What annoys you most about your culture?

[Vykromond]

LOLz wthi all these wordz in this thred u coud write a book AMIRITE !!!

i lafed

[Mantra-Slider]

it annoys me that whenever I go abroad theres always alot of other swedes doing the same thing. stay the fuck home morons, let me be the one travelling!

[Da1andonly]

It annoys me that we have ridiculously high taxes on alcohol and cigarette's cos its "bad for your health".

Yes. I'm pretty sure we have higher taxes than you have, though

[Foreign]

I never implied that anyone will 'hold a gun to your head' if you didn't use their product. But you cannot deny the simple fact that Microsoft is in just about every home and school in North America, as well all across the globe. We live in a society that teaches us how to use Microsoft's functions, we are expected to know how to use this program to help us enter the work force. I completely agree with you that its up to the consumer to control this market, but its not always that easy of an answer. The simple answer is for people to use an operating system other than Windows but the truth is not a lot of people would waste their time learning how to use another operating system. I also believe that a lot of people would not see the benefit since they will most likely never in the next ten years have to use anything besides Windows. I know some jobs require you to use Apple such as Broadcast Journalism or Digital Editing but nine times out of ten you'll be using Microsoft.

Its ridiculous to assume that Microsoft would ever drive their prices as high as the cost of a car, but they could steadily increase their prices over time by 5 percent each year and you wouldn't see a HUGE outrage immediately. At least not outrage in the way that corporations boycott Windows all together.

It's not getting used to the new OS that is hard nowadays, it's getting people to try it. The problem with free operating systems currently is that they come in so many flavors, so finding the right one is a little tricky. Depending on your culture, many won't be bothered to actually do some studying and God forbid work as opposed to spending hundreds of dollars for no reason. That said, as long as the price of the OS doesn't out-pace the efficiency gains that come from it (from a business standpoint), there is no reason to change unless it can be relatively inexpensive. The peculiarity in operating systems, though, is the enormous open source community dedicated to improving on them.

Speaking of which, it just occurred to me that Vista might spell Microsoft's doom. Why? It enforces better software programming practices and standards. One reason windows emulation (i.e. Wine) has been only moderately successful is the fact that windows applications have very loose standards in coding, memory usage, registry usage, etc. Vista breaks a lot of old software but enables free solutions like Wine to be more reliable in future releases. Before too long you'll be able to download a version of Ubuntu that not only looks and behaves akin to windows (and then some), but will also run all of the very necessary office applications as well. Microsoft's hold on the office application market isn't nearly as strong.

As for the price argument, there is no such thing as an acceptable price increase in computer software or hardware. As technology improves prices are expected to drop, not rise. Any increase in price would be a red flag to consumers on its own. For example, the $140 I spent two years ago on a 35GB 10K rpm hard drive was good to buy me twice that capacity a couple weeks ago when I ordered a new one.

And there is the fact that most versions of an operating system don't last long enough for any gradual price increase to have a real effect. The reality would be to just charge an extreme amount for a new version (real life example: Vista). Businesses easily respond to that by just not upgrading (real life example: Vista).

[Mantra-Slider]

It annoys me that we have ridiculously high taxes on alcohol and cigarette's cos its "bad for your health".

[Cops]

All redundancy aside, do you honestly think this is true? Would everyone buy a copy of Windows or Office for the same price they would buy a car even if it were the only purchasing option? No. Why? Because everyone besides Microsoft isn't incapable of creating an operating system. I think Jerome's argument is that there are always alternatives that prevent monopolies from being that extreme. Unless a law is passed saying "you must buy Microsoft products or you will die" people will have the freedom to create alternative solutions that don't require shelling out so much dough (i.e. free as in beer). So yes, Microsoft can charge whatever it wants, monopoly or not, but at least in the realm of computer software consumers have control of the market, not the corporations.

I never implied that anyone will 'hold a gun to your head' if you didn't use their product. But you cannot deny the simple fact that Microsoft is in just about every home and school in North America, as well all across the globe. We live in a society that teaches us how to use Microsoft's functions, we are expected to know how to use this program to help us enter the work force. I completely agree with you that its up to the consumer to control this market, but its not always that easy of an answer. The simple answer is for people to use an operating system other than Windows but the truth is not a lot of people would waste their time learning how to use another operating system. I also believe that a lot of people would not see the benefit since they will most likely never in the next ten years have to use anything besides Windows. I know some jobs require you to use Apple such as Broadcast Journalism or Digital Editing but nine times out of ten you'll be using Microsoft.

Its ridiculous to assume that Microsoft would ever drive their prices as high as the cost of a car, but they could steadily increase their prices over time by 5 percent each year and you wouldn't see a HUGE outrage immediately. At least not outrage in the way that corporations boycott Windows all together.

[Scurvy]

haha, i think we both just went into a Zappa phase, check my facebook quotes :P

your whole life should be a zappa phase.

[Jerome Scuggs]

lol?

haha, i think we both just went into a Zappa phase, check my facebook quotes :P

[DoTheFandango]

SORRY I CAN'T HEAR YOU I'M SWIMMING IN CRUDE OIL.

lol?

[Squeezer]

Clitoris?

I wish

[Troll King]

It's right on the tip of my tongue.

Clitoris?

[gran guerrero]

What's that phrase people usually use when they disagree on something that's pretty much impossible?

It's right on the tip of my tongue.

skeptical?

[Liquid Blue]

agree to disagree

[Squeezer]

What's that phrase people usually use when they disagree on something that's pretty much impossible?

It's right on the tip of my tongue.

[Arikel]

what about de beers?

dont they control a huge percentage of the worlds diamonds? dont they only release a small percentage of the diamonds they own to keep prices high?

could that be called a monopoly that keeps the price elevated?

Yes it was like that untill a few years ago.
You can say De Beers has the monopoly of the diamond market. They held such power over the market that they used to only invite a select few companies and estabilish the prices at wich they had to sell their diamonds. They literally owned the mines in south africa.