Microsoft has lost its appeal against a record 497m
euro (£343m; $690m) fine imposed by the European Commission in a
long-running competition dispute.

The European Court of First Instance upheld the ruling that Microsoft had abused its dominant market position.

A probe concluded in 2004 that Microsoft was guilty of
freezing out rivals in server software and products such as media
players.

Microsoft has two months to appeal at the European Court of Justice.

“The Court of First Instance essentially upholds the
Commission’s decision finding that Microsoft abused its dominant
position,” the court’s statement said.

Microsoft’s top lawyer said it was important now for the
company to comply with EU competition law, but that it had not yet
decided on its next legal steps.

Now that M$ was dealt another blow to their monopoly tacktics I wonder what they will come up with? Will they start playing fair or will they find another loop hole in the legal system to continue with their ways?! Time will tell.

In the mean time, I found this last night (or was it this morning? )

It’s called Wubi and it will permit you to install Ubunutu on Windows (I really can’t find a valid reason other than) to test out it’s funcionality.
Please try it out and let me know if works or not (I can’t test it since I don’t have Windows :p )

Powered by ScribeFire.

The long-running dispute between Microsoft and the European Union will finally be decided on Monday.Many might say that Microsoft has been targeted only because Bill Gates is extremely rich. I not 100% behind this idea, I say that M$ is a monopoly (not the board game!)

But on the other hand I saw this!

“Microsoft Corp. has started updating files on computers running Windows XP and Vista, even when users have explicitly disabled the operating systems’ automatic update feature, researchers said today. Scott Dunn, an editor at the “Windows Secrets” newsletter, said that nine files in XP and Vista — but not the same files in each operating system — have been changed by Windows Update, the Microsoft update mechanism, without displaying the usual notification or permission dialog box. The files, said Dunn, are related to the XP and Vista versions of Window”

Read the full story here and the follow up story here.

From now on I declare that my home is 100%

To make up for it I have other options for you

Try Ubuntu on the web (no need to install)

And if you don’t want to do the big move, you can still use free software in M$-Windows. Completely free*!!

* Free as in Free gifts/stuff and free from the shackles of the M$ License

So what are you waiting for? the big companies have started to provide free SW on their systems

Dell

Lenovo, it’s poll

And I’m sure that many will follow suite

You might think that I’m talking about work, nope! that’s not it. It has it’s own stress mind you but it’s becoming a routine lately (when I finish my BPI then it will be a different story )

Does it involve my private life; YES! sort of…

I suddenly decided to revisit an old blog I used to read a while back and what do I see???

Now back to my complaint…

WHY WHY WHY WHY?!!?! Why are opensource communities so active? I mean it’s not only Sun, but others as well. Why do they release Great (with a CAPITAL G) products and distributions? Why don’t I have enough time to install them where ever I what?

Like that’s not all, next month there will be the new version of Ubuntu 7.10 . What should I do? stay with a tested and trusted OS (Linux) where I have everything working fine OR install and try to migrate everything to a new OS (Unix) I know little about? not to mention the headaches and hassle to move the data and test if all is working as it should.

Probably not all of you know that I M$? I find it extremely hard to understand why I need to pay a BILLION $ company to use a product that at the end is not mine to do what ever I want, when on the other hand I have other choices that can *almost* do what I want and they are mine to keep? why do I need to carry and PAY a M$ license around just to prove that what I installed is legal? (In Italy there’s a special police force who does checks) and I had a few friends who got stopped on the road and stations, to a couple they had their PC and CD’s confiscated

I ask of you (if you have time and a spirit of adventure) to try one of them out! I’m sure that you’ll be able to find a specific distribution that suits your needs, think on the positive side (I know this is getting monotonous)

• No more viruses
• No more spending on extra software
• Extremely limited risks of hackers (even with out a firewall)
• Etc…

Seriously try Ubuntu out if you’re looking for an easy OS, you can

• Download it
• Have it sent to you by mail for free (need to register)
• Buy it paying a nominal fee if you wish!

Trust me! you’ll be amazed

Or this

Click on the picture to go to the post of a blog I read “And Far Away”