Read this article: http://english.chosun.com
Although the article seems to be focusing on MP3 Players, a small paragraph further down the page mentions the following:
"Meanwhile, some financial institutions and Internet portals are working on their websites to make them compatible with the new OS, as Internet banking and electronic payment services were found to be unavailable on computers that operate Windows Vista."
Let's focus on this quickly: I remember sometime ago, I was trying to read news on http://msnbc.com (which is a Microsoft owned news reporting website) and I remember being rejected from the website which mentioned with no shame: "You will not be able to view this website unless you run a Microsoft Windows operating system!". How's that for discrimination on the Internet?
I understand that there is and has been an existing browser war and we're all fighting as developers and designers to keep things working (thanks to Microsoft). Now, we basically have to re-develop to be compatible with a whole Operating System? Not just the Browser? What has the world come to? This does not make business sense but I think that WE (designers, developers and the likes) should stop trying to make our works compatible with products from an organization that does not even try to follow any of the recommended standards!
Actually, I think I am going to start a new website with a forum and a petition for developers not to follow or help Microsoft by changing or rebuilding or redesigning their websites. We cannot let Microsoft bully the world and do things as they like just because they hold the OS monopoly. The only way to stop them dead on their track is by not considering anything they "shit" out of that Redmond campus of theirs!
So, to all of you reading this post: Web developers should unite and fight against Microsoft Bully-ism! If we do not stop them now, we might never get the chance to do that again in a long time (that is till their next upgrade to IE 8 which from what I've been reading around will take web incompatibility to new heights).
As a matter of fact, every website that wishes to participate in this should have a footer note in addition to the usual ones that says "Windows Vista Upgrade => Web Suicide".
Just my 2-cent worth of opinion on what Microsoft is doing to the world.
Regards,
Shaolin H4Xor.
I just want to add my vote of support for this. As many people as possible need to start cleaning up their act by following open standards and not implementations.
ReplyDeleteI think we need to give supporters of proprietary formats the finger and educate the masses on the dangers of this evil.