Path: utzoo!attcan!telly!lethe!yunexus!ists!network.admin.ists.ca!terry
From: terry@network.admin.ists.ca (Terry Lim)
Newsgroups: comp.std.misc
Subject: Re: UNIX International / OSF Question?
Summary: There was a tribe of liars, see, and one of truthtellers...
Keywords: OSF, UI, pseudo standards
Message-ID: <11387@ists.ists.ca>
Date: 8 Aug 90 20:02:09 GMT
References: <776@tfsg.UUCP> <13394@yunexus.YorkU.CA>
Sender: news@ists.ists.ca
Reply-To: terry@ists.ists.ca (Terry Lim)
Organization: Institute for Space and Terrestrial Science
Lines: 45

In article <13394@yunexus.YorkU.CA> davecb@yunexus.YorkU.CA
(David Collier-Brown) writes:

>  Be warned: the dichotomy is deliberate, and is strongly approved
>of by marketers of proprietary software who are overreacting to the
>spectre of someone else's operating system running on their precious
>hardware (:-)).
>  You can 
>	1) pick and chose technology on its own merits, and know that
>	   vendors will be forced to support it if really is worthwhile
>	   (ie, the normal pre-war assumption)

As Humpty Dumpty would say, the words "merits" and "worthwhile" mean
just what one chooses here, especially since Dave and I are in agreement
that it's a market, rather than a technical, issue.  But then the market
is exactly what elevates technical gimmickry to "technology".  I can
hear the angry mob in the background, but it is my opinion that the IBM
PC was a classic case of technology which "made it" for much more than
reasons of technical superiority over its competitors.

>	2) apply political/purchasing pressure on the two antagonists
>	   to force them into bed together.

Sort of.  Personally, I doubt any group we could assemble would be
large/loud enough to make a jot of difference.  As they say in Africa,
when the elephants fight, it is the grass that suffers.  What we have
to do (somehow!) is to adjust the balance of power so that the process
becomes consumer- rather than producer- driven. This means gravitating
away from market forces toward "purely technical" natural selectors for
technological evolution.

>  This is not a discussion of standards: its a discussion about
>market power.

Not so bad in itself, provided marketing boards stop masquerading as
standards bodies.  As it stands, vendors drive standards which drive
Fortune 500/govt/big spenders which drive trends which drive small
spenders.

All of which means that the original poster's question is still good:

Whom do we watch and follow?

Terry Lim (not the answer to the question!)
terry@ists.ists.ca