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An Open Letter:
To the managers of Corel and Adobe:
Dear Persons:
You people are fools. I will go so far as to say, you are damn fools. You jealously guard your little secrets from each other. You play the self defeating competitors game. You treat each other as adversaries while your real adversary is systematically devouring your market share.
Why don't you get your heads out of your rectums and take a look around. Look before it's too late? Gates and his company are eating the world alive while you squabble over your ever diminishing market share. Microsoft is your real adversary. It grows over the world like a fungus. Against that giant threat you are natural allies. How many companies is Gates going to have to devour before you come to your senses? When are you going to realize that you are not too big for him to swallow?
Between you, you have it within your scope and power to send MS Windows the way of CPM. You have it in your power to change the face of the PC industry. You have the power to take the control away from the bullies and give it back to the PC users. You need not do anything spectacular. You don't have to do anything but agree.
What you need to do is to agree on a single version of the Linux OS. To do that, you need only form a consortium team to agree on the best versions of what you already have. Create a Linux which is easy to install with a decent GUI. Then give it away. Port your software to it and start to cash in as the people who are sick to death of the bullies flock to your doors.
Here is a reality. Between you two, you have a product line which equals and, in most areas, surpasses everything that Microsoft can offer. We at Wesoomi are a small publisher. Let's look at the product list which we find useful.
To start, Microsoft has a historically notoriously unstable OS. You will have the very stable Linux. No contest!
Microsoft has Microsoft office. We use WordPerfect Office. I think it's a compatible, possibly superior product.
You have PageMaker which we use for our book and document layouts. Microsoft has something similar to PrintShop I guess?
You have several excellent art and graphics tools. we use some of them. What does Microsoft offer? Very little.
You have several web authoring tools. This give us choices. Microsoft has Frontpage. Those who use it say its okay.
We use your products. We even like your products, but we are
under a Windows handicap.
They tell us to upgrade because this new version is really solid.
I've heard that bull before. PC Magazine and PC World and all
the others say that this one is really stable and crash proof
and all that bull. It is bull. Everyone knows it's bull. In a
few more days they will have to begin slipping in retractions
and yeah, buts. "Well there are a few exceptions, but it
really is great." Sure! They have been laying that crap on
us ever since the first upgrade to Windows. And now Gates has
new rules wherein we must beg his permission to install what we
have already paid for. I say, Bull!
This cooperative Linux is not something you can do overnight. That s true. There are issues to be resolved and some of them are difficult. There are compatibility issues for hardware. There are lots of drivers involved. You already make some drivers. You know how. You know the issues. The alternative is to be slowly strangled to death by Microsoft. For God's sake, you know his MO. You know his intent. Don't take cover, take action.
If you establish a single solid version of Linux as a viable alternative to Windows it will be accepted; perhaps not overnight, but soon. Sooner or later, If the hardware vendors want to have the full market, they will need to be Linux compatible. They will have to make drivers. If not, they will lose a large share of their market to those who will do it.
For me and, I suspect, others, selecting your software to use
within a really stable and open operating system is a no brainer.
The switch will be gradual at first, but it will quickly build
into an avalanche. Get with it!
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