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What about us computer USERS ?



 
 
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  #16  
Old October 17th 15, 10:06 PM posted to alt.windows7.general
Stan Brown
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Default What about us computer USERS ?

On Sat, 17 Oct 2015 08:52:28 -0400, Wolf K wrote:
OP didn't whine, he expressed his frustration. He's unusual only in
expressing his frustration here.


Someone who reports an actual problem, with reasonable details, is
asking for help and will usually get it.

Someone who just whines about unspecified "problems" is indeed
whining.

--
Stan Brown, Oak Road Systems, Tompkins County, New York, USA
http://BrownMath.com/
http://OakRoadSystems.com/
Shikata ga nai...
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  #17  
Old October 17th 15, 10:07 PM posted to alt.windows7.general
Stan Brown
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Default What about us computer USERS ?

On Sat, 17 Oct 2015 09:12:12 -0600, Ken Springer wrote:
I'm not so sure freeware will disappear, they'll probably just modify
there user agreements. I don't remember which one it was at the moment,
but I loaded a Linux Live CD or something free to play with, and it had
a statement that amounted to there was no warranty of anything. How can
you be held accountable when you say your product isn't guaranteed to do
much of anything. G


And of course Microsoft's EULAs say essentially the same thing -- if
our software causes a problem, it's your tough luck. That's standard
in the industry, and has been for the 30+ years that I've owned PCs.

--
Stan Brown, Oak Road Systems, Tompkins County, New York, USA
http://BrownMath.com/
http://OakRoadSystems.com/
Shikata ga nai...
  #18  
Old October 18th 15, 12:35 AM posted to alt.windows7.general
Nil[_5_]
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Default What about us computer USERS ?

On 17 Oct 2015, Wolf K wrote in
alt.windows7.general:

You still don't get it. I don't think you ever will.


It seems that neither will you.

If someone comes here looking for assistance they will likely get a
good effort from several people. If they just want to whinge, they
should go somewhere else. It's their choice.
  #19  
Old October 18th 15, 06:18 AM posted to alt.windows7.general
SPD[_2_]
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Default What about us computer USERS ?


"Mayayana" wrote in message
...
| The free market will weed out inferior software.

You mean like the way it caught the VW scam?
Or maybe the way the free market gives me a choice
of 2 duopoly companies for phone service, which both
charge the same price that keeps going up? Or maybe
you're referring to the way that Microsoft has managed
to charge outrageous prices for their monopoly office
software for decades. Did you imagine that was due to
the free market and not their carefully planned non-
compatibility and market power? (Is it the free market
at work when college students are forced to buy MS
Office in order to do their work?)

The valorization of so-called "free market" has given
us Apple lock-in while legalized slave labor builds their
iPhones and legal offshoring of profits allows them to
legally evade taxes.

Free market thinking gave us NAFTA, which drove
jobs out of the US, to Mexico where it's legal to
exploit employees more. (I once read an article detailing
how HP had a plant over the border in Mexico, all
ready to go online within a week of NAFTA passing.)
NAFTA helped big corporations, but did it help the
US economy or society? A relevant question in the
face of the new NAFTA -- the Pacific trade agreement.

| Expecting governments to do anything more efficiently
| than the free market seems somewhat misguided.

Why? The free market has given us Turing Pharmaceuticals
in the past month, bought out by a hedge fund manager
who's now hiking the prices, while the gov't seems helpless
to stop him. (Just search for Turing price hikes. You'll find
plenty of links.) Would you feel the same way if you needed
a pill that had just gone from $13.50 to $750 per pill, not
covered by your insurance, under a "free market" system
that gives you no recourse?

Software liability is certainly a tricky issue, but in this
crazed election season it's worth remembering that we don't
have only two options, between the extremes of total gov't
control or lack of it. Capitalism, socialism and free market
economy and just some of the trigger words that have
become grossly oversimplified and distorted by two sides
yelling at each other. "Free market" with no regulation is
simply a return to barbaric king-of-the-hill society, where
kings and warlords rule -- whether by sword or by lawsuit.


This is a very sensible and accurate post.


  #20  
Old October 18th 15, 06:22 AM posted to alt.windows7.general
SPD[_2_]
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Default What about us computer USERS ?


"Stormin' Norman" wrote in message
...
On Sat, 17 Oct 2015 13:52:18 -0400, Wolf K wrote:

On 2015-10-17 09:36, Stormin' Norman wrote:
On Sat, 17 Oct 2015 08:52:28 -0400, Wolf K wrote:

you will see pressure to invalidate the EULA clauses
that abrogate any liability for consequential damages, a provision that
amounts to an admission that the computer will fail. The EU has already
taken steps to make software and hardware vendors more liable.

