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[Anil Bawa <anil AT quotesque.net>]

Thanks Jonas for forwarding this on, and to Stuart and Improbulus for taking
the time to comment. A quick response below. May I append this thread to the
published comments on the site?

Improbulus wrote:

> what is
> more important is explaining to users what's in it for them - why should
> they bother to switch?

Stuart wrote:

> I suspect that campaigning for microsoft licensees to move to other
> platforms simply because microsoft is microsoft is unlikely to be
> productive unless people see a genuine gain to themselves from
> making the swap.

Agreed. The emphasis in all this is on end-user gains. Taking a look at the
repertoire of desktop applications and web services provided by microsoft,
there appear to be clear advantages for the casual home user in switching to
alternatives. I have picked out Microsoft applications because they are
particularly poorly designed, not really motivated by the user's needs and
extremely popular. Lots of home users have also not paid explicitly for
microsoft licenses, but rather found themselves using the O/S bundled with
the purchase of their intel box.

> It's interesting that Anil mentioned Gmail as an alternative to Hotmail,
> it's not MS but it's not open source either is it??

This re-iterates my point - this is not an exercise in anti-microsoft
propaganda or corporate ethics. The only motivation is promoting
user-centric software design. I can see clear benefits to the end-user in
switching from hotmail to gmail. It's simply a better webmail tool.

As i've stated in my post - it is important, in writing these how-to's, to
clearly illustrate the benefits to the casual home-user.

I hope you guys are on-board to write one how-to each!

Granted, it takes longer than 30 minutes to knock one up. I'm just trying to
encourage people. Smart people are always full of excuses. Don't you think?

Anil.

+      anil bawa : quoteunquote

~      anil AT quotesque.net
~      http://www.quotesque.net
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