Re: Microsoft Gadgets

TravelinMan wrote: 
In article <csma-70CA29.22325513092005@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>,
 Oxford  <csma@xxxxxxx> wrote:

Word for Word from Microsoft's New Gadgets Page:

"Have you ever wondered how new technologies get developed in Microsoft? Wonder how a cool idea goes from incubation to release? Well, were excited to announce that weve started a blog designed to bring you closer to the process with the Gadgets blog and were kicking it off at the PDC.

What are Gadgets? Gadgets are a new category of mini-application designed to provide information, useful lookup, or enhance an application or service on your Windows PC or the Web."

http://microsoftgadgets.com/

You can add your comments here :)

http://microsoftgadgets.com/blogs/gadgetnews/comments/3.aspx 

But on the plus side, they're learning to copy faster.

It took them 12 years to get even mediocre Plug and PLay and a half-way decent GUI. It only took them a year to copy Widgets.

Don't forget where Apple copied THEIR widgets from: They got the idea from the creators of Konfabulator, not their own software labs. Not only that, but Apple refused to pay Konfabulator licensing fees when they stole the idea from them. This may have been Konfabulator's fault, however. They didn't pursue patent claims when Apple came up with widgets. Or, they may have, and Apple actually got the right to use them from Konfabulator. I'm sure a few bucks changed hands, but very quietly.

Now, Yahoo owns the patents since Konfabulator sold them to Yahoo. I'm sure that neither Bill or Steve want to pay any patent license fees to Yahoo.

If truth be told, everybody copies everybody else and claims the idea for themselves. This has happened since the beginning of the computer revolution, and I am sure it will happen again and again until the end of Time. The fact, is, software developers are ALL NOTORIOUS thieves, just like comedians. So Microsoft is being no different than Apple when it comes to copying ideas. If I'm not mistaken, both the Commodore Amiga and the Atari 500 had a windowed OS about the same time as the Lisa (Apple's first REAL PC with a true windowed environment.) I really liked the Lisa when it came out, but it was SO EXPENSIVE it was completely beyond my capabilities. Of course, all computers were beyond my capabilities at that time, except for a C64 or a tiny Timex-Sinclair with the chicklet-keys.

EVERYBODY copied the idea of of a windowed environment and mice from Xerox's Palo Alto Research Center labs. So Mac fanatics shouldn't be so hoity-toity. If Xerox ever wanted to pursue their patents, they could put EVERY OS manufacturer on the planet in a world of hurt. Imagine, both BILL AND STEVE would have to pay license fees to Xerox to continue producing their Operating Systems. But they were good sports, unlike either Bill or Steve, and remained quiet while BOTH of them stole Xerox's ORIGINAL work.

Too bad Xerox didn't see the value of their original ideas in those wild and wooly 70s. We would probably have entirely different OSes than either OSX or Microsoft Windows. But NO ONE really saw the potential value of ANY small computer in those days. The great majority thought of computers as HUGE things filling up whole buildings, with white-coated scientists or technicians operating them. Only science-fiction writers considered computers as something everyone could someday use .

I kind of liked the original GEOS OS for the Commodore 64 in the mid-80s, when I could even get it to load off the floppy. That was in the early days of floppies, when floppies were only single-sided and not very dependable. How Commodore got so much on such a small floppy, I will never know.

Anyway, I hope I've given you a few things to think about.

==
Donald L McDaniel
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