[11919] in Commercialization & Privatization of the Internet
Re: Windows 4 as Internet interface
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Bruce Fancher)
Mon Apr 25 08:13:40 1994
From: bruce@phantom.com (Bruce Fancher)
To: raisch@internet.com (Rob Raisch, The Internet Company)
Date: Sun, 24 Apr 1994 13:53:48 -0400 (EDT)
Cc: designa@aol.com, com-priv@psi.com
In-Reply-To: <Pine.3.85.9404221652.A13516-0100000@hmmm> from "Rob Raisch, The Internet Company" at Apr 22, 94 04:10:52 pm
[Rob Raisch, The Internet Company] has written:
|
| Ummm, Whither NT? Whither Windows for Workgroups? I mean, we've heard
| lots of interesting proclamations from Unca Bill. Vapour don't feed the
| tiger.
|
| Microsoft has shown itself to only be interested in keeping its users
| "satisfied" with a level of technology which is far, far below current
| practice. I have always thought that this was a marvelous way to control
| an industry, ...if you can get away with it. (See "The Eyedropper as an
| Appropriate Method of Distributing Computer Technology.")
|
| But the Internet and its technologies represent significant and perhaps
| fundamental *loss* of control. In fact, I would expect that the Internet
| would scare the <explitive deleted> out of a company like Microsoft, in
| much the same way that it does Prodigy, CompuServe and AOL.
|
| The real question here, though, is really much larger than pretty interfaces
| and operating systems designed to support technologies like TCP/IP. Ask
| yourself why IP services cost far, far more than a simple commodity like
| telephone services. When someone licks the service and support problems,
| then I'll be impressed with Billion Dollar Bill's pontifications.
|
| <The application you were running has stopped responding to Windows.
| Perhaps your subnet-mask is improperly configured?>
|
| Besides, I think the Fed will have a little input into the future plans of
| Microsoft. More sooner than later.
|
| -- </rr> Rob Raisch, The Internet Company (It's been a loooooong week.)
|
Sure, `cept Microsoft isn't an Online Service like AOL or Prodigy. I
think building an Internet-in-a-box equivalent into Windows would a
brilliant idea. The Internet would be a great way for Microsoft to offer
customer support. A few $5000 Web servers would allow them to lay off a
whole bunch of $16-20K/year telephone support people. Bill may not be
a visionary but he's damn good at looking at taking other peoples ideas and
marketting the shit out of them.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but I was under the impression that your company
designed Mosaic Interfaces and helped other companies get up on the net.
You should be pleased at the prospect of 40,000,000 Windows users coming
on board. It tickles the hell out of me! ;-)
