(e-mail address removed) wrote:
Personally, I think that's a over-reaction. Win 9X/ME can be made
quite secure after some surgery. I use neither a firewall nor realtime
av scanning and I'm on line all day with DSL service. Never even
detect any spyware on my PC. Malware? What's that?
Most 9x/ME users are perplexed by this surgery, myself included. I
think we've all made mistakes before and botched a setup. Renaming
files is safe. If many files are renamed over a period of time and
something goes wrong on down the road a backup clone is the best
defense. It is difficult to appreciate the full implications of well
intentioned surgery due to the secrecy of a commercial product.
I think that you did good in renaming the other three files. They had
been modified (by a critical update) to 08/29/2002. The mshtml.dll
file was modified to 10/16/03.
Like Richard, I think that I need IE to get to a few important sites.
My internet banking site (which I love) doesn't seem to work with
anything except IE, as well as my student account. It's hard to
believe I'm trusting IE with banking, but the patched version seems to
be safe for now. Still, I'd really like to remove it. This is a
personal dilemma I'll be batting around for quite awhile I guess.
Freedom and security are two different, yet interlocked issues. I am
content with my purchase of 98SE, yet they have ended the work on
fixing security holes. In a short time they will remove 98 from the
site entirely and push for XP or whatever comes next in the "MS
lifecycle."
I'm not entirely pleased with the security issues and how they were
handled in the past and I surely am not pleased in the direction MS
intends to herd us in the future. When I buy hardware and an operating
system I intend to be in charge, not MS or anyone else. This is not
the vision Gates has unfortunately. Linux does provide what I seek and
is free to boot (no pun intended). Linux is not a large target for
malware authors. It is a worldwide group project and as Richard
pointed out fixes come quickly when required, rather than months later
or not at all.
Gates has made some good products, but the arrogance, the need to
completely conquer and control the digital world is alarming. I'm
wondering the fate of freeware; what if I don't have permission to run
freewares? This is a ludicrous thought indeed.
The ability to conquer and control the digital world depends entirely
on our willingness to "buy" into the notion. Count me out. One
decision makes little difference though. It is the collective decision
that will ultimately reign. Sales is the only factor that will affect
anything.
For a multi-billion dollar corporation more concerned with piracy in
third world countries and turning a new product into the "life cycle"
on time than in the ultimate security of the product I balk. I value
my anonymitity in my travels, while this corporation seemingly seeks
to destroy it. This corporation places large bounties on malware
authors, rather than working to make a solid product.
All of these factors are related to freedom and security and all point
away from the Microsoft Corporation. Linux is indeed extremely
attractive. If and when the business world awakens to realize the
savings and security that can be had with non-MS products Rome will
burn. I'm surprised in the years of downsizing and reduced budgets
this hasn't already happened.
We each must decide our own course of action, which is applied to the
collective course of action. If things go bad we might lose the
ability to purchase hardware that will run anything aside of MS.
