Further to my last post
.......................... "Do you have a Consumers Association or similar body in the US that could get fired up about this? http://aaxnet.com/editor/edit029.html#mspath I'm going to try to agitate the UK one. DougB" I've written to the Consumers' Association in the UK, Which. Here's a copy of the letter - we'll see what happens. DougB [letter follows] "Dear Which Campaigns, I have been a member of the Consumers' Association for many years and know how effective your campaigns can be on issues affecting consumers' rights and welfare. I want to alert you to some extremely dangerous, far-reaching, extensive, monopolistic developments, already well under way, that are greatly to the detriment of our interests in many fields and that desperately need determined opposition from consumer groups across Europe. The software giant, Microsoft, is pursuing a strategy on many fronts aimed at achieving a total stranglehold over all information traffic, whether in the home or the office, personal or public, leisure or business, forcing it out of the privacy of individually-owned PCs onto the internet in channels meant to be wholly controlled by, and accessible only by payment to, Microsoft. Microsoft is attempting to fetter mobile telecommunications and channel television to its home computer systems as a further part of this strategy. It is promoting pernicious legislation in the European Parliament intended to outlaw or prevent third-party alternatives to its software that might now, or in the future, offer competition. To the average man in the street this may all seem greatly exaggerated - something dreamt up by computer nerds. However,it *will* mean something to the man in the street when a businessman finds Microsoft can cut him off from access to his business until he pays more, or the home owner finds he can no longer use his computer and personal data, because Microsoft has decreed his software obsolete and can force expensive updates of software and hardware without his consent. The EULA (End User License Agreement) accompanying every bit of Microsoft software sets out Microsoft's entitlements explicitly in the small print and will be, indeed already is,a legal license for extortion without redress from the consumer. There is good documentation validating my assertions in a rather long article on http://aaxnet.com/editor/edit029.html#mspath, particularly the section titled: Microsoft "The Road Ahead". It gives a much better and more informed account of the situation than I have been able to do. Please visit this site. As regards the European legislation, I and a number of others who are greatly concerned have already written to our MEPs about it, and for your information I attach a copy of the letter sent to my MEP. The only effective defence of the public's interest we can see working in the long term is to promote Open Source, i.e largely non-proprietary, software, whose huge number of volunteer supporters and developers distributed internationally is not readily intimidated, bought out, or overwhelmed by the financial might wielded by the Microsoft giant.This is vital, because ultimately any third-party information technology, software or hardware, that is to survive in competition with the Microsoft monopolies will depend on having a viable alternative to the Windows system. We need to resist the blanket introduction of Microsoft systems into our public services, especially if accompanied by 'sweeteners' that are actually ties to long-term commitments.We need to bring pressure on many institutions, like banks, to stop imposing the Microsoft system as a condition of e-commerce, for example requiring the browser, Internet Explorer, when alternative browsers offer equally high levels of encryption and, particularly, when running on non-Windows systems, are far less worm- and virus-ridden. There are many other situations where consumers need to be vigilant against some insidious threat or other posed by Microsoft. There is a group of us, very alive to the situation; and we could alert you at an early stage when the need arises, if you would like us to do this...."
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