[MD] Quality computing

[Case]

dmb says:
Okay, "boot" is a pretty good example. Since I live in this world too, I
realized that it was probably a reference to hearty footwear and/or the act
of putting them on and that this implies that it might be something we must
do before we start working. But what's wrong with the word "start"? 

[Case]
So Microsoft puts Start on the taskbar and people bitch 'cause you have to
click on it to shut down.

[dmb]
Whine, whine, geeks are pansies. Yeah, Platt why they gotta make it so
confusing, boo hoo.

[Case]
The first time I saw a Mac classic in the mid 80s I thought, "That's a
computer for stupid people." But it was also the computer for creative
people, because you don't have to know much about it to use it. It is simple
in this way because one company controls both the hardware and the operating
system. As a result everything is inherently designed to work together.

PCs on the other hand are vastly more complicated to use but vastly more
flexible in how they can be set up and what you can do on them. IBM
developed an open set of standards for the computer hardware and software.
They started a more Darwinian system and got driven from it by their
competitors.

Frankly all the efforts I have seen to make computers more "user friendly;"
stuff like the Packard Bell front end, Microsoft Bob and Bonzai Bubby or
current crud like Yahoo and Google toolbars and Real media player; have made
them less flexible and clunkier to work with. I am not looking forward to
Vista and plan to be a very late adopter.

If you are not willing to learn about this marvelous new world we are
exploring and creating here, at least have the decency not to whine about
it. That kind of ludite talk sounded kinda hip and artsy 10 years ago. Now
it just sounds like failure to engage.