The above will only serve to dramatically increase prices, will probably
destroy the concept of freeware or
open source software and result in far less flexible, more
appliance-like, software.

In general, more regulation on the free-market stifles innovation,
reduces competition and ends up costing us
all much more in the long run.

Save regulations for those things which threaten life and limb. The
free market will weed out inferior
software. Expecting governments to do anything more efficiently than
the free market seems somewhat
misguided.


Ah, if only there were in fact a free market. It's an ideal more
honoured in the breach than th'observance, to quote somebody or other. ;-)


A specious argument. My business is part of the free market, I operate in
it everyday. Sometimes I win,
sometimes I lose, but everyday it is up to me which happens.


You're funny. Microsoft is one of the most successful things in the history
of the universe. But it has only done two or three things right and is
living proof that the Govt is frequently as efficient as private sector
entities. If you get the govt out of business, you have some tycoon
deciding how much you have to pay for bandwidth. And everything else.


  #21  
Old October 18th 15, 07:48 AM posted to alt.windows7.general
masonc
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Posts: 152
Default What about us computer USERS ?

On Fri, 16 Oct 2015 00:03:01 -0700, masonc
wrote:

All well and good to spend time solving Windows 7 problems
What about workers (like me) who just want to get work done on their
computers?
Because my 11-year-old HP XP was slow and had symptoms of failing
disk, I sprung for a big Dell and Windows 7.

I get problem after problem after problem and no work done.
I have learned to keep a log of solutions: my "Win7 Manual"

I must *permanently* keep my xx XP machine on hand, as I see
others doing.

At what point will there be a huge class lawsuit? The damages that
Microsoft are causing must be in the $billions.


Wow, my troll started a great thread. Very interesting. Some of you
would find my "The Liberal Case for Conservatism" book interesting.

I do ask for specific help, but mostly Google for it. In every case,
someone else has had the same problem. In some cases there is/was no
solution (and don't expect me to recite them for you).

I'll now post one for which I've found no solution (making a repair
disc).

Here's an amusing anecdote of no importance: I did a search for
"notebook.exe" and found 11 (eleven) of them. Eleven.

Theory: After the Vista disaster, Microsoft *threw together* Win7 in
a big hurry. Now they want to flush the Win7 pile by forcing us all
to Win10.

Incidentally, I *never* touch the registry manually or by any jokester
"Fix It" program. I do use Avast! and three junk cleaners that work.
It's incredible how verdant capitalism pushes adware.

  #22  
Old October 18th 15, 03:28 PM posted to alt.windows7.general
Mayayana
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Default What about us computer USERS ?

| Theory: After the Vista disaster, Microsoft *threw together* Win7 in
| a big hurry. Now they want to flush the Win7 pile by forcing us all
| to Win10.
|

I don't think many people would agree with that.
Back in the early-mid 2000s MS was working on
something like Metro, which they were calling Longhorn.
They had a plan to remake Windows as a sandboxed
trinket-app system running on top of .Net, which
in turn would run on top of Windows. Only Microsoft
would be able to actually access the system files --
like tablets and phones now.

The problem was that a .Net layer on top of the OS
was so bloated and resource hungry that they simply
couldn't make it work with the hardware of the time.
By about 2005 they decided to cut their losses and do
a "Longhorn reset". Vista was a relatively new version
of NT that was put together between that time and 2007.
Win7 is basically just Vista with some rough edges
removed. Most notably, people can adjust the nag
and restriction level in Win7, making it somewhat less
safe, but more usable and far less irritating. Metro is
pretty much what Longhorn was meant to be, albeit
a somewhat less ambitious version.

The move to Win10 is the latest, most extensive version
of what MS has tried to do with Active Desktop, Passport,
Hailstorm, Longhorn, SPOT watches and Metro -- Windows
as a service, not a tool. That's not a theory. It's been
clearly articulated in recent years by Microsoft, which
now call themselves a services and devices company. They
no longer even include software in that description.

| Incidentally, I *never* touch the registry manually or by any jokester
| "Fix It" program. I do use Avast! and three junk cleaners that work.
| It's incredible how verdant capitalism pushes adware.
|

You might find it worth your while to look into
some of those "jokester fix-its". Some of them could
help you to put a serviceable lock on your front door,
so to speak. What you're doing instead is to ignore
system maintenance while hiring several resource-hungry
thugs to help you kick out all the riff-raff who are
getting in. That's not a very efficient way to keep
house. The riff-raff often leave a mess behind, and
the thugs may end up breaking some china. At best
you've got a noisy, busy house unnecessarily.

