(I normally don’t resort to personal attacks, as I think they are not necessary to get my point across and will usually only degrade someone’s points, but this guy deserves it; he’s just that stupid).
For those of you that don’t know anything about Paul Thurrott (take note that he is actually respected in some corners of the Internet), consider yourself lucky that you haven’t had to read through his blather. But now, I’m going to subject you to some of it.
On Thursday, July 13th, he wrote this:
“Win 98 vs. Mac OS 9
The normally reliable Todd Bishop makes a good point, but trips up in one key area:
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On CNet’s Buzz out Loud podcast yesterday (a good daily tech-news show, if you’re not familiar with it), one listener called in with an interesting response to complaints about Microsoft ending support for Windows 98 and Windows Me.
“That would be like complaining that Apple no longer supports OS 9,” said the caller, Mike from New Jersey. He concluded: “Come on people, get with it.”
It is true that Windows 98 came out more than a year before Mac OS 9. But in response to the call, co-host Tom Merritt pointed out that Mac OS 9 doesn’t need regular security updates, unlike Windows 98.
I think it’s also worth noting that there have been five releases of Mac OS X in the past five years, since Microsoft released Windows XP.
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Daahhh…
In “off the top of my head” order:
1. Windows XP Professional x64 Edition
2. Windows XP Media Center Edition
3. Windows XP Media Center Edition 2004
4. Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005
5. Windows XP Tablet PC Edition
6. Windows XP Tablet PC Edition 2004
7. Windows XP Home and Professional N Editions
8. Windows XP with Service Pack 2 (SP2) (absolutely a discrete Windows version)
9. Windows XP Embedded
10. Windows Fundamentals for Legacy PCs
11. Windows XP Starter Edition
Please don’t try to tell me that the sum of the changes in each of these products is not greater than the changes that Apple has made to Mac OS X since 2001. It just ain’t true. Microsoft may not be as good as Apple as calling out every comma as a new feature, but let’s just stop the silliness about 5 year breaks between Windows releases. That isn’t what happened. There’s been a five year break between truly revolutionary new Windows versions, but many of these releases–Media Center, and Tablet PC anyone?–include huge and innovative functional changes.
All that said, yes, Windows 98 requires all kinds of security patching that would never have been an issue in Mac OS 9. But there are also 75 million people still using Windows 98 worldwide today. Apple would kill to have that kind of usage statistic on a brand new OS, let alone one that’s being retired. That, more than anything, explains the true difference between the Mac and Windows worlds.”
-source
Honestly, how this guy gets any respect at all, I have no idea. He should clearly be defined as a moron, no matter what biases you have towards any operating system.
Observe number 8 in his list of “Windows operating system releases.” So, when you bundle security fixes with an operating system it becomes a new operating system release, does it? And only 5 releases of Mac OS X in the past 5 year? Hmm, it looked like you really FUBARed that one, Paul. So we can count Windows XP with SP2, but not OS X 10.0 – 10.0.4, 10.1 – 10.1.5, 10.2 – 10.2.8, 10.3. – 10.3.9, and 10.4 – 10.4.7? Gee, Paul, I count 38 releases of Mac OS X according to your own logic.
And if you check out number 11, Windows XP starter edition, you can get the feeling that now he’s just getting desperate.
The fact is that every single operating system of the 11 he mentioned were variations of Windows XP. Can I say that when Apple released Front Row, it should be counted as a new OS? So, 39 releases of OS X now.
And Paul, you dare to tread on the “security by obscurity” argument? Come now, you don’t believe that drivel, do you? Ever heard of Microsoft IIS? There’s more exploits for it than there are for Apache, even though Apache is more widely used. Right now, OS X and Linux represent a challenge to those that wish to see it fail, and/or those that write malware. There have been no self-propagating OS X or Linux viruses; only proof of concept ones. While I’m absolutely sure it’s possible to make one, at this time, they just don’t exist. So, don’t make me laugh, Paul.
Windows in the right hands is fine (like yours, I’m sure), but in the hands of the general public, it’s proven to be a disaster. I work at a computer help desk at a decent sized university and the problems I’ve seen originating from Windows security vulnerabilites are just staggering. I’ve seen Windows installations become corrupted somehow, where the only way to fix them was a reinstall. Yet, the worst problem I’ve had with OS X has been removing someone’s preset PPPoE settings so they could connect to the Internet now that they lived on campus and didn’t use that PPPoE connection.
I’ve never seen a Linux kernel panic in person. How is it that Windows drivers (made by Microsoft or not) can cause so many Windows kernel panics, yet Linux drivers don’t? And don’t get me started on the “invincible” registry, as I’ve once heard it called. Microsoft’s impossible attempts at backwards compatibility are laughable, at best.
I’m not even saying this because I hate Microsoft. Quite the contrary, in fact. I just hate total fanboys (read: Paul Thurrott) that try to appear like they are fair and that they are a good source of information.
I use Windows XP on a daily basis by choice. I’ve got Linux installed, sure, but I’d rather deal with the occasional Explorer crash, which is usually the worst problem I have with Windows, than having to learn endless terminal commands or edit endless configuration files just to use the software I want to use on Linux.
So as a computer enthusiast, not as an OS X, Linux, or Windows enthusiast, you, Paul Thurrott, fail at knowing what the f**k you are talking about.
