🚀 go-pugleaf

On Sun, 11 Jan 1998 05:03:15, chucks@isd.net_x (Erik Funkenbusch) wrote:

> >
> >It is correct that once a company becomes dominant enough they can ignore 
> >standards that are good for customers and good for the industry.  That is 
> >what we have anti-trust legislation for.
>  
> Just because there is a standard that may or may not be good for
> customers, doesn't mean that a proprietary solution isn't also good
> for the customers.
>  
> VHS was an "open" standard.  Beta was not.  Beta was clearly a better
> format.  

The problem with Beta was the tapes were too short.  They wouldn't hold a 
feature length movie at first.  By the time they did they had lost.

> The PC architecture was an "open" standard.  Most others were not.
> The PC architecture has tons of problems dating back to it's first
> designs.  

The PC was not an "open" standard.  After it was successful the Bios was 
reverse engineered and it effectively became one.  Which was good.  It 
lowered the prices for PCs.  Open standards will lower prices for OS's even
more since they do not really require any tangible material to replicate.

> Examples like these show clearly that open can succeed even though
> it's not in the customers best interest.
 
I fail to see an example that was not in the customer's best interest.  If 
what you are saying is that later on a better thing came around that the 
"open" standard that is probably true, but those who try to establish open 
standards work very hard at trying to select the "best" technology 
available at the time.   That is what the Java consortium is all about.

Bob O - Computing for fun