I shudder to even imagine what kind of dubious
stuff you're installing to get so much adware hanging
around. Crapware isn't really an effect of "capitalism".
Usually it's a result of trying to get something for
nothing. Much of the Internet is built on the flim
flam model that exploits people's greed. You try to
grab a freebie trinket that's being held out while
the other person tries to pick your pocket, hoping
you'll be distracted by the trinket. Both sides are
trying to cheat the other.


  #23  
Old October 18th 15, 03:53 PM posted to alt.windows7.general
mechanic
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On Sat, 17 Oct 2015 17:07:45 -0400, Stan Brown wrote:

And of course Microsoft's EULAs say essentially the same thing --
if our software causes a problem, it's your tough luck. That's
standard in the industry, and has been for the 30+ years that
I've owned PCs.


Not working so well for VW though is it?
  #24  
Old October 18th 15, 04:28 PM posted to alt.windows7.general
Gene Wirchenko[_2_]
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Default What about us computer USERS ?

On Sat, 17 Oct 2015 14:12:53 -0400, "Mayayana"
wrote:

[snip]

I'm not so sure about that. If a contractor works
in a state with an implied warranty of 2 years, but
explicitly writes a one year warranty into his contract,
I expect the one year version would hold, since it was
signed and agreed to by the customer. It would
certainly hold if the law is written to say, "In the
absence of explicit warranty, a 2 year warranty shall
apply."


Some laws state that certain terms can not be signed away.

[snip]

Sincerely,

Gene Wirchenko
  #25  
Old October 19th 15, 11:34 AM posted to alt.windows7.general
Stan Brown
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On Sun, 18 Oct 2015 13:12:12 -0400, Wolf K wrote:
The Common Law principle is that you cannot agree to limit or reduce
your legal rights.



I'm sorry, but that's just not true. People do things every day --
quite legal things -- that limit their rights.

When you sign an apartment lease, you give up your legal rights to
dispose of your income as you choose, to keep a pet in your home,
etc.

When you sign a mortgage, you give up your legal right to live
without fire insurance, and you give up your legal right to pay your
own fire insurance.

--
Stan Brown, Oak Road Systems, Tompkins County, New York, USA
http://BrownMath.com/
http://OakRoadSystems.com/
Shikata ga nai...
  #26  
Old October 19th 15, 03:43 PM posted to alt.windows7.general
Mayayana
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Default What about us computer USERS ?

| The Common Law principle is that you cannot agree to limit or reduce
| your legal rights.
|
|
| I'm sorry, but that's just not true. People do things every day --
| quite legal things -- that limit their rights.

This is going way off track to no purpose. Whether
one can agree to be a slave, for instance, is not the
same as contract agreements.

This all started with a discussion of whether software
companies can disclaim liabitility for weaknesses in
software products. That's not talking about giving up
personal rights.

And, in fact, no one has yet detailed
exactly what liability we're talking about. Usefulness?
Security? It seems reasonable to me to make the claim
that the product makes no promise about usefulness
for a particular purpose, or security from malware
attacks. What *does* clearly limit personal rights
is licenses that go directly against fair use law,
such as license limiting serial installation and resale.
Microsoft licensed .Net with a clause that said one
forfeited the right to criticize it. Isn't that a 1st
amendment violation? (I can't quite see the Scalia
cartel putting a stop to it. Powerquest
licensed Drive Image with the claim that it could only
be used on one disk drive! Microsoft, to this day,
is licensing OEM Windows in viloation of fair use law.
I don't know of any legal threat to that license.


  #27  
Old October 20th 15, 11:33 AM posted to alt.windows7.general
Stan Brown
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On Mon, 19 Oct 2015 10:19:57 -0400, Wolf K wrote:
On 2015-10-19 08:56, Stormin' Norman wrote:
[quoted text muted]
Wolf's statement is essentially correct. He omitted one word which was easily inferred from the context. I
have corrected it below.

The Common Law principle is that you cannot agree to limit or reduce your 'enumerated' legal rights.


Thanks, Norman. "Enumerated rights" include any that have been
established by precedent.


Care to give a legally valid definition of "enumerated legal rights"?
I doubt you can. I'm not a lawyer, but I'm a well-read layman, and
as far as I know that is not a legal term.

The ordinary English meaning of "enumerated" (which might not be the
legal meaning, if it had one) would be pretty much the opposite of
rights "established by precedent".

Using the ordinary English meaning of enumerated, we would include
the First Amendment. And here is another counter-example to your
claim: Every employee at the NSA, every person with a security
clearance, every deployed soldier, has agreed to limit his or her
legal right to free speech by _not_ talking about certain topics.



--
Stan Brown, Oak Road Systems, Tompkins County, New York, USA
http://BrownMath.com/
http://OakRoadSystems.com/
Shikata ga nai...
  #28  
Old October 20th 15, 09:46 PM posted to alt.windows7.general
J. P. Gilliver (John)
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Default What about us computer USERS ?

