Kort Explores conundrums of the human condition

I recently had to change Internet Service Providers due to a change in my former provider's server software. After several years as an "equal opportunity" service provider whose system was compatible with all systems that also complied with the open standard, the new Microsoft supplied server software will no longer work with non-Windows or Macintosh email software. My former service provider attempted to force me to chose between using the operating system I find best for my other computer activities, and the operating system I needed to access the Internet.

Unwilling to be manipulated, I elected to find a different Internet service provider. In my search I was dismayed and disturbed at the number of large services that have also become hostile to non-Microsoft/Apple systems. The fact that I'm sending this message indicates that I was ultimately able to find a real ISP running real Unix server software that still supports the open standards that have been so critically important to the growth and vitality of the Internet.

The Internet is one of the most unique creations of human technology, and from its modest beginnings has grown at a phenomenal rate to a point where its potential to change the very nature of human society has become clear to many. The very expression of chaos and anarchy in the minds of some, the Internet has provided an electronic common ground, owned and controlled by no one and welcoming all comers. Based primarily on servers running Unix, the originators of the global network defined an open standard that allowed the users of all types of computers and operating systems to freely participate in this new digital wonder of the modern world.

The greatest power and treasure of the Internet has been that it was created by the cooperation and shared efforts of literally millions of individuals and businesses around the globe. No one owned the resulting network because no one individual or business had intentionally built it or was supplying a critical level of support. The Internet was a clear demonstration of the old adage of the whole becoming far more than the sum of the individual parts.

But the tremendous value and potential of the unguarded common creation of the Internet has inevitably attracted the envy, greed, and fear of a variety of unsavory types. The unrestrained flow of information through the network has already triggered the fears of governments around the globe who have made efforts to throttle and control the knowledge that might reach their oppressed citizens. Moralists have attempted to claim that their potential use of the network gave them the right to impose their beliefs through censoring the information available to all users. While the ferocity of the attacks are increasing, the efforts of those seeking to control the content of the Internet have so far been frustrated by the exuberant anarchy and resilient nature of the network.

But a far more insidious threat to the Internet has been evolving behind the scenes - a venal effort to steal the defacto ownership of the Internet itself and distort this most powerful tool for humanity into a proprietary product serving to expand and enhance the power of the world's most predatory company. Microsoft first attempted to usurp and replace the Internet with its inferior alternative The Microsoft Network. Chastened by the world's rejection of their efforts, Microsoft was obliged to downgrade its failed Internet replacement into just another service provider in the real Internet.

The latest Microsoft efforts to turn the open standards of the Internet into a proprietary extension of their dominance in the desktop operating system market have focused on server software - the software at the heart of the network. While Unix was the dominant platform for Internet servers for years, Microsoft has been aggressively pushing its Windows based server software - especially targeting large service providers. And as has become typical of Microsoft products, its server software attempts to break the very standards that made the Internet worth stealing.

Microsoft got its start solely because of IBM's decision to embrace an open architecture in its first desktop computer. The open architecture allowed third party developers to participate in the resulting market, greatly accelerating the evolution of computer technology by adding their tremendous innovation to the core common ground defined by the open standard. Microsoft's Ms.Dos operating system became a logical extension of the open hardware standards, and Microsoft profited as a result.

But since the early days of apparent cooperation, Microsoft has changed from prospering by offering a level playing field for others to play on, to attempting to leverage its control over the playing field into control the game itself. Far from its early roots masquerading as the champion of open standards, Microsoft has now adopted a policy of breaking the very concept of open standards. Having exploited an open marketplace to grow into a huge and powerful company, Microsoft now seeks to slam the doors on its competitors and distort the formerly free marketplace into the same sort of single company dominated market that Microsoft decried when IBM was the dominate presence.

Those who have retained the wisdom of the value of open standards have become increasingly concerned over Microsoft's market manipulations. These enlightened people have proposed new open standards to restore the environment that has so benefited producers and consumers alike. With their arrogant dominance of the marketplace threatened by these new open standards, Microsoft has moved to break the new standards and pervert them into yet more Microsoft proprietary properties.

Java is a prime example of the new Microsoft strategy. Java was developed and released by Sun as a platform independent open standard. Microsoft took the Java standard and created a nonstandard implementation that it is now promoting against the original standard. Not surprisingly Java products built with the Microsoft nonstandard Java imitation won't run on non-Microsoft platforms, eliminating the core value and intention of the technology.

Microsoft's Internet server software is a similar attempt to pervert an established standard into a proprietary Microsoft property. Unlike the Unix software it seeks to replace, Microsoft's server software is incompatible with client systems running non-Microsoft or Apple operating systems. Microsoft's server software does support Apple products since of all the other competitors in the computer industries, Apple poses no real threat to Microsoft's control of the market.

Apple, once the beneficiary of the open standards it pioneered with its Apple II computers, has become Microsoft's token competition since it compromised its market acceptance by embracing a proprietary philosophy that shut out third party hardware and software manufacturers and relegated Macintosh products to an insignificant niche market. As a self destructive company, Apple provides useful token competition to deflect monopoly charges at little real cost to Microsoft - at least until Apple wakes up and once again opens their closed systems and participates in open standards.

Microsoft's intention is that in order to access the Internet a user will have to use Microsoft's operating system and other software. And since Microsoft's operating systems are built to be aggressively hostile toward any other operating system installed on the same computer, if a user must have Microsoft's operating system to access the Internet, they are likely to employ that same operating system for all of their computer use. Microsoft has also built preferences into its Internet access software to guide users to the sites and products it controls on the Net. As such Microsoft seeks to control not only the means of access but the manner and nature of Internet usage itself.

Not long ago the alleged inferior quality of Microsoft products provided the primary reason to avoid them. Microsoft's hostility toward open standards and free competition now adds the issues of principle and ethics to the ever growing list of reasons to avoid the third rate software products of the worlds most predatory company. Those who value the freedom of the Internet should also think very carefully about supporting those ISPs who are cooperating in corrupting the open standards that have made our connected community possible.