[40274] in North American Network Operators' Group
Re: The Death of TCP/IP
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Valdis.Kletnieks@vt.edu)
Sun Aug 5 22:55:35 2001
Message-Id: <200108060254.f762sxv21864@foo-bar-baz.cc.vt.edu>
To: Wojtek Zlobicki <wojtekz@idirect.com>
Cc: nanog@merit.edu
In-Reply-To: Your message of "Sun, 05 Aug 2001 22:26:00 EDT."
<014001c11e1f$22816790$020a0a0a@wojtek>
From: Valdis.Kletnieks@vt.edu
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Date: Sun, 05 Aug 2001 22:54:59 -0400
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On Sun, 05 Aug 2001 22:26:00 EDT, Wojtek Zlobicki <wojtekz@idirect.com> said:
> Agreed, BUT .... as stated by Cringley himself, Microsoft tailors their
> software to the
> populus. Wow a software company listening to its users, what a travesty.
Does a manufacturer of *any* product have a moral obligation to give their
customers what they ask for, if they know that it would be a bad/unsafe idea?
I'm sure consumers would want a backyard gas grill that can heat itself up
to cooking temperature in 5 seconds flat. The average consumer may not
realize that this also means you're 7 seconds away from a fire, but the
design engineers should know that.
There *are* successful corporations that make a conscious decision to
disregard the customers when they feel they have a moral obligation to
do so. I know Chick-Fil-A loses my business every time I want a chicken
sandwich on Sunday. I'm sure *most* of their customers wish they were
open on Sunday - but they have their reasons, clearly explained on a big
sign on every store I've been in.
Also, remember that when Microsoft says "We just gave users what they asked for",
there's a *VERY* good chance that (a) the users didn't know they had a *CHOICE*
(you don't believe me, stop 50 people in front of a WalMart sometime, and ask them
if a PC can run anything other than Windows), and (b) would probably answer
differently if the question was rephrased ("Would you want more ease-of-use
features, if those features also meant that some hacker from a Third World country
could use them to hack into your computer, take your credit card numbers, and
generally make your life miserable?").
--
Valdis Kletnieks
Operating Systems Analyst
Virginia Tech
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