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> We also need to remember that even those people who did use computers never used them how we use them. They used Windows and Microsoft stuff. Hardly in contro

by imiric 2y ago

> We also need to remember that even those people who did use computers never used them how we use them. They used Windows and Microsoft stuff. Hardly in control of their own computing. That's just elitism. MS and Windows gave access to computers to millions of people who otherwise wouldn't have been interested. MS products allowed them to be productive, and enabled thousands of businesses to function. MS was instrumental in the explosion of the internet and WWW in the 90s. No niche hacker-oriented or consumer OS had as large of an impact as Windows. We can argue whether MS has lost its way since then, but claiming that people weren't in control of their computing in the 90s because they used MS products is silly. The aggressive tracking, SaaS business models and everything else MS is criticized for today came much later.

globular-toast 2y ago
Hmm.. this is the line where it become elitism? Google enables people to be productive and thousands of businesses to function. What's the difference between using Google and a PC in the 90s? That you own the hardware? The hardware is useless to most people without the software. OK, so it's the data. Well, Microsoft were (and are) champions of vendor lock in. Even when they claimed to use open standards they messed it up (see the Office XML formats). If anything, Microsoft conditioned people to believing that personal computing was just running the software in your own house. It doesn't mean you are meaningfully in control of it, though. For me, it's only a short jump from there to what we see today where people just do the computing on someone else's computer too.
- imiric 2y ago
  > What's the difference between using Google and a PC in the 90s? Well, you answered that yourself. Software in the 90s was running locally, and the data it used was also local. That's an important difference from running software on someone else's computer with data you don't control. That access can be cutoff at any point, and there's nothing you can do about it. With local software and data you would at least have the option to export the data to another format (assuming the software supports it), or to read the data with another software. For the specific case of MS Office formats, even the closed ones prior to the XML formats were readable by 3rd party software. I would qualify this as being in "control of their computing". Vendor lock-in doesn't deprive users of this control. You have exactly the same issue with F/LOSS today. Whether you choose to use PostgreSQL/MySQL or Oracle/Access, you're always locked in to that specific vendor. Hopefully that vendor has good integrations and interoperability features so that you can migrate to something else if you wanted to, but the actual license has no bearing on this. I suppose our disagreement is with what it means to be in "control of computing". If you define it as being able to read, modify and share the source code, then proprietary software doesn't fit that definition. But most users don't practically need this level of control. As long as the software has decent interoperability, and you actually have control over how and where you run it, then proprietary software can qualify. SaaS, OTOH, does not.
- CRConrad 2y ago
  > Even when they claimed to use open standards they messed it up (see the Office XML formats). Yeah, sure -- but that came long after the 1980s / early '90s, which was the period at issue here.

by imiric 2y ago

globular-toast 2y ago

Hmm.. this is the line where it become elitism? Google enables people to be productive and thousands of businesses to function. What's the difference between using Google and a PC in the 90s? That you own the hardware? The hardware is useless to most people without the software. OK, so it's the data. Well, Microsoft were (and are) champions of vendor lock in. Even when they claimed to use open standards they messed it up (see the Office XML formats). If anything, Microsoft conditioned people to believing that personal computing was just running the software in your own house. It doesn't mean you are meaningfully in control of it, though. For me, it's only a short jump from there to what we see today where people just do the computing on someone else's computer too.

imiric 2y ago
> What's the difference between using Google and a PC in the 90s? Well, you answered that yourself. Software in the 90s was running locally, and the data it used was also local. That's an important difference from running software on someone else's computer with data you don't control. That access can be cutoff at any point, and there's nothing you can do about it. With local software and data you would at least have the option to export the data to another format (assuming the software supports it), or to read the data with another software. For the specific case of MS Office formats, even the closed ones prior to the XML formats were readable by 3rd party software. I would qualify this as being in "control of their computing". Vendor lock-in doesn't deprive users of this control. You have exactly the same issue with F/LOSS today. Whether you choose to use PostgreSQL/MySQL or Oracle/Access, you're always locked in to that specific vendor. Hopefully that vendor has good integrations and interoperability features so that you can migrate to something else if you wanted to, but the actual license has no bearing on this. I suppose our disagreement is with what it means to be in "control of computing". If you define it as being able to read, modify and share the source code, then proprietary software doesn't fit that definition. But most users don't practically need this level of control. As long as the software has decent interoperability, and you actually have control over how and where you run it, then proprietary software can qualify. SaaS, OTOH, does not.
CRConrad 2y ago
> Even when they claimed to use open standards they messed it up (see the Office XML formats). Yeah, sure -- but that came long after the 1980s / early '90s, which was the period at issue here.