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Security Through Obscurity May Have Some Truth

April 27th 2008 14:12
Firefox Safari Internet Explorer
One argument against Microsoft based software is that they are less 'secure'. Now personally I don't understand the concept of software being less secure, if you're not doing anything stupid you probably won't have to deal with anything nasty.


Having said that I think it is becoming more and more obvious, if Microsoft’s software was ever less secure it was not because of poor software practices but rather the obscurity of its competitors. Unfortunately for the open source community they can no longer just talk as such software as Firefox becomes more and more mainstream.

Now after years of learning from mistakes Microsoft seems to have created a fairly solid package, there is yet to be a major security breach for any of Microsoft’s newer software and all the while the security holes in competing software such as Firefox and Safari to Microsoft's Internet Explorer keep adding and adding.

Many people are switching from Internet Explorer to alternative browsers such as Firefox and Safari. Though that might make them feel more secure, the shift has also opened new doors for bad guys.

Case in point: We have no IE bugs to report this month, but both Firefox and Safari have been hit hard.

Hackers Focus Efforts on Firefox, Safari


Something tells me lots of hobbyist Firefox/Safari fanboy hackers are going to go hard after Internet Explorer to even things up before the month is out. But we'll see.
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Posted By: Ahmed - Category: Proprietary, Linux.open|Source, Windows
   


A Note to the EU - GET OUT OF THE SOFTWARE INDUSTRY

October 23rd 2007 13:49
Earlier on I elaborated on what I believed was a conspiracy against Microsoft through a veil known as 'The EU'. I retract that prior statement, or at least a part of it, the open source community seems to have nothing to do with this conspiracy because now, suddenly, out of no where, the EU says the open source community should pay Microsoft for alleged software patents the software giant is holding.

The natural question is, WHAT THE HELL? What software patents? They are so vague you'd have to have the imagination of Shayamalan to pull off a ripper of a twist that would even vaguely apply to any individual alleged infringment.

Reuters reported that "Commercial developers such as IBM or Red Hat must pay a license fee of 0.4 percent of revenues to Microsoft when they redistribute that software, to protect against patent challenges."

Commissioner Kroes has said, of the deal, "That percentage royalty has become a nominal, one-off payment of Euro 10,000. This is all that has to be paid by companies that dispute the validity or relevance of Microsoft's patents

Source
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Posted By: Ahmed - Category: Business, Proprietary, open|Source, Microsoft
   


Firefox is Proof Open Source is Failing

September 16th 2007 09:12
The general consensus is that the open source isn't gaining traction is because Microsoft is doing what it needs to from a business standpoint to buy out/take hostage the consumer. However the massive popularity of Firefox is proof enough that this simply can't be the case.

When it comes down to it all you just have to look at it in perspective. Every Windows machine ships with a copy of Internet Explorer for free, yet consumers are actively finding and download Firefox. What of Word Processing software? People pay money for Microsoft Office, and it sure isn't cheap, it doesn't even necessarily come with every Windows PC and additional components will invariably cost more (such as Excel, PowerPoint, etc).

Yet we have 'Open Office' which is the Open Source communities answer to Microsoft Office. Totally free and comes with everything Microsoft Office does, not to mention has basically copied Microsoft Offices interface meaning there is nothing alien about moving between one and the other.

Common arguments such as 'Microsoft is willing to break laws and pay fines' or 'dump products' is absolute rubbish, the Open Source community is so full of itself that they have all but forgotten that good products is what sells and that laying blame on Microsoft is not going to make any real progress. Microsoft competes, if that means 'dumping' then so be it.

If Linux is free and the Chinese people may use Linux simply because it’s free Microsoft has every right in the world to say 'hey what the hey, I'm going to sell Windows for $3 in China to effectively compete with Linux. I’ll also invest heavily in the IT industry in China so that Chinas software industry can grow and thrive'. Not just Microsoft, many companies invest in developing nations, they invest to compete, it’s a game of chicken, the more you invest the bigger the turn back but the bigger the risk. Who benefits from all this rabid investing most? The Chinese people.

Microsoft Research and Development Lab in China
Microsoft Has Invested Heavily in China's Software Industry

Is dumping so wrong? That the Chinese in their whacko market get access to $3 Windows others pay $300 for? It's just the way things work, the way different economies work. Microsoft wants to establish a foothold in China because China is developing into a major software developer. In the same way IBM has always been investing millions of dollars in Linux Microsoft is investing millions in its own software, as a company must do.

So what of Microsoft 'cheating'? If Microsoft’s cheating (assuming its happening) is directly affecting Open Source softwares ability to compete then Firefox should have bombed. Like most other Open Source applications it should have started with massive hype and just ended there. Yet it didn't, why? Because it's a damned good piece of software, one of the few that can effectively compete with something you might want to pay for.
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OOXML From Microsoft, Scares Living Shit Out of Open Source Community

August 30th 2007 09:55
I find it strange how Microsoft’s bid to create a new standard for document formats is causing the Open Source community to respond with empty claims and false accusations. It sure isn’t that different to how Microsoft was acting not too long ago in regards to supposed Linux patent violations.

So what is OOXML? For the uninitiated it is a set of standards set up by Microsoft to allow documents to be portable across the board of software. It’s nothing new, even Open Office has had its document type standardized by the ISO
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Posted By: Ahmed - Category: Business, Proprietary, open|Source, Microsoft
   


Apple Lies - Again

June 13th 2007 04:27
Somehow, someone will blame this on Bill Gates *but* what the hell? Wired decided to do its own benchmarks for Safari versus IE7 and Firefox and in typical fashion Apples marketting machines deception shown through.

Apple Safari VS Firefox

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Posted By: Ahmed - Category: open|Source, Microsoft
   


Open XML Trap, From Microsoft With Love

January 17th 2007 20:18
Clearly Microsoft is trying to get under the skin of open source then deviously tear it apart from the inside.

OOXML open XML logo
OOXML
Open XML (OOXML) is a list of specifications for the file format of several document types such as memos, spreadsheets, documents amongst others, it is to be used in Microsoft Office 2007. Microsoft has also gained approval from Ecma to make OOXML an open standard
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Posted By: Ahmed - Category: Proprietary, open|Source, Microsoft
   


If you can’t beat them…

November 4th 2006 08:20
Pretend you join them and tear them limb for limb from the inside. You might think that is cruel, harsh, diabolically evil, but when you know Microsoft is in the picture you know only one word can pretty much describe it all: “Typical”.

MS TUX
That'll be the day
Microsoft has for years been trying to destroy open source community via calculated law suits, generally speaking it has had wins and losses for Microsoft legally, but nothing but loss in terms of public relations. One of the main reasons many claim Microsoft is evil is the fact it goes after unpaid programmers who produce software that may or may not even (in some cases) infringe on Microsoft’s patents


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Posted By: Ahmed - Category: Proprietary, open|Source, Microsoft
   




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