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Sunday, Nov 8, 2009
Feb 14, 2002 | Read the story
Stop it! Those pom poms are hurting me!
-- Mike
I'm speechless with shock and horror. .Net is a mechanism designed by Microsoft to lock its users into its products, forever, with zero personal privacy. Saying this is a "boon to mankind" ... If Microsoft had been proven innocent in the recent antitrust hearings, rather than guilty of felonies, I might be able to put some faith in its intended uses of the Passport information, which is, or will be, gathered as a mandatory part of using .Net. If Microsoft had abided by the restrictions placed on it in 1998, rather than showing contempt for the laws and breaking them, I could believe it was reforming. As it stands, I can only regard Microsoft's intentions as criminal in all avenues, as well as against the public interest. This has been shown in a court of law twice now; I have no remaining expectation that Microsoft will reform willingly.
With regret I say that by publishing this article, you have lost my respect.
-- Tom Ammon
Who is Peter Wright and what has he done with Andrew Leonard? At first, I thought I was reading a satire piece; then I realized I was reading a press release. (".Net marks the third age of computing -- embrace it." Hmmm ... ) I suppose I can't fault Mr. Wright for trying to drum up business, seeing as he's got two books on .Net technology coming out soon.
But seriously, while Microsoft is to be cautiously commended for submitting at least parts of its .Net core technologies to standards bodies (whereas Sun has been unfortunately tightfisted with its Java technologies), .Net is hardly innovative. XML has been in use for an eternity by IT standards and was not handed down by Bill Gates from on high. Similarly, SOAP seems to be Microsoft's embrace-and-extend answer to RPC, technology in use in the Unix world for over a decade. CIL's yet-to-be-proven "write once, run anywhere" promise sounds conspicuously like what Java bytecode has done for years.
I wonder whether companies who have yet to spend significant sums in building portable application services will jump for Microsoft's heavily marketed but unproven .Net; I can't imagine companies who already have investments in RPC and/or Java services spending the cash to switch to Microsoft's offering. In any case, I'm deeply skeptical of what Wright calls .Net's ability to transform the Internet into "a dynamic pool of data connected by a true web of Web services all working together to make your life easier." I think the last time Microsoft made my life easier was with the release of Word 5.1a for Macintosh. It's all been downhill from there.
-- Isaac Salpeter
By the time I reached Peter Wright's bio at the end of his orgiastic propaganda about Microsoft's .Net "vision" and its latest developer software package, I was actually relieved to discover he was a Visual Basic writer and had ulterior motives with his forthcoming Visual Studio .Net titles.
Mr. Wright is apparently unaware of the world outside of Microsoft. He presents with great awe the prospect of an independent Perl programmer sharing his code with a corporate Cobol developer. This has been happening for some time, and there are even Web sites where code is readily available.
He blithely skips over the point that Gates' vision is an attempt by Microsoft to control the underlying infrastructure of connectivity so that a) it can get a piece of every commercial action and b) control and sell of a lot of development tools and controller code while completely wiping out any competition. In other words, the "vision" of .Net is not only to maintain but expand Microsoft's monopoly.
Mr. Wright failed to mention that this "must have" Visual Studio .Net software runs only on a Microsoft platform and works only with Microsoft-based systems.
As for comparing Gates to Henry Ford or Gutenberg or Babbage, I think if Wright does a modicum of research, he'll find that John D. Rockefeller is closer to the mark.
-- Carolyn Cooper
I am writing to comment on Peter Wright's column branding .Net as the second technological coming.
The article was the most naive, superficial piece of writing I have seen in some time.
I was not at all surprised to see Wright's history with Visual Basic. To someone steeped in VB, C#/CLR might seem like the second coming. It's not so much that .Net is so wonderful, it's more that the old VB development paradigm sucked. It doesn't take much to seem great when your past alternative was so bad.
To Wright I have to say: "Great! I'm glad you like the Java paradigm! I'm sorry it took MS's implementation of it to get you to use it."
Wright's article is a wonderful example of how Microsoft's monopoly has much of the tech industry hoodwinked. Many developers have been locked into thinking VB is the only language under the sun and Windows the only OS. Understandably, to them .Net and C#/CLR seem like a revelation. If MS didn't have such tight control over them, they might see that C#/CLR is just a slightly better implementation of Java. These developers aren't familiar with Java, however, because MS has such totalitarian control over the industry.
Wright's article is steeped in naiveti. Open source embracing it? Please. One only has to take a look at Slashdot or any other independent tech site to realize how much of a furor C#/CLR has caused. Open source advocates are in arms because a single, albeit influential group (with historical ties to MS) has embraced it. If Wright knew anything about open source, he might have thought more about characterizing the majority of the open source community vis-`-vis one member.
Wright also seems to be duped by MS's claim that .Net can miraculously run any code from any language without alteration. Not true. Again, review any site such as Slashdot, and you'll see how much many of these languages have to be butchered in order to run on the CLR. Sure, they'll run, as long as they are written to run on the CLR. Every language is equal, but some languages are more equal than others.
To brand the criticisms of MS as trite opinions, or simply the "cool" thing to say, is equally naive. Need anyone remind Wright that MS has been solidly convicted of illegal monopolistic practices? And because of those manipulative Machiavellian practices is facing a slew of lawsuits from governments, individuals and industry? Just recently the States asked MS to open the Windows source code. Was that the result of a "fad"?
No. Criticisms of MS are entirely legitimate, and everyone has every right to be concerned about MS's practices, including .Net. MS has repeatedly shown disrespect for the rights of individuals and corporations with regard to freedom and privacy. Given this pattern of behavior, we should be cautious about jumping on the .Net bandwagon.
If Wright is to make comparisons of biblical proportions, I suggest he make reference to a different sort of coming: that of the antichrist. It is silly, but then again, so is Wright.
-- Saul Levinson
