Subject: RE: bug#12621: Emacs 24.1 crashing on Windows 7

From: "Drew Adams" <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 15 Dec 2012 12:41:19 -0800

> > I don't think a piece of proprietary software, with known 
> > spyware, DRM and back doors, deserves respect.
> 
> Well, actually, it does, for several technical achievements that I can
> only dream of when I work on modern GNU/Linux systems.  But I won't
> say a word more about that, because this is off-topic here.

Off-topic technically, perhaps, but not off-topic wrt the OP's feelings and
intention indicated in the bug report.

Aside from the question of whether MS deserves respect or whether MS Windows
deserves some respect as software, there is the neglected point that the OP made
in characterizing the anti-"win" campaign as "puerile".

I think that raises a reasonable question, and one that perhaps is not
completely independent of asking how effective such a campaign is or can be.

I would agree with the OP that it smacks of childishness, even if that is not
the intent.  It also seems a bit old-hat/been-there-done-that at this point.

It reminds me of those who still like to call users "lusers" or "losers".  Kind
of an infantile joke, and an old one.  A joke you might have laughed at the
first time you heard it back in 1968, but one you no longer find very funny.
Quite the opposite - users deserve respect, even, or especially, when they are
ignorant.

Of course, poking fun at things that are evil or regressive can sometimes be
effective and progressive, even sometimes when the poking fun is infantile.

But it's a good question for GNU to (re)consider perhaps at this point: what's
the point/effect of the anti-"win" campaign now?