JB>Microsoft does have an inferior product, the people aren't given a choi
JB>begin with.. (I'm speaking of Win95 here).
 
      OS/2 and Unix are offered plus Apple is still out there plugging
away.  A choice most certianly does exist for those who desire it. It
is not a question of lack of choice, simply lack of a reason to
exercise that choice.
 
JB>Can you explain the reasoning behind Microsoft giving a product away af
JB>spending millions upon millions in production costs?  I doubt they are 
JB>it to be nice..  I've got my own ideas on it, none of them good towards
 
     Profit.  By being the dominate web browser not only will Microsoft
be able to profit with advertisers, but will have the ability to target
other sites, funneling users to them, creating a bonanza of ecconomic
opportunity.  
     I do not, BTW, see profit as an evil.  I consider profit the most
honorable of all methods to aquire income and assets.
JB>Do you know why?  Microsoft took out more than just IE, they reduced 
JB>functionality across the board..
 
      No, not quite.  Microsoft rereleased Sr1, the version before
Explorer was built into the operating system.  Sr2, the current
version, fully integrates Explorer and creating a new version, absent
all Explorer code, would be a task on the scale of writing an entirely
new version.  Yes, Sr1 lacked some of the features of Sr2, but do you
really expect Microsoft to release a special edition just to satisfy a
pack of lawyers?  
      Let me ask you this...how long does it take to drag the Explorer
icon into the recycle bin? 10 seconds?  If you don;t desire Explorer
you can delete it and nothing in Windows 95 Sr2 or the latest USB
version prohibits the loading of Netscape or any web browser you may
desire.
      Is this really the kind of stuff we need to be spending millions
of tax dollars paying lawyers to argue about?  Why no just let the
marketplace take care of itself?
 
JB>Neither one is the superior product, but not many know that, or could h
JB>it..
 
     I would most certianly consider Sr2 superior to Sr1.  It runs
FAT32 and sees drives larger than 2.5gig.
 
JB>Believe it or not, I can guarantee it won't end up like you think it wi
JB>There are good times to be paranoid, this isn't one..
 
    When government starts dictating to software companies how they
may, or may not, write code, it concerns me.  If you think Windows is a
pain now, wait until Congress rewrites it. 
 
                                             /\/\ike
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