In message , Stan Brown
writes:
[]
When you sign a mortgage, you give up your legal right to live
without fire insurance, and you give up your legal right to pay your
own fire insurance.

I think not in the UK; I'm not sure specifically about fire insurance,
but we have legislation that specifically forbids mortgage lenders
specifying which insurance provider you must use, after a spate of abuse
(or perceived abuse - I think at least some of it was genuine) of such
arrangements by some providers (of mortgages and insurance).

They can still insist you _have_ insurance which otherwise you might
not, but they can't make you buy it from them.
--
J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf

Experience is the comb life gives you after you lose your hair. -Judith Stearn
  #29  
Old October 22nd 15, 03:23 AM posted to alt.windows7.general
Stan Brown
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On Tue, 20 Oct 2015 21:46:16 +0100, J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:
In message , Stan Brown
writes:
[]
When you sign a mortgage, you give up your legal right to live
without fire insurance, and you give up your legal right to pay your
own fire insurance.

I think not in the UK; I'm not sure specifically about fire insurance,
but we have legislation that specifically forbids mortgage lenders
specifying which insurance provider you must use, after a spate of abuse
(or perceived abuse - I think at least some of it was genuine) of such
arrangements by some providers (of mortgages and insurance).

They can still insist you _have_ insurance which otherwise you might
not, but they can't make you buy it from them.


Just like the US, in other words.

Perhaps you were misled by my "pay your own fire insurance". The
usual practice here is that the homeowner signs up for fire
insurance, the insurance company asks which bank holds the mortgage,
and bills are sent to the bank.

I say "usual practice"; doubtless there are exceptions. I was one, in
my first house in the 1970s. The bank actually failed to pay the fire
insurance, despite reminders from me. After my home was uninsured, I
argued successfully that I was more responsible about it than they
were. Amazingly, they agreed, and allowed me to pay my own insurance
after that.


--
Stan Brown, Oak Road Systems, Tompkins County, New York, USA
http://BrownMath.com/
http://OakRoadSystems.com/
Shikata ga nai...
  #30  
Old October 22nd 15, 05:37 PM posted to alt.windows7.general
Ken Springer[_2_]
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Default What about us computer USERS ?

On 10/22/15 7:35 AM, Stormin' Norman wrote:
On Wed, 21 Oct 2015 22:19:34 -0400, Stan Brown wrote:



You do know that the Declaration of Independence has zero legal
force, right?



Stan, your statement is not entirely correct. At the time it was ratified, the Declaration of Independence
served as a legal expression of international sovereignty, formally separating the thirteen colonies (as the
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA) from the authority of, and breaking all political ties with, the Crown. Enforcement
of this legal document took the form of the Revolutionary War.

Those who ratified the Declaration were the legally elected or appointed representatives of each of the
thirteen colonies.

In addition to my comments above, I offer the following for your consideration:


Hi, Norman,

An "Ah, but" comment or two...

Professor John Eidsmoe , Professor of Law at Faulkner University School of Law, writes:

"The role of the Declaration of Independence in American law is often misconstrued. Some believe the
Declaration is simply a statement of ideas that has no legal force whatsoever today. Nothing could be further
from the truth. The Declaration has been repeatedly cited by the U.S. Supreme Court as part of the fundamental
law of the United States of America .


My read of the Professor's statement is the Declaration is not
necessarily legal, just the ideas expressed is part of the "fundamental
law of the United States of America." Professor Eidsmoe has not said
*directly* the Declaration itself is legal and binding. I think the
Professor is saying the ideas of the Declaration are built into the
fundamental laws of the US, not that the Declaration itself is a legal
and binding document.

"The United States Code Annotated includes the Declaration of Independence under the heading 'The Organic Laws
of the United States of America' along with the Articles of Confederation, the Constitution, and the Northwest
Ordinance. Enabling acts frequently require states to adhere to the principles of the Declaration; in the
Enabling Act of June 16, 1906, Congress authorized Oklahoma Territory to take steps to become a state. Section
3 provides that the Oklahoma Constitution 'shall not be repugnant to the Constitution of the United States and
the principles of the Declaration of Independence.'" (Christianity and the Constitution, pp. 360-361)


And at the end of this paragraph, the Oklahoma Constitution says "the
*principles* of the Declaration of Independence", not the Declaration
itself.

A search finds lots of links discussing the issue. I think to find the
correct answer, the place to start are the Supreme Court case(s) where
this question has been part of the cases presented and see what the
Court ruled.

But I, for one, do not have the time at the moment to ferret that info out.



--
Ken
Mac OS X 10.8.5
Firefox 36.0.4
Thunderbird 31.5
"My brain is like lightning, a quick flash
and it's gone!"
 




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