - the
FUD factor - Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt but I don't think people are
quite and I say quite as suscept to this as they used to be).
We'll just have to wait and see but I'd love to see Apple add to iWork
a module that does what Entourage does and I'd probably switch as
Pages (word processing is my key application after Entourage) is
certainly all that I need for WordProcessing and its faster a cleaner
than Word. However, with all that said I'd just love Office 08 and
onwards just to work and work well as I've used Office since its
inception and have gone through all its iterations and know it well
and have basically been very happy with it (no reason, until now, to
even think about switching and I really don't want to but....). So
time will tell but so far time hasn't been very kind to 08.
