[ale] Fwd: [FSF] Enter the Restricted Boot Webcomic Contest: Defend user freedom on tablets and smartphones

[Rich Faulkner]

A greater questions (IMHO) is more, what would (or will) the consumer
reaction be to this.  Android and Apple have the lock on consumer
confidence and loyalty.  Microsoft is well known for (well, you know
what they're well known for).  Outside of gaming systems; I think their
goose is getting cooked.  

The market will drive what gets built.  Apple sells how many millions of
units per quarter?  How many millions of units per quarter too of
Androids are sold globally?  Then there's Microsoft...and they sell what
and how much?  It's looking to me that they are loosing the war and this
may be a last ditch effort at gaining a lock on ARM.  I don't think
consumers would go for it and don't think manufacturers would go for it
for that reason.  

I work for a manufacturer and we build with UEFI enabled systems.  All
are open, unrestrictive and free for further development so they are OS
agnostic for the most part.  We have Windows 8 in the lab for testing
(it sucks too that I've seen) but it's not the mainstream part of my
sandbox these days.  The bulk of our clients go with Linux or XP.  Very
few with Windows 7...none with Vista that I have ever seen.

I applaud the efforts of the FSF and will support it...but feel the
greater public will not embrace Windows 8 as it is coming onto the scene
a bit late and they (the mobile media hungry public) already get their
appetites whet from Android and Apple....

I could be completely wrong and off-base, but that would be my take.
Personally, I think Microsoft is nearing it's end in the desktop OS
scheme and will only be found in the gaming sector.  

Rant over....cheers!

RinL
 

On Thu, 2012-03-01 at 11:27 -0500, Jim Kinney wrote:



> Ah. Videos online. The bane of freedom-friendly software everywhere. 
> 
> Yep. Can't have unlicensed people looking at the stuff we post for
> free. So we make 'em pay twice, once for the codec and again for the
> extra bandwidth for the encryption.



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