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Journal twitter's Journal: Vista Failure Log. 16

Vista has failed [officialy] and M$ may soon go out of business. This is a list of failure and rejection news, written as it happened. Here is what Vista looks like to me. This is what it looks like to xkcd and having seen the single line of blinking text that Vista reduced a friend's computer to, I can agree. Vista is such a flop it can take M$ down, which would put an end to their attacks on free software, free software advocates and reasonable standards. Vista's failure is the predicted, practical result of a business model that tries to keep customers helpless and divided. Renaming Vista 6.1 to Windows 7 won't save it.

Most ammusing failure, 12/08/2008, Stephen Fry just wants one copy of Vista that works:

I hate Vista so much I want to cry. Bought a Vaio. The most useless $4k ever spent. It just will not join a sec-enabled network. ... I have nine macs!!!!!! I don't need another fucking mac. I just want ONE ARSING PC that isn't complete SHIT. ... Too late. It's going out the window. I can't put up with this sort of arse. Listemn I have parallels, I have fusion, I have 2 distros of Linux. I need jsut one, just 1 of cunting Vista so that I can review things. Forgive intemperate language, but every time I buy a PC they're worse, not better than they were before and it make me so angry I could kill. ... I've calmed down now. Vista and PCs are so crap it's funny

Here's a more technical discussion of the same problems.

The six year development was troubled and expensive. There were signs that nothing important had changed. Promissed features evaporated and those that came through were downright creepy.

Then came real use and real problems for users: security problems, devices not working, features dropped, competitors run off and high costs.

The list keeps growing as people report Vista problems and restrictions. See this list of 100 popular reactions to Vista. The most damning evidence of all comes from user videos. See the bugs for yourself in this list of Vista Sucks YouTube videos, I've collected more than 50 but there are more than a thousand of them and people keep adding new ones. On February 2, 2008 a new lowpoint was reached when it could honestly be argued that Vista is not as good as GNU/Linux for gaming. Yes, Vista is not even good for gaming. Understandably late to the list party, David M Williams's 100 reasons GNU/Linux is better than Vista is very amusing. The bottom line is that Vista demands total M$ control of your computer but this is an impossible task and the result is a system that's terminally buggy and slow. Read on now for a chronological listing of failure, rejection and revolt.

There was rejection and the revolt is ongoing.

Vista has failed and has become a synonym for tech disaster as M$ also fails. For nearly three years, Vista has been rejected by home users, business users, the mainstream and wintel press and is predictably far from their two year, 200,000,000 user goal, even after they lied about sales. SP1 was full of bugs and offered little improvement so people are still having experiences like this (8/4/2008) and this (12/09/2008). M$ would like to tell you it's all in your head, and is desperately trying to distract defectors with Windows 7. People are not just skipping Vista, they are getting out of the Windows world. Investors questioned M$'s place in the world and worth before the 24% decline in revenue. Because people are listening, I'll mark the next few stories. The real story is now the rise of GNU/Linux on the desktop.

Software Freedom is the only way to prevent abuses like M$ has pulled over the years. Faith in source code that can't be seen, modified and shared is misplaced.

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Vista Failure Log.

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  • Okay, let's see.

    1) The two BBC pieces are opinion pieces and don't reflect company policy. The first one continues to advocate Vista take up with reservations regarding driver compatibility which is not a Microsoft issue.

    2) The DoT said no based on compatibility issues, not reliability issues.

    3) "Vendors selling Vista with OSX screen shots" - how is this a Vista failing again?

    4) Oracle aren't even developing that program for other Unix-based systems - it's an advertising scheme to sell more Linux support.

    5)
    • Dedicated M$ defender, Macthorpe [slashdot.org] thinks Vista is doing well, despite it being the lowest selling version of Windows ever, a disappointment to the entire industry, [slashdot.org] and having zero impact on M$'s own bottom line [theregister.co.uk]. Funny, but I thought sales and revenue were what non free software was all about. What other measrue can there be? Let's have a look at his list of gripes, starting with what's not important.

      If I didn't mention something in particular, it's because it wasn't worth the time.

      You mean like the FA

      • You tried to refute my comments by posting pretty much dead on what you posted earlier, with as little proof and as much opinion as before, which draws me to the inevitable conclusion that you're batshit fucking insane.

        Of course the monopoly is over. There are alternatives to Windows. It doesn't mean you have to invent what you seem to take as personal sleights against yourself. People will continue to use Windows, and you need to get over it.
        • Of course the monopoly is over. There are alternatives to Windows. ... People will continue to use Windows, and you need to get over it.

          I'm perfectly happy for people to use what they want. The problem is that they don't have a choice due to vendor manipulation like ACPI insanity [slashdot.org] and ogg bans [theregister.co.uk]. Their ability to pull stuff like this is the only reason people "recommend" Windoze today.

          The end of the monopoly means M$ won't have ability to do this anymore. It's already happening because Vista is a market

          • You actually can't stop yourself, can you?

            Two more links that have been debunked time after time, and you didn't actually listen to a word I said. Not only that, you say the monopoly is over because users have a choice and then say they don't have a choice.

            Make up your mind.
            • by twitter ( 104583 )

              you say the monopoly is over because users have a choice and then say they don't have a choice.

              The monopoly is over because vendors now have a choice and are exercising it. This will, hopefully, lead to true user freedom. Users have a choice, but M$ tries as hard as they can to make anything but M$ difficult and punishes vendors who don't obey. The failure of Vista eliminates M$'s ability to punish vendors because no one is making money by obedience. There's still plenty of sabotaged hardware on the

              • Please give me one example in the last, say, 5 years of Microsoft actually punishing a vendor for not selling Windows.

                Please give me one example of hardware that Microsoft sabotaged.
                • by twitter ( 104583 )

                  Please give me one example in the last, say, 5 years of Microsoft actually punishing a vendor for not selling Windows.

                  2002, Whack Dell for selling gnu/linux [slashdot.org].

                  Please give me one example of hardware that Microsoft sabotaged.

                  Every piece of hardware is doomed by the upgrade train, some sooner than others. The same tricks that have been proved in court against vendors and specific software packages have been used against specific hardware companies. When Intel co-operated with the free software community

                  • So you can't provide an actual example of either, just an email full of bluster and more bullshit without sources. How typical.

                    No, I don't think it's so because I haven't seen any proof yet. Still waiting.
    • I checked one thing you said:

      8) One man at Acer expresses minor disappointment but Acer show no sign of moving away from Vista.

      That "one man" was Acer president Gianfranco Lanci. And the "minor disappointment" was, quote, "The whole industry is disappointed with Windows Vista".

      I'd say your credibility on this is shot, at least with me.

      I don't listen to a fanboi, no matter what his religion or political party.

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