2 ms·
There's plenty of blame to go around, if you want to play blame games. The "free market" has no mechanism for 3rd parties to affect the decision making process.
by cmurf 9y ago
There's plenty of blame to go around, if you want to play blame games. The "free market" has no mechanism for 3rd parties to affect the decision making process. Microsoft has its policies, well known to the buyers, and the buyers accepted this as well as their own policy to delay recommended upgrades. A completely neutral person, a patient, is put at risk through no fault of their own, had absolutely no say in either transaction (either the original point of sale of the OS, or the policy to not keep software up to date) is injured.
This person arguably has an injury claim against Microsoft (their bug, their policy to stop updating software without disabling it thereby permitting the broad weaponization of their software). And they have an injury claim against each medical service institution who refused service because their systems were fully or partially non-functional due to their negligent choice to run old software; to not have their own user space programs on a constant "everygreen" cycle so that, without any gaps, it's possible to run their mission critical software on a currently supported and secure OS.
Basically, these injured 3rd parties have to sue or legislate. Either way it requires a sovereign to intervene in the market.
And what role and blame do millions of non-business end users running outdated software, and their computer was part of a web enabling such prolific spreading of malware? Do they get sued or billed their incremental share? What if it's $1000 per person running Windows XP? And now that they have liability, maybe they can all sue Microsoft because Microsoft permits them to run outdated software?
This shit really needs to be engineered better, and really where we're at is, we're monkeys playing with computers and reveling in our own self-importance, when in reality we still sometimes suck. And this is an (yet another) example of how primitive we are still.
- davidf18 9y ago> There's plenty of blame to go around, if you want to play blame games. The "free market" has no mechanism for 3rd parties to affect the decision making process. Microsoft has its policies, well known to the buyers, and the buyers accepted this as well as their own policy to delay recommended upgrades." Nobody forced people to purchase Microsoft software. There are other vendors (Apple, Linux based systems). But if they choose to purchase the software, they need to follow the vendors maintenance instructions if they want properly operating equipment. Does United Airlines ignore the maintenance instructions of Boeing or Airbus? If they even thought about it, the FAA would be all over them. In the case of hospitals in the US and the UK there are accrediting agencies. In the US it is The Joint Commission. In the UK it is Care Quality Commission. If the people running hospitals are irresponsible and choose not to follow manufacturers instructions for maintenace for any capital equipment, then the accrediting agencies should refused accreditation.