Re: Platform of choice

["Wing, Michael J" <mjwing -at- INGR -dot- COM>]

>>Yet for some unfathomable reason neither NeXtStep, nor OS/2, nor MacOS
>>has had nearly the success, market share, or acceptance that Windows has
>>had (and still has).  This despite their HUGE head start.  Please
>>explain.
>
>Would you like to see the figures for the Windows 95 advertising
>budget?  Remember the giant Windows 95 banner hanging from the CN
>Tower?

Are you saying that IBM, Apple and others were precluded from running a
heavy ad campaign?

>(Funny how they never ran pictures of some 60% of those being returned
>to the stores).

First I've heard of this number.  I suppose you have some verification
of this percentage or did it just sound like an impressive figure to
toss about?

>>If Sun's been doing it for years, shouldn't they be dictating
>>the 'de facto' OS standard?
>
>Problem is, for four years it was almost impossible to buy a PC without
>DOS and Windows 3.x preloaded.

How hard was for the user to reformat the PC and load in their own OS?

C:\format
A:\install.exe

>Rather than charge hardware vendors on
>a per-installation basis for their operating systems, like everyone
>else did, Microsoft suckered most of them into a deal by which they got
>all the DOS/Windows licenses free as long as they paid MS a cut of
>every CPU they sent out the door.

UNIX was dumped for free on many universities.  For a while students
graduated predisposed to UNIX.  Were they suckered?

>When you turn on your PC and an operating system pops up, whether you
>asked for it or not, and you don't know enough about computers to
>change it... then that operating system becomes the 'de facto'
>standard, regardless of how mediocre it is or how many more advanced
>systems are available.

If I'm a user who doesn't know enough to change my OS, what's my
interest in a 'more advanced' OS?  If that's the case, I'm probably just
word processing, drawing pictures, entering items in a
database/spreadsheet, or playing games.
>
>>Pioneering a technology is one thing.  Developing it and bringing it
>>successfully to market is another.
>
>Advertising it is another matter altogether.

Where's the dividing line between bring a product to market and
advertising?  Or are you agreeing with me?
>
>>It looks like developing and controlling the market in operating
>>systems were IBM's, Sun's, Apple's, and Next's to lose.  They did!
>
>They developed and brought to market most of the advances you see in
>Win95 today, but did it years ago.  Only problem was, they didn't spend
>huge bucks advertising it to the masses, and the mass media (PC
>Magazine and kin) were completely fixated on Windows... such that
>advanced features like object-oriented shells would get little mentions
>in "news bytes" columns, then be drowned out by big splashy ads for yet
>another Windows virus scanner.

Lot of sour grapes here buddy.  Sit on them for a while you may have a
great vintage w(h)ine :^).
>
>
> Your friend and mine,
> Matt

Mike
 _____________________________________________
|   Michael Wing
|    Principal Technical Writer
|    Infrastructure Technical Information Development
|    http://www.ingr.com/iss/products/mapping/
|    Intergraph Corporation
|    Huntsville, Alabama
|    (205) 730-7250
|    mjwing -at- ingr -dot- com

 TECHWR-L (Technical Communication) List Information: To send a message
to 2500+ readers, e-mail to TECHWR-L -at- LISTSERV -dot- OKSTATE -dot- EDU -dot-  Send commands
   to LISTSERV -at- LISTSERV -dot- OKSTATE -dot- EDU (e.g. HELP or SIGNOFF TECHWR-L).
  Search the archives at http://www.documentation.com/  or search and
browse the archives at http://listserv.okstate.edu/archives/techwr-l.html